Transportation Security Agency Gone Haywire

by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700

Copyright January 23, 2012

All Rights Reserved.                                         

   Molded in the blackened aftermath of Sept. 11, the Transportation Security Administration, a division of Homeland Security, was signed into law by former President George W. Bush Nov. 19, 2001.  After egregious airport security breaches, Bush and the 107th Congress led by Rep. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) viewed a new federal transportation security agency essential to prevent another terrorist attack.  Among other things, Sept. 11 shocked traditional law enforcement and intelligence agencies to the core, unable to prevent the worst foreign attack on American soil in U.S. history.  Hiring 60,000 federal workers, standardizing their training and implementing one-size-fits-all airport security was the highest priority.  Commissioned with applying stringent security requirements to all air-travelers, the TSA makes few exceptions while performing standardized security checks.

             Passing through TSA in Nashville, TN Jan. 22, 49-year-old U.S. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kt.) refused a pat-down after his “knee” apparently triggered metal detectors.  “Just got a call from @SenRandPaul,” Paul spokeswoman Moira Bagley posted on Twitter, admitting, “He’s currently detained by TSA in Nashville.”  While TSA officials would like to backpedal, unforgivable abuses take place daily since Day One when TSA opened its doors Jan.1, 2002. TSA detention of a U.S. senator shows the extent to which the agency is out-of-control, not preventing a future Sept. 11 but harassing ordinary citizens who fall so far outside the parameters of national security, fully exposing TSA’s charade.  Detaining Paul or countless grandmas, grandpas, grandkids or other responsible citizens turns the idea of effective transportation security on its head, serving no one other than the federal bureaucracy.

             TSA’s one-size-fits-all approach to airline security does little to identify possible terrorists plotting the next Sept. 11 or something less.  Patting-down U.S. senators or properly credentialed U.S. citizens does nothing to prevent terrorist attacks.  Security experts all agree that only profiling passengers that meet certain criteria, specific demographic characteristics, including race, ethnic group, age, etc., can pinpoint those likely to commit terrorist acts.  Paul’s case shows the agency operates without any real security pardigm, simply performing he most primitive algorithms that can’t and won’t prevent future terrorism.  Demanding a pat-down and refusing to re-scan Paul, TSA showed its ready for a Congressional review and overhaul.  Paul “said he was detained in a small cubicle and couldn’t make his flight to Washington for a Senate vote scheduled later in the day.”

             With TSA in every airport in the country, countless security abuses have been reported, including genital pat-downs of children and seniors.  “Passengers who refuse of complete the screening process cannot be granted access to the secure area in order to ensure the safety of others traveling,” read a TSA statements, realizing the blunder.  TSA officials know that Paul presents no risk to anyone other than to a monolithic authority that gives mega-doses of harassment but provides no real transportation security.  Preventing travelers from flying with toothpaste or mouthwash does nothing to prevent potential terrorism.  Today’s behemoth TSA bureaucracy costs U.S. taxpayers $8.1 billion a year, delivering none of the promised benefits, only an inept one-size-fits-all approach.  Detaining Paul proved that TSA needs a major overhaul to protect ordinary citizens.

             Strip-searches, secondary inspections, genital pat-downs of credentialed citizens, whether aged or not, does nothing to intercept stealth terrorists currently slipping through the security cracks.  If properly vetted U.S. citizens receive the same treatment as young Middle Eastern men, then TSA’s system is broken.  Paul told reporters “that he had no idea why his knee raised concerns with TSA,” denying any past surgeries or implants which could have set off metal detectors.  While Paul was allowed to board the next flight to D.C., his father, 77-year-old GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul (R-Texas), blasted the TSA.  “You’ve gone overboard and you’re missing the boat on terrorism because you’re doing these invasive searches on six-year-old girls,” Sen. Paul said at a Senate hearing last summer.  Both Rand and Ron Paul are vocal critics of TSA’s failed security system.

            Anyone that travels knows the excesses and deficiencies of the TSA.  Sens. Rand and Ron Paul’s outspoken criticism of the TSA resulted in some payback in Nashville, putting a U.S. senator in solitary confinement.  With so many abuses piling up over the last 10 years, it’s time for President Barack Obama to summons Homeland Security Director Janet Napolitano and TSA Director John S. Pistole to the White House.  Barack needs to read them the riot act and insist on an overhaul of current policies and procedures.  “I think you outghta get rid of the random pat-downs.  The American public is unhappy with them.  They’re unhappy with the invasiveness of them,” said Sen. Ron Paul.  Paul knows that there’s much more wrong with TSA than intrusive security procedures.  Napolitano and Pistole need to figure out a more efficient way of targeting potential terrorists.

John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news.  He's editor of OnlineColumnist.com.and author of Dodging the Bullet and Operation Charisma.

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