So much for TSA security

We had a weekend visit from my wife’s aunt and uncle who flew from Los Angeles to Atlanta. It was a nice visit, but I was surprised at my wife’s uncle’s request when they were about to leave and what it really meant.

My wife’s uncle is a world class heart surgeon living in Pacific Palisades overlooking the ocean. The house is so nice, that we’ve never managed to see all of it when we visit.

You’ve probably seen him on the Grey’s Anatomy TV show. It won’t help for me to describe him as you’ve only seen his hands. If you watch the show and they have an actor operating on someone’s heart, it’s actually my wife’s uncles hands performing the “operation” on a pigs heart, with a blood pump under the table to make it look real.

Anyway, I digress. My wife’s uncle asked me to use my computer to print boarding passes so they could go straight through TSA and avoid the checking-in process. They like to do things at the last minute, so I helped him print them.

It occurred to me that if TSA was really concerned about terrorism they would not allow remote check-in. Why? Because a ticketing agent can easily see anomalies in the ticketing process. They can see if the ticket is one-way, paid for in cash or suspicious for any number of reasons.

TSA can’t see any of it. Yes, I’m sure that they spy of the traveling public using computers by “seeing” that information but I doubt that they are anywhere near as effective. But you can’t beat a check-in agent for flagging a traveler for additional inspection. They just rely on multiple tickets and ID checks before boarding. None of them can catch something strange about the ticket.

Even the TSA sniffer dogs can be easily distracted and even scared if you know the dog’s weakness. They do as does TSA, but it wants to keep it a secret. It isn’t. Any dog trainer can tell you what it is.

I think that Israel has a far less expensive system; they rely on human interaction. Our “security” relies on machines, as they are good for scanner companies profits, and to a minor extent TSA roaming agents. I don’t think that the agents have ever caught anyone.

It’s common knowledge that a maniac bent of self destruction would only have to blow himself up in the terminal particularly at the choke-point, the scanners. He would kill lots of people, destroy the scanners and cause the traveling public to stop traveling. That would cripple our airline industry. They don’t have to actually get on a plane to do the damage. That’s the illusion.

In San Diego, this was discussed by security employees at the airport many years ago. They thought that moving the primary check-in off-site and then busing the passenger to the terminal afterwards would solve it. That’s when one bright spark suggested that the human bomb would detonate at the remote site instead.

So while you may think that TSA is “keeping you safe,” I don’t think that it’s true. They just create that illusion, and need to keep the public scared so they can constantly petition for a bigger budget and more power. It’s more smoke and mirrors from our government, and hugely expensive as well.