re: #15 Obdicut
I don’t think that they’re all that effective. That’s an entirely separate issue from what’s going on now, though.
What is going on now? That people are getting pissed off?
fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com
Nate Silver makes a very astute observation that the public’s “approval” of these methods is directly related to how often (if ever) they fly:
The ABC News poll also suggests that opposition to the measures is higher among those who fly regularly (a distinction that this blog had previously anticipated). Among Americans who fly at least once a year, 58 percent support the new x-ray scanners, versus 70 percent of Americans who fly less often than that. Support for the new pat-down procedures is at 44 percent among fliers, meanwhile, versus 52 percent among those who do not fly regularly.
In the past, even measures that have polled fairly well have nevertheless produced a material reduction in air travel. Indeed, the ABC News poll gets at this issue as well: 20 percent of respondents said that the new procedures would make them less likely to fly, versus 10 percent who said more so. Discouraging air travel could have a number of economic and safety consequences, principally because the primary substitute for air travel is automobile travel, which is considerably more dangerous over all.
Somewhat contrary to conventional wisdom, the T.S.A. has been willing to dial back or reverse new security protocols in the past…