We Had to Spend the Money Because of the Threat. Which The Thing We Spent the Money On Won't Prevent.
Interesting followup on Jacob Sullum's post below, on the ExpressJet pilot who refused a full body scan. From an interview with RAND Corporation terrorism expert Brian Jenkins, in the November issue of Los Angeles magazine, alas not online:
In the wake of the Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab episode--the guy who had a bomb concealed in his underpants--even though the bomb didn't work, there was a great deal of alarm, and in response we decided to deploy full-body scanners. Hundreds of millions of dollars. One guy, one small device in his underpants, and we've just spent hundreds of millions of dollars.
Then, a page later in the story, so maybe you wouldn't notice the connection:
And, you know, I'm not entirely certain that a body scanner would have detected Abdulmutallab's bombs.
Maybe it's not even likely?
I don't want to get into technical details, but it's not certain…
Security theater: if only it provided entertainment commensurate with its expense.
