"Hi! Remember all that stuff we started doing when I was in charge? You should stop doing it now because it's all rubbish."
Also worth reading: Bruce Schneier's response to the article.
In heaven, I get back all the expensive moisturizer they've thrown in the trash, right?
But in hell, you have to be one of the TSA workers.
Pretty much the only occasions I entertain libertarian thoughts (for others, I mean; of course I believe that I should consistently enjoy all conceivable liberties) are when standing in airport (or train station or bus (!!!) station) security lines. A meek herd is nothing for the citizens of a free country to play whenever they want to go somewhere.
In America, any successful attack--no matter how small--is likely to lead to a series of public recriminations and witch hunts. But security is a series of trade-offs.Therefore, since America lives in a state of permanent election campaign, you're basically wasting your breath, because the one thing that will never be on the table is for a politician to associate themselves willingly with an unquantifiable risk.
ISTM that all you need is a highly vocal movement with a major emphasis on liberty and a skepticism about big government. Security theater is a natural focus area for them, they could get behind this program, and Bob's your uncle.
h/t Rotten
Until I moused over it and saw the link, I thought, "Wow, rotten.com sure has changed its focus since I was last there."
If bob's my uncle, does that mean read is my aunt?
8: same here. That really didn't seem like his style.
I mean, not to say he doesn't have wide-ranging interests.
the one thing that will never be on the table is for a politician to associate themselves willingly with an unquantifiable risk.
If only we had a media capable of asking probing questions that would force politicians to take a stand on this.
6: Well, it's possible to imagine slight rollbacks in TSA's power and the security state's intrusiveness in general if there's a big, ugly fuckup shortly before or after an election. Admittedly, though, that's damning with faint praise.
A friend of mine is a TSA screener, although I think for some reason she may be a contractor rather than a federal employee. She's generally pretty liberal and left-wing, but we don't talk about her job much.
I tend to mistrust Libertarian anti-TSA screeds. At times they seem to be less about reassessing security priorities and more about ginning up a pretext to privatize and de-unionize airline screening.
||
Not strictly related, but tangentially so:
I thoroughly approve of Obama going after Romney on the Osama thing. But I'm kind of skeeved out that he's giving a speech from Afghanistan tonight.
Obviously, if there's a substantive point to the speech - he's declaring victory and going home! - then I'll change my position, but for now, it smacks of Mission Accomplished.
|>
I very much agree with 14, but I feel as if the liberal position on the TSA is clear and well-considered, so I don't expect to get rolled by more-prepared libertarians.
Setting aside the uselessness of actual elected Dems, most of whom probably do NOT have clear and well-considered positions.
Grumble.
I'm never so disappointed in a newspaper's commentariat as when I visit the Wall Street Journal online.
WSJ.com is a successful extension to the printed newspaper, and its news pages generally contains topical coverage (ignoring for the moment the editorial and op-ed pages.)
Yet the people who comment on its stories are the basest collection of cranks, guttersnipes, and imbeciles that one couldn't pay to go away.
Speaking of federal agencies, I just submitted an NEH Fellowship application! Hooray!
16.last: more or less what he said, yes. Which is good. As a friend of mine put it on his Facebook feed this time last year, "ok, he's dead. NOW can I go home?"
18: The only newspaper comments section that makes the paper look better is the Daily Mail's. And frankly it couldn't look any worse.