Tuesday, November 09, 2010

Intrusive Airport Searches Miss Point

By Charles V. Peña
November 9, 2010

Security guru Bruce Schneier defines the term security theater as “security measures that make people feel more secure without doing anything to actually improve their security.

Read on.

3 comments:

Morton Kurzweil said...

This essay poses all the key statements of an ideologue as facts without any substantiation. Even if the conclusions were acceptable the propaganda is not.
Pena: 'Middle East resentment towards the United States"
The Middle East includes Israel, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Iran, and Iraq. These states may represent ideologies incompatible with the desires of a free people of any religion. Those oppose to the West remain in control through coercion, religious or secular.
"resentment and hatred of the Muslim world" is another phrase out of the handbook of political fanaticism. The vast majority of Muslims want the peace, freedom and opportunity available in democratic societies. That is the cure for anarchy and the fomentation of hate. Let the people be free from the state control of thought and behavior and work to provide the safety and security, and the respect of all people. Then the demands of religion will be fulfilled without fear or violence.

rosemerry said...

Again all the "evidence" of Yemeni terror is assumed to be true,conveniently for the fear mongers.
The danger of terrorism is, like "international communism" allowed to take over our lives, when so many other issues are the real threats.

Trisha said...

If terrorists didn't exist, the governments of the U.K., U.S. and Europe would invent them. Yes, the past fifty years of colonialism in the middle east has caused a backlash, but it it nothing more than a flea bite, in reality. I grew up in a Britain which was always under threat from the I.R.A. Life went on, and we had the sixties and the seventies. The youth of the west terrified the powers that be with their counter-culture. Steps had to be taken to reassert control. They knew what was coming! They knew access to oil was likely to become more difficult and costly as the emerging nations (BRIC) grew their economies, but they needed a cover story for their resource wars. AQ was nominated as the fall guy. Forget crotch bombers and Jihad Jane, this is about controlling the masses while the bankers and their political 'familiars' steal everything they can. Witness how these governments are destroying ever gain in social justice won over the last three hundred years so the bankers can be bailed out.

As for the security enhancements we are seeing deployed, almost daily, they are nothing more than a way of funneling tax payer money to the well connected, like Chertoff, who lobbies for the company that manufactures the latest x-ray machines.