TSA under fire

by Charlie Leocha on September 3, 2010

Few federal agencies are coming under the withering fire that the TSA finds itself subjected to. Perhaps, they are simply incompetent as an organization, staffed by lots of smart and well-meaning people but hamstrung by their bureaucracy. Perhaps it is the total lack of control on the agency. Something is wrong.

When even the GAO publishes study after study about the faults of TSA and their haphazard procurement ways; when normally security minded blogs and newspapers question the need for continued increases in surveillance; when the House of Representatives has attempted to reign in this monstrosity; it keeps on ticking.

Unfortunately, TSA has become a symbol of everything the American public loves to hate. It is now the most pervasive arm of our government that most citizens see up close and personal. Even though it is not a law enforcement agency, it tries to look like one with flashy badges, police-style uniforms and patches according to the full-length documentary, Please Remove You Shoes. Even local police tend to ride around in cars and our only interface with them is with the bad luck of getting a ticket. But TSA agents are right there in our face every time we step foot in an airport.

I am going to amble through several of the pet peeves that have made the news over the last few weeks. TSA is the gang that can’t shoot straight. Wait! Please don’t give them weapons. Plenty of their sister organizations have weapons at the airports, if they haven’t lost them. (I know it’s a cheap shot, but can’t help myself.)

Nearly 180 Department of Homeland Security weapons were lost — some falling into the hands of criminals — after officers left them in restrooms, vehicles and other public places, according to an inspector general report.

The officers, with Customs and Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, “did not always sufficiently safeguard their firearms and, as a result, lost a significant number of firearms” between fiscal year 2006 and fiscal year 2008, the report said.

Back to TSA. Let’s take a look at the whole-body scanner fiasco. Almost nine months after the Christmas Day bomber and the rush to get whole-body scanners approved over objections of privacy groups, medical/radiation organizations and government’s own Government Accountability Office (GAO), TSA still only has a smattering of these high-tech, questionable scanners installed across the country. The outrage against these machines is growing exponentially, however, as the American public has a chance to see what the top security minds in the country have created.

Even TSA officers feel the machines are invasive
Where these whole-body scanners are installed privacy issues are still discussed on a daily basis. Even TSA personnel will not go inside these machines to be used as a test for journalists writing stories about the machines because of privacy concerns. “You understand,” they say to me as they go through their routine to make sure I have no idea which officer was in the machine while they ran the test they performed for me.

TSA now punishes passengers who do not go through the whole-body scanners
Reports surfaced earlier in the spring, which were denied by TSA. Now we find that there was indeed a clandestine testing of enhanced pat-downs going on. They lied, of course, in the name of security.

A new “European” pat-down
TSA has coined another euphemism, European pat-down. Sounds like some sort of beauty treatment a Swedish massage or Vichy shower. No. Not quite. This is the name that TSA has applied to a police-style or prison pat-dow using palm forward and roughly pushing the hand into body crevices. I’ve been through scores, of not hundreds of pat-downs in Europe and haven’t been treated like by any European inspector.

Grassroots effort to thwart whole-body scanners
On Flyertalk, a bulletin board of frequent fliers, several members have created a pamphlet and started an organized resistance to the scanners complete with a website urging fellow travelers to refuse to go through the new whole-body scanners. The effort is going viral and international with pamphlets showing up in the U.K., Australia, Japan and Italy.

What’s worse? Lost privacy or lost time? Businessmen say time and TSA fails again.
The before-they-were-installed outrage was focused on privacy violations. Now that some machines are in place, a new outrage is starting. What was already a slow process of going through the security systems at airports has become slower — a lot slower.

Opposition to new full-body imaging machines to screen passengers and the government’s deployment of them at most major airports is growing.

Many frequent fliers complain they’re time-consuming or invade their privacy. The world’s airlines say they shouldn’t be used for primary security screening. And questions are being raised about possible effects on passengers’ health.

“The system takes three to five times as long as walking through a metal detector,” says Phil Bush of Atlanta, one of many fliers on USA TODAY’s Road Warriors panel who oppose the machines. “This looks to be yet another disaster waiting to happen.”

Privacy issues can be rather esoteric, but losing time at the airport is something with which every passenger can identify. And they are irritated. Even the airlines that these machines are supposed to protect are hopping mad.

The International Air Transport Association, which represents 250 of the world’s airlines, including major U.S. carriers, says the TSA lacks “a strategy and a vision” of how the machines fit into a comprehensive checkpoint security plan. “The TSA is putting the cart before the horse,” association spokesman Steve Lott says.

The concerns with these machines is beginning to indicate a boondoggle of amazing proportions, just as the GAO warned. All because of poor planning and testing by the TSA. Though, they assured congressional committees that testing was ongoing, GAO inspections and now reality are showing that TSA has been truthful.

The tale of two Yemenis

Is this an example of good work by the TSA or more incompetence. First the suspects’ bags were allowed to fly on a separate flight from from them, then they were allowed on a transatlantic flight. Was this a clever TSA investigation to see if the suspects led to other conspirators or did the missing luggage get discovered after the two terrorist suspects were in the air on their way to Amsterdam? Were the watches and bottles construed to be bomb materials really just gift wrapped together for different friend and families in Yeman? Why didn’t our vaunted personnel screening process spot an expired visa.

After much hoopla and TSA crowing, the Dutch released the suspects and I expect that the passengers are filing a missing baggage report in Dubai.

“The investigations in the US and the Netherlands yielded no evidence of any involvement of the men with any unlawful act,” said a statement on the website of the Dutch prosecution service, which said the men had been freed without charge.

When will Congress, especially the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security propose control on this wayward agency. Admittedly, the TSA had no leader for months, but when an agency has squandered as many millions of dollars as TSA over the past few years, and when GAO has already blow the whistle on TSA spending and procedures in report after report, when will someone do something to stop this madness?

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Tagged as: advanced imaging devices, Transportation Security Administration, TSA, whole-body scanners

  • Hapgood

    I have reluctantly concluded that we cannot count on anyone in government to “do something to stop this madness.” The simple reason is arse-covering. Nobody, either in Congress or the Executive Branch, wants to be blamed for “weakening security” when the next terrorist attack inevitably occurs.

    So it’s in the interest of every member of Congress to keep giving the TSA carte blanche to operate in secret and accountable only to itself. Sure, they’ll keep requesting GAO reports and pontificating at hearings about the results. They know many of us are angry, so (like the TSA) they have to give the appearance of doing something. But when it’s appropriation time, they just write the check and tell the TSA to keep up the good work. That way nobody will be blamed for trying to “weaken security” by doing anything to impose the oversight and accountability the TSA urgently needs.

    And it’s in the interest of everyone at the TSA to keep piling on the intrusive, costly, and time-consuming reactive “enhancements.” For to do otherwise (and especially to remove anything) risks being blamed the next time something happens. Better to hassle every passenger than to leave even a speck of bureaucratic arse uncovered. Indeed, the TSA was created to cover the government’s arses after the failure of 9/11. (It’s best to ignore the fact that the basic approach to screening that failed on 9/11 has not changed at all. They’ve replaced the lowest-bidder mall cops with federal employees, and added a slew of reactive patches that cost us time, money, and privacy. But it’s otherwise the very same system that failed on 9/11, and will continue to fail regularly.)

    That, folks, is what makes the TSA completely impervious to criticism. It lets them ignore even the most damning GAO audits, and react to rebellion against strip search scanners with punitive “pat downs.” To use one of the TSA’s favorite catch phrases, “Do you want to fly today?” If the answer is yes, you’ll just have to submit to whims of the officer who gives you that wonderful European massage.

  • Michael

    I sent both of the Senators from my state and my Representative an email regarding the “enhanced pat-down” (I think “frisk” is a better term), and my concerns that I was searched for evidence of wrong-doing without any suspicion of malicious intent. One of the Senators responded with the following:
    “Thank you for contacting me regarding homeland security and the protection of civil liberties. I am glad to have the benefit of your views on this issue.

    Our homeland has not been attacked again since 9-11-01, but terrorists continue to plot against America and our allies. Recent technological developments have resulted in the introduction of new security measures such as whole body imaging. It is important that we continue programs which will help keep our country safe, by aiding law enforcement officials actively pursuing those who would threaten our nation and our way of life. However, it is equally vital that we protect the civil liberties of law abiding Americans.

    Be assured I will keep your views in mind as Congress considers legislation related to homeland security or civil liberties. Please do not hesitate to contact me if I can ever assist you.”

    His response did not leave me feeling like anything would be changing in the near future. I have always prided myself on trying not to be a sheep in life, but I guess I will have to be if I want to fly anywhere.

  • Karen C.

    Concerning the arrested passengers who had taped cell phones to things like Pepto Bismol, my first impression was they might have done that to prevent them from getting stolen rather than having a “dry run” for a planned attack.

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  • http://www.nudeoscope.com/ RB

    TSA and its employees have sold out the ideals of a free America.
    TSA causes great harm to a free society and trample the Constitution.

  • Anonymous1989

    It had been a long summer with lots of sunburn, so I wanted to avoid radiation from the scanner, I told the TSA screener I will call Matt

    Twenty-something, a few years older than me, I imagined him working this job for the health benefits or to support his young family. He seemed kinda nervous, it must be his first day on the job.

    He guided me through security telling colleagues “this one’s an opt out — do you want your patdown in private?” In a rush and thinking it was like the old 30-second patdowns I told him it’s OK to do it here. “Do you have any injuries?” he asked. I was made to take off my belt and run my wallet, pen, and tissue through the X-ray scanner.

    He stood behind me and placed his arms around my neck, surprising me with how strong and firm his grip was — it felt like someone choking me from behind. He squeezed the area around my collar, his neoprene blue gloved hands tickling my ears. And he kneaded around my shoulders, pressing with his fingertips into my muscle, as if he were tenderizing a piece of meat. With my arms held out straight he grasped both his hands around each one and pulled all the way down to my wrist.

    With the palms of his hands he stroked down my back to my belt, rounding the curve of my rump, with the tips of his fingers slicing into the cleft of my cheeks, pulling them apart with a gentle tug. He continued down the back of my thighs, his fingertips like a paintbrush running down my legs.

    “That kinda tickles,” I said laughing nervously. By now a crowd of people was standing around us watching him run his fingers over every inch of my body. A lady pointed at me and said “what did he do?” to her friend.

    When he was done with my backside he moved to the front, again painting stripes down my chest with his palms and fingertips, running down from my shoulder, to the curve of my pecs, down my abs to my waist line. Moving methodically from left to right, never missing an inch.

    In high school and college track my co-athletes and I would pinch a bicep in jest, squeeze a shoulder blade, snap a wet towel against bare skin, but I had never been touched by a man like this before. This felt like my girlfriend, on our third or fourth date running her hands over my chest, my arm around her in a darkened movie theatre.

    Now Matt was kneeling down in front of my crotch, lifting up my T-shirt, studying my belt loops, carefully feeling each one. A crowd of 20-30 people was now watching us, and in that sliver between my shirt and pants they could see the tufts of hair that cascade down my belly, the treasure trail as my ex-girlfriend called it.

    While I don’t think of myself as gay — I’ve heard we all have a bit of that inside of us — I couldn’t help but having a reaction to all this, blushing. “Some people pay a lot of money for this,” I joked as now a growing crowd was staring at me and Matt wondering why we were holding up the security line.

    Matt had me lift up my feet, patted down my soles, and felt the space between each toe. Still kneeling, his face less than a foot from my crotch he advised me he would pass the back of his hands over my crotch, under my testicles, and in the fold between my legs. I felt him cup my testicles and run his fingers from my anus down the back of my balls. By now I was turning red.

    Wait here he said while a colleague handed him a wand with a piece of fabric. He rubbed his gloves all over the cloth which went into some kind of sensor. “For explosives,” he said. I was free to go. I wondered what government official in what dark alley dreamed up this groping to protect the public?

  • Carrie Charney

    We should all have our pat-downs in public, so that everyone can see how we are sexually assaulted if we refuse to be radiated. What’s the difference between this and prison?

  • MarkieA

    @Anonymous1989

    You should have sighed heavily with a satisfied smile on your face, taken a few seconds to “collect” yourself, and thrown him a couple of bucks. Sounds like he earned it. You probably would have been detained, though, for …well, they’d think of something.

  • Hapgood

    So Anonymous1989, the question here is whether the “aversive conditioning” treatment was effective. Have you learned your lesson? Next time, will you unhesitatingly head for the much more comfortable strip search scanner?

    The problem I foresee is when some passenger responds to the violation in a less placid fashion than you did. That indeed may be what the TSA people who devised the pat down treatment intend. Someone reacts violently to a screener touching his genitals, and the police sweep in and make a big show of arresting the offender and carting him off to prison. Then the TSA propaganda machine rolls out its prepared messages about how the groping and the strip search are absolutely necessary to protect aviation from violent threats to aviation. It was entirely the passenger’s fault for reacting inappropriately to a necessary security measure that the screener administered in a proper and entirely professional fashion. But of course, if you aren’t comfortable with a screener touching you in this fashion, you can easily avoid it by stepping into the Advanced Imaging Technology scanner. It’s comfortable and friendly, and it protects your privacy.

    That’s not a “conspiracy theory” scenario, but one that seems inevitable if the TSA insists on groping passengers’ genitals.

  • steve – nyc

    Hapgood,
    You’ve pretty much hit the nail on the head. I was reading a story about just such a scenario the other day. I think it was on the Consumerist.com site. But sorta like the MTA does here in NYC, tell us the fare is going to go to $3, but then it only goes to $2.50 and we all feel better. Oh sure, you have a choice, scan or pat down. Lesser of two evils. But in both cases (the MTA & TSA) we don’t really feel any better afterwards.

  • terry

    This in October 2010 – - After my replacement knees sounded an alarm, a TSA employee informed me that he would have to feel my buttocks and between my legs “until he encountered resistance”, meaning he was going to run his hand up my legs until he ran into my genitals. I asked for a supervisor and a large woman – full of bad attitude – watched. He ran his hand up my leg to my crotch and starting feeling my genitals. I looked at the woman and said, “Hey this guy does NOT need to be feeling my balls!” She replied, “You will NOT address a TSA employeed with that kind of bad language!” I replied, “Well, he does not need to be feeling my genitals and my testicles!” She turned and walked away, and I guess he had had enought, too, and he said ‘ you can go sir’. After I got my belt, watch, shoes back on I tried to calmly discuss this ”
    procedure” with her, but she refused to talk to me.

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