The Terrible Truth About the TSA: It’s a failure at everything it does.
We don’t all all agree on whether the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has any business groping toddlers and destroying expensive medical equipment in the pursuit of its appointed mission of keeping travelers safe from scary terrorists. Quotable security expert Bruce Schneier calls it all pointless and oppressive “security theater” intended to make the government look responsive, while Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) describes intrusive measures as “very important” and pushes for even stronger stuff. But necessary evil or not, it’s increasingly apparent that the TSA is spectacularly inefficient and inept at everything it tries to do.
A report released this week by the Department of Homeland Security Office of the Inspector General was only the latest peek at TSA doings to take issue with how the security bureaucracy handles its job. Sparked by security breaches at Newark Liberty International Airport, the redacted document (PDF) found that when the TSA’s roughly 50,000 Transportation Security Officers stumble in their battle against whatever smoldering undergarments international terrorism might throw their way, letting people and cargo pass uninspected through checkpoints, there’s often little consequence. “At the six airports visited, TSA did not always take action or document their actions to correct security breach vulnerabilities. During our review, we identified documentation of corrective actions for only [redacted] (53%) of the [redacted] breaches we reviewed.” In fact, “TSA does not have a process to ensure that all security breaches are identified and reported.”