Security?

That's me talking to Nicki.  I do look like a terrorist, I guess.

A couple of weeks ago, my kids all came to town to visit me here in Northern Virginia and we decided to go visit the National Aquarium in Washington, D.C.  I won’t go into what a letdown the aquarium was, because I’d like to talk about how hard it was to get through the security at the door.  The aquarium is located in the basement of the Department of Commerce Building (which should have been a clue that it might not be all that awesome), and because that is a federal building, there is a security checkpoint at the door.  I understand why this is, and I support having at least some level of security of government buildings.  I don't really expect much out of people.  I'm a life-long cynic and a dedicated pessimist.  I still managed to be surprised by the lack of professionalism and competence on display at that doorway, though.  I was turned away by a somewhat rude security guard who looked a bit like Nicki Minaj, because I had a small knife in my pocket.  Not a samurai sword, mind you, but a pocket knife with a blade of about two inches.  

This is the fearsome weapon.

Nicki Minaj, Security Guard at the Department of Commerce.

But Nicki didn’t let a little thing like common sense bother her.  She had a position of power, and she was going to exercise it.  When I asked her why I couldn’t have a small pocket knife, she cracked her gum, and with one hand on her hip said “‘ummm… it’s too big.”  So then I asked what the size regulations were, and I got the infamous eye-roll of the put-upon African-American woman and no answer.

So, I decided that rather than winding up in the paper, it was better to just leave and put my fearsome edged weapon back in my car, which was in the parking garage of the Reagan Building, just across the street.  The Reagan Building is also a federal building with security at the door.  However, I breezed through this time even though I still had the pocket knife.  I asked this security guard about the pocket knife specifically, and he just shrugged and said it was fine.  So I hurried to the garage, put the knife in the car, and went back across the street to look at the albino alligator with my family.  I found the whole experience bewildering, and also infuriating.  What is the danger of citizens carrying pocket knives in a federal building?  You can’t hijack a building, last I checked.

Why on earth have we lost our minds when it comes to security?   The events of September 11, 2001 were horrific, to be sure, and we should never allow such a thing to occur again.  That being said, we can’t prevent another terrorist attack by searching for the tools of the last one.  This is called “closing the barn door after the horse has bolted,” as the idiom goes.  The airport is the easiest place to see this, of course.  Terrorists will observe the security apparatus, locate the gap in coverage, and then exploit the gap.  They will seldom repeat an exact same tactic, especially one that depends on surprise.  After the events of 9/11, they couldn’t hijack a plane with a bazooka and a heavy machinegun.  Every passenger on the plane would rise up and beat them down.  Little old ladies would be bashing them with their walkers.  There isn’t a knife in the world big enough to take over a jet filled with people anymore, not even that giant sword Mel Gibson had in Braveheart.  You just can’t get people to sit down and shut up if they think you’re going to fly the plane into a building.  The days of the passengers passively complying with hijackers are behind us now, and I’m sure that the terrorists understand that.  It’s the TSA that hasn’t quite realized it.  It’s time to realistically and pragmatically examine the threat, rather than just a knee-jerk response to past attempts.

Feel Safer Yet?

The thing that makes it so retarded is that it is futile.  You just can’t stop people from sneaking things onto planes.  Even if every single passenger was stripped naked and cavity-searched, they would find a way.  From out-smarting the scanners to bribing the TSA agents, there is always a way.  Take a long, careful look at those TSA agents the next time you go through the airport.  I’m sure that will fill you with a sense of security.  No, the only guaranteed thing the technique of trying to find every conceivable weapon accomplishes is to make the battle for the plane now occur between an armed terrorist and completely unarmed passengers.  Hardly an improvement. 

Richard Reid, Certified Dipshit

The real thing we should be worried about here is explosives.  Hijacking is pretty much a thing of the past, for the reasons I put forth above.  But some nutball can absolutely make the plane crash and kill all aboard with just a small amount of explosives, and there is no shortage of nutballs willing to blow themselves up to make a point.  Finding hidden explosives is a difficult thing to do also, but it is a whole lot easier and less obtrusive than taking naked x-ray pictures of grandma.  The danger posed by explosives is the reason for the weird rules about how much shampoo or toothpaste you can have in your carry-on, and for why you can’t have gel shoe inserts (remember the Shoe Bomber?).  These rules also seem kind of arbitrary, but they are actually based on a scientific reason, namely the amount of explosives required to puncture the skin of the aircraft, which makes them much easier to tolerate.   I find it funny that Richard Reid’s crazy ass was actually foiled by the unarmed passengers and flight attendants around him, and he was physically subdued despite being six feet four inches tall and weighing more than 200 pounds.  It’s a good thing he didn’t have a nail file on him.  What we really needed up there was a cop.  If you think about it, why aren't we spending our money on air marshalls?  Because we'd rather take a picture of your uncle's junk, I suppose.  
The really big question is how much more are we willing to put up with?