TSA Has Yet to Catch Anybody

Well, they did stop me from getting on a plane with a half bottle of Lectric Shave, but other than that they've pretty much got bupkiss:

Nine years after the Sept. 11 attacks and decades after hijackers first began to target passenger airliners, the United States has invested billions of dollars in an airport system that makes technology the last line of defense to intercept terrorists.

It has yet to catch one.

In every known recent attempt, terrorists have used a different tactic to evade the latest technology at airport checkpoints, only to be thwarted by information unearthed through intelligence work - or by alert passengers in flight.

The result is an emerging consensus among experts and lawmakers that the checkpoint-heavy approach - searching nearly every passenger - may not be the most effective.

Instead, many of them say, the system should focus more urgently on individuals, gathering a greater range of information about people to identify those most likely to present a real danger.

The problem is the TSA regulations are reactive - in other words, they're fighting to stop yesterday's terror attempt. A guy tries to light off a bomb in his sneakers and after that we all have to take our shoes off. Another guy puts explosives in his underwear and we get nakie scanners and invasive body pat downs.

The next attempt won't be caught by millions of dollars worth of electronics or the janitors-with-a-badge in the TSA uniforms. The next attempt may not even be against an airliner. There are plenty of other ways to take out lots of people and do it without going through any screening at all.

But then, you can always do what this guy did and just take your loaded gun on the plane with you:

The effectiveness of security at U.S. ports is being questioned after a businessman accidentally travelled on a flight with a loaded handgun in his luggage.

Iranian-American Farid Seif was screened by Trasport Security Administration officials at Houston airport in Texas. His hand luggage was also X-rayed before he took off on his international flight.

It wasn’t until Mr Seif arrived at his hotel several hours later that he realised that he had forgotten to unpack a loaded snub nose Glock pistol from his luggage before he embarked on his journey.

‘It’s just impossible to miss it, you know. I mean, this is not a small gun,’ Mr Seif told ABC News.

‘How can you miss it? You cannot miss it.’

According to ABC, security slip-ups in the U.S. are not rare.