The TSA Is Bad Because We Demand That It Be Bad
The article doesn&#x27;t mention that Israeli screeners are highly trained. There&#x27;s a term of art in law enforcement, &quot;hinky&quot;, which denotes the red flag that LEO&#x27;s develop with experience. To fly in Israel, one stops in a bombproof room and is merely questioned by professionals, who will pull you aside if you are hinky.<p>The underwear bomber&#x27;s father was worried that he was violent and crazy. He CONTACTED THE US STATE DEPT about his son, out of concern. His son the bomber traveled internationally to the US, without any suitcases. He was as hinky as you could hope to find.<p>Our relatively untrained TSA is nearly useless; at best it is security theater. I would be heavily against the underwear bomber sneaking by professionals successfully.<p>Also, I don&#x27;t see how airplanes are not such a rich target any more. Killing a lot of people without access to the cockpit is challenging (they are sealed in the US now). A McDonald&#x27;s employee could fare much better with a slow poison I suppose.<p>Credit where due: a great deal of this post is gleaned from Bruce Schneier writings.