They’ve been accused of rampant thievery, spending billions of dollars like drunken sailors, groping children and little old ladies, and making everyone take off their shoes. But the real job of the tens of thousands of screeners at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is to protect Americans from a terrorist attack.
Yet a decade after the TSA was created following the September 11 attacks, the author of the legislation that established the massive agency grades its performance at “D-. The whole program has been hijacked by bureaucrats,” said Rep. John Mica (R.-Fla.), chairman of the House Transportation Committee.
“It mushroomed into an army,” Mica said. “It’s gone from a couple-billion-dollar enterprise to close to $9 billion.”
As for keeping the American public safe, Mica says, “They’ve failed to actually detect any threat in 10 years.”
“Everything they have done has been reactive. They take shoes off because of [shoe-bomber] Richard Reid, passengers are patted down because of the diaper bomber, and you can’t pack liquids because the British uncovered a plot using liquids,” Mica said.
“It’s an agency that is always one step out of step,” Mica said.
it’s always risky to believe in a god
GregAllen:
IMO, only incrementally, and we’re already past the point of diminishing returns. Picking up on your concern, how hard is it to coordinate the firing of 12 gauge slugs into several transformers at key locations on the grid? With some simple research, the east coast blackout of 2002(?) could be replicated. Four people could probably black out the entire country for a week or longer.
Regardless, a point that was shot down by the Cheney-bots after 9/11 is that the USA can absorb some attacks without bringing down the entire house or turning the place into a massive green zone. Of course we pay attention and work to prevent attacks, but the idea that we can catch a smart and dedicated terrorist, or all of them as Cheney aspired, is asinine.
It’s time to quit with the shoes, and the liquids, and the damned pat-downs.
#12 – Now there is a plan I can get behind! Nuke them twice to be sure.
Like the Poster ! I’ve always called the TSA the “Tittie Squeezing Agency” !!! But they soon added GONAD GROPING to their LIST OF PERVISIONS !!! I don’t travel much any more !!!
Well, of course the TSA should be dismantled. Airlines should be in charge of the security of their plains. Potential passengers should be free to decide, based on a particular airline’s record, whether they wish to use them, or a rival carrier with a different combination of hassle/safety.
But, this being the United States of America, we have to have the government telling everyone what to do.
f’n commies!
Do they still allow smoking on airliners? And if not, do they take your cigs and lighters? Because one could construct a bomb from several of those, strapped together. Yet I’ll bet that until someone tries that, it’s not something they’ll “think of”? And not deprive passengers of the after-flight nicotine fix.
BTW, it’s rather interesting, ANC-Tv’s new fall series “Pan Am”, is set in the 1960s. They had to go that far back, before any real trouble began, like hijackings. To find an era of air travel to show the public. To make they forget all the crap they’ll have to put up with, if they go on a flight, today. Once again (and again) the entertainment industry coming to the rescue of a brother industry. There are probably some Tv executives on the boards of the air carriers too. And all this TSA stuff is what they hope to erase from the public’s mind, by creating a feel good drama, set decades before it all came about. That should get some of the gullible public, back to flying. Propaganda Tv. Don’t ya love it.
>> What?
>>Greg Allen, you gotta stop smoking the weed.
>> You’re telling us that someone who is willing to blow up a plane, and kill himself, will be deterred by a )@$! with a TSA badge? Are you kidding me?
Deterred in the sense that terrorists could get detained before taking a plane down.
That’s worth something!
I guess I think it is an overreaction to call of the end of the TSA. A reasonable amount of security seems helpful.