In reality, we are generally very safe flying on commercial airlines. Airline security, driving a car, riding in a school bus and swimming in a pool are all subject to something akin to the law of diminishing returns. Let me explain.

If you drive your kids to school in a car, they are very safe during the ride. Could the ride be safer? Certainly, you could put the kids in NASCAR-type vehicles with five point belts, fire-retardant suits, helmets and HANS devices for everyone and they would be “more” safe, yet the additional cost to do so is not considered reasonable.

We’re up against the same diminishing returns when it comes to airline security. We are very safe when we fly and everyone understands that. Security has it’s place, but last year we ran up to what could be described as a tipping point. The additional security – in the opinion of many travelers – added no additional measure of safety in return for a lot more inconvenience.

Back to the TSA screw up highlighted in the New York Post.

The incident happened at around 10 p.m. Saturday as factory worker Eusebio D. Peraltalajara, 45, of Jersey City waltzed past the screeners on his way to a Dominican Republic-bound flight, the sources said.

Agent Ahmir Wilkerson, supervisor Anthony DeJesus and at least one other screener allowed his carry-on luggage — with the boxcutters with razor blades — to pass through the X-ray machine, police sources said.

Once aboard Santiago-bound Flight 837, flight attendant Fausto Penaloda, 40, asked him to stow his luggage in the overhead storage bin.

As Peraltalajara’s shoved it into the compartment, Penaloda saw the boxcutters fall out of the bag, according to a police report.

The Federal Flight Deck Officer (FFDO) program is a voluntary training and certification that allows pilots to carry a handgun in the cockpit as an additional security measure. Not only did the TSA suspend the pilot from the program, the sheriff’s office in his area pulled his county issued state permit to carry a concealed weapon.

Homeland Security big brother antics and an abuse of power as far as I’m concerned, unless the pilot really did release confidential security information concerning San Francisco’s international airport. I already knew about what I saw in the video, it was common knowledge that ground crews did not have to go through the full security we experience as travelers.

The TSA may certainly have the authority to suspend the pilot from the FFDO program, but the sheriff’s office stepping in to the situation (what would they have to do with this?) seems totally unjustified. Sending four federal air marshals and two sheriff’s deputies to the pilots home – unannounced – is overkill and was done to send a threatening message to the pilot and the community.

From News 10 in Sacramento.

The 50-year-old pilot, who lives outside Sacramento, asked that neither he nor his airline be identified. He has worked for the airline for more than a decade and was deputized by the TSA to carry a gun in the cockpit.

He is also a helicopter test pilot in the Army Reserve and flew missions for the United Nations in Macedonia.

Three days after he posted a series of six video clips recorded with a cell phone camera at San Francisco International Airport, four federal air marshals and two sheriff’s deputies arrived at his house to confiscate his federally-issued firearm. The pilot recorded that event as well and provided all the video to News10.

At the same time as the federal marshals took the pilot’s gun, a deputy sheriff asked him to surrender his state-issued permit to carry a concealed weapon.

A follow up story indicates the pilot informed the TSA he would voluntarily esign from FFDO, and the TSA stated they would drop the issue. To me, that indicates the pilot did nothing wrong and the government was just throwing their weight around. Again, no justification for pulling his state permit either. If they man really did violate security rules … let’s here it.

What say you?

Overnight update: Allahpundit at Hot Air and Powerline writing. Drudge Report seems to be taking the story over-the-top suggesting his home was searched, which is not indicated in the articles I’ve read. AP is wondering if there was really a security leak of information within one or more of six of the YouTube videos, but if there was, you would think the TSA would not just drop the issue as long as the pilot resigned from the FFDO program.

Doug Powers at Malkin’s site writing this morning.

Big Hat Tip to Ed Morrissey on this one and I will include his best comment from his post in a minute, but first the story. A woman and her 17 year old son are going through the screening process at Albuquerque airport when the TSA screener decided Mom needed a closer inspection, so to speak. As Adrienne Durso of Carlsbad, California explains it they seemed to be spending an inordinate amount of time on her bosom. From KOB TV.

“Heavily concentrating on my breast area where I told her I had a mastectomy the year previous and in just seemed to go on and on,” said Durso.

She says she felt humiliated as the extensive pat-down happened in front of her 17 year old son and hundreds of other travelers.

“I felt as though I didn’t have any rights other than I had to stand there and let them do what they want to do to my body,” Durso continued.

She says she knew her rights had been violated so she asked to speak to a supervisor who she thought would help.

All the while her son stood by her side and couldn’t remain silent anymore

“My son, who I’m very proud of spoke up and said ‘I went through the metal detector and I did not get a pat-down’ to which the supervisor said ‘well you don’t have boobs’,” she said.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sho8w5oHiTA

I think Ed Morrissey has the line of the year on this one.

Ah, the boobs exception to the 4th Amendment!  Well, say no more.  Thankfully, TSA will keep all of us safe from breasts while we fly the friendly skies.

Go to Hot Air and read his whole take on the story. Plus he has track backs to the entire story and the full video. But as he says, no excuses. She’s suing and well she should. Just file this one under TSA T&A.

I could say we are doomed, but I may have overused that phrase a bit. But, if our security is in the hands of these folks at DHS, then we’re closer to doomed than I had truly expected. Popular Mechanics interviewed cryptology expert and security consultant Bruce Schneier, who, according to PM, has been one of the most ardent critics of our current airport security setup.

So what about the new equipment?

PM: The machines have shown up in the wake of the so-called underwear bomber, who tried to blow up a plane with chemicals stored in his briefs. Would this technology have stopped him?

A: The guys who make the machines have said, “We wouldn’t have caught that.”

PM: So what kind of attack will this prevent, that otherwise might be successful?
A: There are two kinds of hijackers. There’s the lone nutcase, like someone who will bring a gun onto a plane because, dammit, they’re going to take the whole plane down with them. Any pre-9-11 airport security would catch a person like that.

The second kind is the well-planned, well-financed Al Qaeda-like plot. And nothing can be done to stop someone like that.

PM: Has there been a case since 9-11 of an attempted hijacker being thwarted by airport security.

A: None that we’ve heard of. The TSA will say, “Oh, we’re not allowed to talk about successes.” That’s actually bullsh*t. They talk about successes all the time. If they did catch someone, especially during the Bush years, you could be damned sure we’d know about it. And the fact that we didn’t means that there weren’t any. Because the threat was imaginary. It’s not much of a threat. As excess deaths go, it’s just way down in the noise. More than 40,000 people die each year in car crashes. It’s 9/11 every month. The threat is really overblown.

There’s more and it’s worth reading. Plus, read this this … from Instapundit:

DOES THE TSA KILL? More on risk-shifting and risk-increasing. “According to the Cornell study, roughly 130 inconvenienced travelers died every three months as a result of additional traffic fatalities brought on by substituting ground transit for air transit. That’s the equivalent of four fully-loaded Boeing 737s crashing each year.” Not sure how to weigh these numbers, but we certainly ought to keep them in mind.

UPDATE: I have changed the headline in the interest of accuracy, from “says” to “reports”. My apologies.

The vide was taken at Salt Lake City International Airport on Nov 19th, at least that is when it was posted. The shooter reports this:

Lets get the facts straight first. Before the video started the boy went through a metal detector and didn’t set it off but was selected for a pat down. The boy was shy so the TSA couldn’t complete the full pat on the young boy. The father tried several times to just hold the boys arms out for the TSA agent but i guess it didn’t end up being enough for the guy. I was about 30 ft away so i couldn’t hear their conversation if there was any. The enraged father pulled his son shirt off and gave it to the TSA agent to search, thats when this video begins.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSQTz1bccL4

This is crazy stuck on stupid. Want even more scary stupid. Read what happened to the videographer after he shot the video.

a black suit who had been talking with the other TSA officials approached me. He asked to speak to me and I obliged, wondering what was to come. He then proceeded to interrogate me about why I was videotaping the “procedures of the TSA”. I told him that I had never seen such practices before on a young child and decided to record it. The man being frustrated at this point demanded to know my plans with the video, of which I didn’t respond. Repeatedly he asked me to delete the video, hoping his mere presence could intimidate me to obey, but I refused. By this point it became obvious that he felt TSA had done something wrong and that I caught it on tape. After the interview, I left for my gate. I called my brother who told me I should put the tape on YouTube because this had been a recent hot topic in the news.
My gate was a long way off, but about 15 minutes after arriving 2 TSA agents came and sat 15 feet or so away from me. I stood up and moved so that they were in front of me and then took a picture. A 3rd and then a 4th agent came and sat down with the others.

OK, stop it. Really. You guys are cracking me up. This is a joke right. Push back?

The first story is from Grand Rapids, Michigan. A woman who likens her TSA experience was so violent she cried.  Click the pic to watch. But here’s the transcript.

Swift says they told her she was singled out because she was wearing a skirt. She says the search earlier this month was very rough and left her in tears.

“The female officer ran her hand up the inside of my leg to my groin and she did it so hard and so rough she lifted me off my heels,” she says. “I think I yelped. I was in pain for about an hour afterwards. It just felt excessive and unnecessary.”

After reviewing the incident, a TSA spokesman says officers involved in the Grand Rapids search acted “appropriately and respectfully.”

Story number two comes from St Louis who likened her “pat down” to sexual assault. From KMOV in ST Louis.

From KMOV in ST Louis.

Moroney explains “Her gloved hands touched my breasts…went between them. Then she went into the top of my slacks, inserted her hands between my underwear and my skin… then put her hands up on outside of slacks, and patted my genitals.”

“I was shaking and crying when I left that room” Moroney says.  “Under any other circumstance, if a person touched me like that without my permission, it would be considered criminal sexual assault.”

As the ACLU points out in this story there are no laws governing pat downs so TSA officials can pat down anyone for any reason and set their own standards for a pay down. We give up our fundamental rights way too easily in this country especially when there are other ways.

DHS could require that Airports be in charge of their own security, or could assign highly trained screeners to stand at the gate or at the counter. It would require profiling. No, not Muslim profiling. Watching people, and how they act, how they purchase their ticket, whether it’s round trip or one way … with bomb sniffing dogs everywhere. Expensive? Probably, since it would require police investigation training. But then at least a pat down would come because of reasonable cause.

How far do we let this go? Above stories via Drudge.

The man in question is 51 year old John Christina, a man who has some serious medical issues. Police arrested him yesterday after allegedly punching a TSA agent in the chest. Apparently the confrontation took place after he went through the scanner at Indianapolis Airport and began a conversation with the TSA agent. From the Indianapolis police report.

“HUTMAN STATED AFTER CHRISTINA WENT THROUGH THE AIT THEY WERE TALKING ABOUT MEDICAL ISSUES AND CHRISTINA ASKED HIM A QUESTION. SINCE HUTMAN NORMALLY WORKS IN DAYTON, OHIO, HE STATED HE WAS NOT FROM THIS AIRPORT AND HE WAS NOT FAMILIAR WITH THE PROCESS IN WHICH YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT. AFTER THE CONVERSATION, CHRISTINA “PUNCHED” HIM WITH HIS RIGHT CLOSED FIST IN THE MIDDLE OF HIS CHEST. ACCORDING TO HUTMAN’S WRITTEN STATEMENT AFTER HE GOT PUNCHED IN THE CHEST HE ASKED CHRISTINA “WHY DID YOU HAVE TO HIT ME” AND CHRISTINA REPLIED “I WAS ONLY KIDDING WITH YOU.” THIS WAS WITNESSED AND CONFIRMED BY ANOTHER TSA/TSO NAAMAN DAVIS AND US AIRWAY PASSENGER ALSO GOING THROUGH TSA SECURITY, JOSEPH HALLETT. ALL OF THE WITNESSES PROVIDED WRITTEN STATEMENTS.

I have no idea what was said that touched this off and I am not even going to speculate. He didn’t go through a pat down … but he was screened. I will try to update this.

As for those screen machines, Howard Portnoy, from Hot Air, will be joining us this morning at 10 AM. He put together a great report on the safety of these machines themselves. Apparently the machines radiate well beyond the machine itself.

The agency does not specify whether millimeter wave technology was evaluated or by whom, which seems vaguely unsettling if not suspicious. Nevertheless, the TSA’s bottom line findings are “that the energy projected by millimeter wave technology is thousands of times less than a cell phone transmission” and that “a single scan using backscatter technology produces exposure equivalent to two minutes of flying on an airplane.” (Flying on an airplane produces exposure to radiation? Does anyone else find this less than comforting?)

As to the sources of these claims, note that only one—the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL)—is an independent, non-government agency. (Forgive my cynicism, but the FDA doesn’t have an exactly sterling track record in its capacity as consumer watchdog.) The APL’s report, which is available here, does seem to offer some assurance about the safety of the Rapiscan Secure 1000 backscatter scanner. But it is also contains this caveat:

And that caveat?

In short, whether you receive dangerous levels of radiation depends on who set up the particular AIT scanner being used and whether he followed the manufacturer’s recommendations.

And the beat goes on … so to speak.

As a part of my job, I was flying every couple of weeks almost immediately after 9/11.  I’ve watched the security measures ramp up and ease down, noticed the differences between different airports and, generally, bitten my tongue and let the security folks do their thing.  I have joked with the TSA folks and tried to smile through the mindless annoyances that accompany air travel.

But, frankly, I think we’ve gone a little too far with this:

“The head of the Transportation Security Administration, John Pistole, today defended his agency’s new, controversial pat-down procedure, one that has been described by some critics as sexual assault. The new procedure involves screeners running their hands up the inside of passengers’ thighs and touching around women’s breasts.

“There is an ever-evolving nature of the terrorist threat,” Pistole told a Senate committee holding a hearing on the safety of cargo.”

For starters, could someone please tell me the what “ever-evolving” terrorist threat requires the screener to cop a feel?  Has there been terrorist chatter about explosive breast implants?  If so, can someone tell me how the screener can tell the difference between the silicone implants, the saline implants and the C-4 implants?

Mr. Pistole continued:

“Pistole said the government is not always ahead of the terroists and that his agency seeks “the proper mix” between passengers’ rights and protecting airplanes.”

Note to Director Pistole… if your personnel are grabbing at my “joystick” before I can fly, I’m thinking that my “passengers’ rights” aren’t in mix.

I mean, it isn’t as if the TSA is known for its maturity.  One could say that they “lack gravitas” when it comes to their jobs.  However, there are suggestions that security is a secondary concern.  But that’s okay… I mean, they promise that they won’t save the images and swear their sexual harassment security patdowns are not meant to encourage folks to accept the scanner.  I am sure that they’re just doing their duty when they do these things.  There is, however, some suspicions that these regulations are not going to be enforced equally.

Now, personally, I would suggest that the TSA is riding rough-shod over the Fourth Amendment… but, hey, I also take the Second Amendment seriously.

UPDATE (Jim): Speaking of the fourth amendment, here’s an interview with former TSA Chief Mo McGowan has to say about the 4th Amendment and the TSA searches. From Hot Air. As  AP at Hot Air says, the money line comes around 2:30. Gotta do what ya gotta do.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nArQTg88k6U

UPDATE 2 (Jim); Wondering what happens if you decline the big bad scanner machines at the airport. The opt out means you get searched. Here’s a tale by a woman in Boston.

My pal happens to be a Boston media personality and crime reporter, Michele McPhee. She is not a shy lady. When this tough blond makes up her mind she makes up her mind. There was no way she was going to be convinced to do a body scan if she didn’t want to.

So instead, she opted for a pat down and was whisked away, barefoot, by two women – a TSA officer and her supervisor – to a private room, where McPhee says a very intrusive body search was conducted.

“They run their hands inside your leg and under your bra strap and patted the front of my breasts,” she says. “If someone had done that to me at a nightclub I’d call the cops.”

McPhee says the officers were “nice and apologetic” and seemed to feel bad they couldn’t give her her shoes back until after the search, especially when she pointed out how dirty the floor of the terminal was. The whole process took about 15 minutes.

So why did she reject the full body scan? McPhee says her big issue is privacy when it comes to the images that are taken.

“I have questions about privacy. I don’t really trust the TSA to keep these things private,” she says.

A media personality? This is something I talked about yesterday. What TV news person, in particular a woman, wants a “see all” pic going around the internet. It happens.

I still take these searches very seriously. I believe the TSA is going too far in the name of safety. I believe that if the TSA, booking agents, the FBI and CIA, did their jobs, we would not need to hands up skirts or pants. But sometimes even the most serious subject deserves a laugh. From Iowa Hawk … to the tune “Come Fly with Me” by Sammy Cahn. If you want to sing along, we have included an instrumental by Michael Buble.

Hit it, Frank.

Comply with me, before you fly away
Remove those shoes and take a cruise
Through my peekaboo X-ray
Comply with me, I’m your friendly TSA

Comply with me, you domestic coach class bums
If you opt out I’ll just give a shout
To my icy-handed chums
Comply with me, bend over here it comes

Once I get all up there where your hair is ticklish
I’ll just fish
Got my wish
Once I get all up there you’ll be squirming like an eel
You may squeal
At the feel
When we’re together

Want to see the entire song rewrite … go here to Iowahawk.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCmrPI3wmJ0

I love the song … but being a 70′s Doors fan … this isn’t bad either, heh?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PECk9A-07Pw

Hey, how about adding your own official songs of the TSA in the comment section below.

UPDATE: Video added:

From San Diego.com:

The 31-year-old Oceanside software programmer was supposed to leave from Lindbergh Field on Saturday morning and until a TSA agent directed him toward one of the recently installed full-body scanners, Tyner seemed to be on his way. Tyner balked. He’d been reading about the scanners and didn’t like them for a number of reasons, ranging from health concerns to “a huge invasion of privacy.” He’d even checked the TSA website which indicated that San Diego did not have the machines, he said in a phone interview Saturday night. “I was surprised to see them,” said Tyner. He also did something that may seem odd to some, manipulative to others but fortuitous to plenty of others for whom Tyner is becoming something of a folk hero: Tyner turned on his cell phone’s video camera and placed it atop the luggage he sent through the x-ray machine. He may not be the first traveler tossed from an airport for security reasons but he could well be the first to have the whole experience captured on his cell phone. During the next half-hour, his cell phone recorded Tyner refusing to submit to a full body scan, opting for the traditional metal scanner and a basic “pat down” — and then refusing to submit to a “groin check” by a TSA security guard. He even told the guard, “You touch my junk and I’m going to have you arrested.”

Then there is the video of a 3 year old girl getting the old once over. As Ed Morrissey notes … bet the TSA was really happy to discover the kid’s father was in the media.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TCHSGvNwRY

I’m sure TSA must be really happy to have discovered that Daddy works as a television reporter. We can’t know for certain that terrorists wouldn’t use a child as a mule to get explosives or other weapons through airport security, of course. In fact, we’ve seen al-Qaeda use children and the mentally impaired as “suicide” bombers in Iraq, so we know they have no scruples in doing so. Allahpundit noted three days ago that those who complain about those procedures now would have a very different take on the matter if a plane suddenly exploded in mid-air. However, wouldn’t that require the parents of the child (or those posing as parents) to be the actual terrorists? Shouldn’t TSA have taken the whole family aside and questioned Mom and Dad first to see if they got a hint of some ulterior motive?

Here’s one more for the books … now they are checking out “Nuns”? Oh brother, the end is near.

Please take the poll on the right and I will get to the results tomorrow. Thanks.