Airline politics?

[Theodore Martin]

Forcing the 95 yr. old lady to remove her Depends was utterly ridiculous. There needs to be some common sense mixed into the equation.

[Rey Ramon]

The guy at EWR said that the metal detector randomly picked my daughter. I guess may be there is a randomizer that randomly dings some one to get searched. any one know about this?

[Greg Gemelli]

To grop or not to grop.....

I hear endless stories as I fly back and forth across the country about this issue. I'm not a fan of the TSA process. The problem as I see it in regard to airport screening is that we still lack proactive solutions and are left with a very reactive program. If safety is truly the goal and I know it is then we need to look at an entirely new system of screening. I think the best option is to follow the Israeli model but it's not without it's drawbacks. The primary is cost both in implementation and operational after it is put in place.

I have gone through airport security all over the world. Asia, Europe, South America, Africa and nowhere have I dealt with the level of inefficiency I have found in the US. By efficient I am not referring to the "speed" of the process. The goal is to weed out the "bad folks" while minimizing the inconvenience on the rest (99.999%) of the traveling population. Looking for a needle in a haystack requires specialized training in this case and the ability to profile. Seriously how the heck else are you going to do it? But as soon as you say this you're gonna get an earful about civil rights. However I'm not advocating profiling by race or culture. I'm advocating psychological profiling by people trained to detect stress or behavior abnormalities.

OK before I go on I want to say that I have respect for the TSA employees and understand that they are tasked with a tough job. With that being said..

A system that randomly selects a 95yr old for an enhanced patdown is the result of a system (the TSA) that is largely staffed by people with a basic skill set in regard to security. Seriously if no one is able to say "let this one (the 95 yr old) go" then it's painfully obvious that the TSA screeners aren't even trusted enough by the TSA to make a judgement call. So the process we are subjected to is very regimented, automated and often time consuming. I don't mind the time part but like anyone I want value for my time spent. Like anyone I want value for my tax dollar spent. The TSA is not entirely broken and compared to what we has pre-911 it's a substantial improvement but it needs to evolve. The evolution will cost travelers a lot of money. When airports have higher operational costs they pass it on to airlines who pass it on to passengers. This will cause the airline lobby to fight this to the bitter end because higher ticket prices means less passengers; less profit. The money either would have to come from taxes or ticket prices but it could be used to create a TSA with highly trained/skilled screeners. But gone are the days of cheap employees for the TSA. People with specialized security training and advanced degrees demand money.

Anyway thats my take..

[Norberto Rivera]

Groping is already illegal in every state. It's called sexual assault in most of them. I don't think legislation is going to solve anything because federal law has always superseded state law. Maybe instead all the governors and state legislators should make it a point to harass the heck out of the TSA director until they get it straight... but then again that might require them to do some work.

[Michael Blakely]

So will it get more or less restrictive now that some guy got on a plane with no ID and an expired boarding pass?

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2 ... tizen.html