TSA Goons Miss 75% of ‘Bombs’ But Take Your Toothpaste Anyway
Most fake bombs missed by screeners
America’s boldest government effort to employ the retarded ‚Äö√Ñ√Æ the Transportation Security Administration ‚Äö√Ñ√Æ just announced its security guards are now unable to notice a record 75% of the fake bombs brought through Los Angeles International Airport’s x-ray machines. The numbers are almost as miserable in Chicago, where 60% of the fake bombs went unnoticed by TSA losers at O’Hare. But TSA chief Kip Hawley proudly noted that the airport screeners took 96% of passengers’ toothpaste, 88% of their dry stick deodorant and an impressive 79% of $3 bottles of water purchased after going through security.
Man, if this doesn’t make you want to take Amtrak or Greyhound when you go to Grandma’s house this Christmas, I don’t know what will. Yes, America, that rampant incompetence and ineptitude is your Transportation Security Administration hard at work confiscating your deodorant, toothpaste, and bottled water while actual (or fake) terrorists sneak real (or fake) bombs onto airplanes. Yep, you can bet that the next time someone blows up an airplane, at least the TSA goons at the security checkpoint will be able to quench their thirst while maintaining exemplary dental hygience before they have to face the music.
Is it really going to have to take another terrorist attack on an airplane (or airplanes) before TSA and the Department of Homeland (In)Security manage to remove their anteriors from their posteriors? While they’re busily reacting to threats ex post facto, there seems to be little emphasis given to preventing what might actually come in the future. Then again, it’s SO much easier shaking down little old ladies, the handicapped, and pregnant women. Sure, they might not be actually accomplishing anything in terms of enhancing security, but it makes us FEEL safer, right? And isn’t that what’s truly important??
Whatever….
WASHINGTON ‚Äö√Ñ√Æ Security screeners at two of the nation’s busiest airports failed to find fake bombs hidden on undercover agents posing as passengers in more than 60% of tests last year, according to a classified report obtained by USA TODAY.
Screeners at Los Angeles International Airport missed about 75% of simulated explosives and bomb parts that Transportation Security Administration testers hid under their clothes or in carry-on bags at checkpoints, the TSA report shows.
At Chicago O’Hare International Airport, screeners missed about 60% of hidden bomb materials that were packed in everyday carry-ons ‚Äö√Ñ√Æ including toiletry kits, briefcases and CD players. San Francisco International Airport screeners, who work for a private company instead of the TSA, missed about 20% of the bombs, the report shows. The TSA ran about 70 tests at Los Angeles, 75 at Chicago and 145 at San Francisco.
The report looks only at those three airports, using them as case studies to understand how well the rest of the U.S. screening system is working to stop terrorists from carrying bombs through checkpoints.
Granted, we’re only talking about three airports, but the odds that the study picked the three most ineptly-secured airports and that all others are fine are nothing if not long. Frankly, this is nothing if not an indictment of the entire airline security apparatus, which seems to be designed more for providing the FEELING of security than in actually keeping airplanes from going “BOOM”.
Anyone who’s flown since 9.11, and by now that’s probably most of us, knows what an insulting, inept, and ridculously Kafkaesque process getting on to an airplane is these days…and it’s only going to get worse. No one can or will tell you why things are done the way they are, but apparently it’s what must be done to PROTECT OUR WAY OF LIFE.
Yes, I understand that terrorism can come from anywhere at any time and any place. Any lucid person knows that there’s simply no way to protect the Homeland from every conceivable threat at all times. An efficient and intelligent approach would seem to dictate addressing what intelligence and experience indicate are the most likely threats. Wanding little old ladies and confiscating $3.00 bottles of water simply make no sense. Then again, this is the government we’re talking about here, whose real jobs seems to be keeping us all scared so that they can keep glomming onto our toothpaste, bottled water, and deodorant.
Your tax dollars at work, eh? Or not….
