"Dominate. Intimidate. Control."

The sorry record of the Transportation Security Administration

James Bovard from the February 2004 issue

(Page 3 of 4)

The group searched four airport departure gates and, after they could not find the man, returned to the checkpoint to retest the machine. More than half an hour after the positive alert for plastic explosives occurred, the TSA notified an airport policeman standing 15 feet from the checkpoint of the problem. Orders were quickly given to empty the terminal. Almost an hour after the laptop owner passed through the checkpoint, his description was circulated through the airport.

Three terminals at the nation's third-largest airport were closed for almost two hours. Thousands of people were evacuated from the airport and at least 200 flights delayed. Hundreds of passengers already on planes waiting for takeoff were obliged to deplane. Forty other airports were affected.

Because the Dallas�Fort Worth airport was not blown up that afternoon, the TSA declared victory. Agency spokesman Ed Martelle told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram: "We caught him, but we lost him. But what he couldn't do was harm anyone. The system worked." The TSA refused to name either the manufacturer of the machine that gave the alert or the screener; as spokesman Brian Doyle explained, "There are privacy issues involved here." After prying into tens of millions of Americans' bags, the agency suddenly developed respect for privacy -- for itself and its corporate suppliers.

Although the TSA promised to issue a full report on the incident, it reneged, announcing a few weeks later that national security concerns prevented it from releasing any more details of the debacle. The TSA also declared that "details about future breaches also would be kept secret because of national security," The Dallas Morning News reported. The Fort Worth Star-Telegram added: "Too much information was made public about the breach, local TSA officials have been told. Further disclosures by airport officials or anyone else privy to the final report could result in fines and/or jail time."

While some people may retain hope that the preceding fiascoes are merely birth pangs, contrary evidence continues to cascade in:

� On February 6, 2003, according to Airport Security Report, San Francisco International Airport was disrupted after a Taiwanese woman with two carry-on bags "sprinted through an unmanned security checkpoint at 10:46 a.m. It wasn't until 1 p.m. that TSA officials evacuated the terminal." TSA agents looked for the woman, concluded she was "lost in the crowd," and then spent time reviewing the videotape of the security checkpoint before ordering an evacuation and rescreening.

� On March 8, 2003, a terminal at the Hartford, Connecticut, airport was evacuated after a screener was caught taking a late afternoon nap by an X-ray machine.

� On March 11, 2003, according to Airport Security Report, TSA officials shut down the Birmingham, Alabama, international airport after "four people were discovered lurking on the airport tarmac. They fled on foot when officers questioned them about their badges identifying them as airport security workers." Dozens of flights were delayed and hundreds of people were evacuated before it was learned that the four suspicious individuals were TSA officials testing airport security.

� On March 21, 2003, Cleveland Hopkins International Airport was placed under a 40-minute lockdown, prohibiting all passenger entries or exits and all plane departures. TSA agents hit the alarm when they spotted a little toy gun on a child's belt buckle in a carry-on bag. The TSA confiscated the child's belt buckle. Spokesman Rick DeChant announced, "Had Mom or Dad helped this kid pack, this [airport lockdown] could have been avoided."

� On April 3, 2003, a passenger at Baltimore-Washington International airport refused to be rescreened after the metal detector signaled an alarm from her first pass. Instead, she walked on to her flight. Although two concourses were closed for an hour, the woman was never apprehended.

� In May 2003 Americans learned that the TSA had fired scores of screeners who had been on the job for several months in Los Angeles and New York after finding that they had criminal records. The Los Angeles Times reported that the agency "lost background questionnaires, failed to run some employee fingerprints through a national crime database and was unable to complete background checks." The Times noted that congressmen began investigating the TSA's "background check process after reports that a screener at Kennedy airport was arrested earlier this year for allegedly stealing $6,000 from a passenger." At Dulles International Airport in Washington, D.C., the agency failed to complete background checks on more than a third of the 600 screeners. One employee complained: "It defeats the purpose of what you are here for. It's a 200-plus [person] security breach." Nationwide, more than 20,000 TSA screeners were on the job even though the government had not completed background checks on them.

One reason for the federal takeover of airport security, you may recall, is that private companies had hired screeners of dubious character and poor trustworthiness.

On March 10, 2003, a TSA press release proudly announced, "The Transportation Security Administration has intercepted more than 4.8 million prohibited items at passenger security checkpoints in its first year, contributing to the security of the traveling public and the nation's 429 commercial airports." Agency chief James Loy bragged that "those statistics are strong testimony to the professionalism and attention to detail of our highly trained security screeners." A few weeks later, he upped the ante, informing the House Appropriations Committee: "We have identified, intercepted, and therefore kept off aircraft more than 4.8 million dangerous items."

And so all the fingernail clippers and cigar cutters seized since 9/11 transmogrified into proof that the federal government is protecting people better than ever. The press release did not mention that the checkpoint seizures included frying pans, dumbbell sets, horseshoes, toy robots, and an unknown but huge number of small pointy objects.

Security as Theater