Honestly, can anyone believe in the "no profiling" rule at the Airports? It is on the brink of being full fledged idiots.
Let me draw an anaology. It is the late 1700's, we are in the wild west at a Fort with the Calvary. There are arrivals at the gate of 40 Indians and 10 troops. The orders are, no profiling..There will be body searches of 5 of the troops and 5 of the indians. All others can enter. Of course the arrows are tied under the horses but it would be profiling to look for them..
Now we come to today at the airport. There are 10 nuns and 40 muslims dressed in their long garb. Again, we cannot profile so a sample of the nuns must be searched and only a like sample of the muslims. Wow, doesn't that make you feel safe.
If the average bomber is a muslim between the ages of 18 and 28 isn't that sort of a clue as to the "risk factor" and deserving of some additional attention???
Many years ago I flew on a flight from what is now the Ronald Regan Airport in Washington to LaGuardia. I made that flight many times. On this one it was comical. Every FAA rule that should be followed was followed to the point of being comical, (e.g. the pilot came on at one point and said. "alright lets all fasten our little seatbelts as there will be turbulence". We fastened and after what was an almost unbelievable light bump he came back on and said, "we are through it, we can all now unbuckle our little belts." The guy next to me and I were laughing and I asked the Flight Attendent what the heck was going on and she said the Senator who was head of the FAA Committee was in 1st class and they were following each rule to be perfect..
Do you think if a Senator was on the plane there would be just standard checking..Forgetabout it..

[Walt.]

Of course the whole no-profiling thing is stupid.
But things have reached it's craziest when the "flying Imams" got an out-of-court settlement after being detained because of their unusual behavior.
The government says to report anything suspicious... and if you do you're screwed.
So... they don't wan't to profile, but if somebody finds a suspicious note in a rest room they'll evacuate 10,000 people, bring in swat teams from 9 counties (all in camoflage suits), and then have a two hour press conference explaining how thorough they are.
Think we'll ever get serious?
Walt.

[johnfarr]

In my youth in the 1960s I worked at JFK Airport for the #1 carrier to Havana: Eastern Airlines. Yup - our flights to FL and San Juan were highjacked on a regular basis. The Feds implemented a profiling policy where we reported to a US Marshall any male hispanic, especially those with a one-way cash ticket. The traveller was then interrogated, frisked (no TSA then), etc., before being permitted on a flight.

It made sense, and the hijackings were reduced and finally ended when Fidel started extraditing hijackers back to the US for prosecution.

What has happened to our country since then?

[Bryan]

"Political Correctness", which includes profiling, has reached the point of absurdity in this country. It is now interfering with the laws it was designed to support and endangering all of us. Whatever happened to "common sense"?

[Larryandlinda]

Originally Posted by Bryan

"Political Correctness", which includes profiling, has reached the point of absurdity in this country. It is now interfering with the laws it was designed to support and endangering all of us. Whatever happened to "common sense"?

Originally Posted by Walt.

Of course the whole no-profiling thing is stupid.
But things have reached it's craziest when the "flying Imams" got an out-of-court settlement after being detained because of their unusual behavior.
The government says to report anything suspicious... and if you do you're screwed.
So... they don't wan't to profile, but if somebody finds a suspicious note in a rest room they'll evacuate 10,000 people, bring in swat teams from 9 counties (all in camoflage suits), and then have a two hour press conference explaining how thorough they are.
Think we'll ever get serious?
Walt.

Last week Newark was evacuated for a guy hopping a rope
to give a goodbye hug, last year WAS as evacuated when a 'security worker' smelled a rotten Quiznos in the wastebasket, each time flights throughout the planet thrown off. Impacts to our population reach into the $100k plus due to the overreaction.
W
If anyone needs screening out and profiling it's the ones that make these poor decisions. Ramping up the minimum standard of intelligence and training for TSA couldn't hurt either
L&L

[otherbruddaDarrell]

Originally Posted by Bryan

"Political Correctness", which includes profiling, has reached the point of absurdity in this country. It is now interfering with the laws it was designed to support and endangering all of us. Whatever happened to "common sense"?

I agree with you. We are the generation of "but I don't want them to feel bad"
Everyone is too worried about saying the wrong thing that they no longer spit out what they really think.