The TSA's True Focus Isn't Safety - It's Self-Preservation
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Re: The TSA's True Focus Isn't Safety - It's Self-Preservation
#2at times I wonder if this is not the unwritten goal of many agencies. We have an incredible duplication of effort on the part of many aid agencies and no progress is usually attempted to weed that out, how would we even begin with this one?
Re: The TSA's True Focus Isn't Safety - It's Self-Preservation
#3See Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Pournelle#Iron_Law_of_Bur...
In any bureaucracy, the people devoted to the benefit of the bureaucracy itself always get in control and those dedicated to the goals the bureaucracy is supposed to accomplish have less and less influence, and sometimes are eliminated entirely.
Re: The TSA's True Focus Isn't Safety - It's Self-Preservation
#4While the TSA is messed up and all that, Americans shouldn't be too quick to turn to private companies. Private companies would be profit focused, this means that any way to minimise costs will be taken which may compromise security. I give you Blackwater in Iraq as a good example
Re: The TSA's True Focus Isn't Safety - It's Self-Preservation
#5This is true of every institution.
Re: The TSA's True Focus Isn't Safety - It's Self-Preservation
#6While the TSA is messed up and all that, Americans shouldn't be too quick to turn to private companies. Private companies would be profit focused, this means that any way to minimise costs will be taken which may compromise security. I give you Blackwater in Iraq as a good example
I think when most people ask for "private companies" they mean cheaper, less intrusive security theater, in the pre-2001 vein.
Re: The TSA's True Focus Isn't Safety - It's Self-Preservation
#7So the TSA is like some kind of rogue AI just "tryin' to survive" - except that unlike an AI, it's incredibly stupid on a massive scale.
Doesn't bode well for our chances of fighting a real intelligent AI when it finally creeps up on us.
Re: The TSA's True Focus Isn't Safety - It's Self-Preservation
#8While the TSA is messed up and all that, Americans shouldn't be too quick to turn to private companies. Private companies would be profit focused, this means that any way to minimise costs will be taken which may compromise security. I give you Blackwater in Iraq as a good example
God forbid that we lose the paladins of security that are the TSA representatives!
Given the odds of actually needing them vs. the continued inconvenience of travel, I'll go with the convenience every time.
Re: The TSA's True Focus Isn't Safety - It's Self-Preservation
#9While the TSA is messed up and all that, Americans shouldn't be too quick to turn to private companies. Private companies would be profit focused, this means that any way to minimise costs will be taken which may compromise security. I give you Blackwater in Iraq as a good example
You trust a private corporation to strap you to a flying hunk of metal, but not to ensure your safety? Sounds logical..
Re: The TSA's True Focus Isn't Safety - It's Self-Preservation
#10I flew yesterday and found a rifle bullet+cartridge on the "secure" side of the TSA checkpoint. Yet somehow the gift-wrapped paperbacks in my checked luggage were deemed suspicious and unwrapped. Useless fools.