"Mike Rapoport" wrote in message
...
| Government employees never get fired.
|
| Mike
| MU-2
|

Which demonstrates the real purpose of the security screening program: to
provide make-work jobs for the otherwise unemployable. It is nothing but a
form of welfare.

It would be one thing if it could be shown that a significant number of
hijackings had been prevented by luggage screening. However, it is far more
probable that the program actually increases the number of hijackings by
guaranteeing that almost all of the potential victims will be completely
disarmed.

The only reason that hijackings diminished in the last thirty years (not
fifty) is that a series of treaties and threats of armed intervention have
greatly reduced the number of safe havens for hijackers and terrorists. It
is the same methodology that finally defeated piracy on the high seas in the
19th century. There are still pirates, of course, and there will continue to
be thugs that try to take control of airplanes. But luggage screening will
not prevent these people from doing what they want any more than luggage
screening on sailing ships would have prevented mutiny and piracy.

The problem of religious fanatics willing to sacrifice themselves for
religious or political purposes is not new, either -- but it does require
different methods than traditional anti-piracy tactics. This requires
systematic destruction of a belief system and the social structures that
support it. That means killing clerics who incite people to violence,
destroying their places of worship, and controlling their means of
communication. The United States has been very successful at wiping out
dangerous cults within its borders, but it remains to be seen how effective
we can be in other countries. A good model might be the British subjugation
of violent cults in India and Africa during the 18th and 19th centuries. A
poor model would be the Spanish Inquisition or the Crusades, although the
Inquisition, at least, was rather successful in achieving its goals with
surprisingly little bloodshed and expenditure of resources.