[Hawkcreek]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rangerone314', '
')I have contempt for the people that continue to vote because they are giving legitimacy to a one-party political system. (The Republocratic Party, run by corporate money)

[Sixstrings]

Here's a good idea. Americans who don't want to be hassled should be able to apply for a security clearance ahead of time. If you fly a lot, this would be worth it to you.. go ahead and let the government do a check on you and once they're sure you're not muslim, haven't done anything odd like travel to Yemen a lot, have a work history and family history in this country.. then you could get a pass and walk through the checkpoint.

Something like that would make sense, but no we can't do that.

[careinke]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mos6507', '
')Until another plane goes down and then "TSA Follies" is all about how we didn't try hard enough.

[rockdoc123]

I'll suggest something here that is actually quite distasteful, but based on the many years I've spent working in the Middle East and SE Asia with the muslim community (and I want to emphasize the majority of these people have more morals and ethics than most North Americans) my view is that outside of my previous suggestion about putting special forces on planes in the role of air marshalls there needs to be a threat to perpetrators that is tangible. Someone who is hell bent on getting to heaven as a religious martre will probably not worry about a threat on his/her own life. If on the other hand there was a retaliatory threat on their family members I suspect they would have second thoughts. Blow up a plane and we arrest all of your family and they are imprisoned for the term you would have been given had you lived. If you have children they will be turned over to social services and raised by someone else. This is eye for an eye response which would be understood. To my mind, part of the reason the terrorists feel they have free reign is they do not expect the type of retribution that would be dealt out in their own community.

[Pretorian]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('careinke', '
')
If I were a terrorist group conducting asymmetrical warfare, my next move to disrupt western society would be some suicide bombers blowing themselves up in the pat-down lines.

[Pretorian]

neverthless i doubt anyone here can remember anything like that happening. when exactly somebody got into a bus/metro/stadium and pulled a plug on himself

[careinke]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Pretorian', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('careinke', '
')
If I were a terrorist group conducting asymmetrical warfare, my next move to disrupt western society would be some suicide bombers blowing themselves up in the pat-down lines.

[Keith_McClary]

Pinckney at slashdot.org writes:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A') paper by Leon Kaufman and Joseph W. Carlson in the Journal of Transportation Security asserts that x-ray backscatter machines are not very effective (PDF) even in their intended role. While carelessly placed contraband will be detected, the machines have glaring blind-spots and have difficulty distinguishing explosives from human tissue. As they write, 'It is very likely that a large (15–20 cm in diameter), irregularly-shaped, cm-thick pancake [of PETN explosive] with beveled edges, taped to the abdomen, would be invisible to this technology. ... It is also easy to see that an object such as a wire or a boxcutter blade, taped to the side of the body, or even a small gun in the same location, will be invisible.