Auditors Question TSA's Tech Spending, Security Solutions 239
Frosty P writes "Government auditors have faulted the TSA and its parent agency, the Department of Homeland Security, for failing to properly test and evaluate technology before spending money on it. The TSA spent about $36 million on devices that puffed air on travelers to 'sniff' them out for explosives residue. All 207 of those machines ended up in warehouses, abandoned as unable to perform as advertised, deployed in many airports before the TSA had fully tested them. Since it was founded in 2001, the TSA has spent roughly $14 billion in more than 20,900 transactions with dozens of contractors, including $8 billion for the famous new body scanners that have recently come under scrutiny for being unable to perform the task for which they are advertised. 'TSA has an obsession of finding a single box that will solve all its problems. They've spent and wasted money looking for that one box, and there is no such solution,' said John Huey, an airport security expert."
Re:Oh, well (Score:1, Informative)
Thank you, Tom Daschle, you ignorant bastard.
Fox News/talk radio philosophy: if it happened when Bush and the Republicans were in charge, keep looking for a Democrat to blame. Then hammer that home on the air 10,000 times a day until people start believing. Just like Barney Frank singlehandedly created the Bush housing bubble when he was ranking minority member of the Senate Finance Committee.
Re:see what happens when point out holes in the TS (Score:5, Informative)
Getting a pilot's license is not all that hard (almost every one of my co-workers has a VFR license and most of them own a single-engine ship.)
The hard part is getting and *keeping* an IFR ticket, where you have to put in so many flight hours that it's really tough to do if you're not a full-time commercial pilot. Let's not even talk about the costs of owning, leasing, or even just fueling and maintaining even a low-end private jet.
It's fantastically liberating to be able to fly your own plane, but it also tends to be quite limiting. Consider the range on your, let's say, Cessna 182, for the 7-8 hours max you'd want to be in the left seat. Also consider what happens when you're grounded or diverted by VFR.
Most private pilots still go via commercial carriers when they travel. Flying yourself from Los Angeles to Maine can be fun, but it's no less greuling (and often not much faster) than the equivalent road trip.
The "use it or lose it" factor of IFR currency (FAR 61.57) in reality pretty much requires you to fly continuously, and without IFR you're stuck with mainly recreational flying in a relatively limited geographical area, only in clear skies. It doesn't suck, but it is not in reality the substitute you hold it out to be, nor do the costs end at the price of school.
Re:see what happens when point out holes in the TS (Score:5, Informative)
My girlfriend and I sat down to figure out how we could fly to her dad's airport outside of Baltimore from the LA Basin in a Cessna 172SP. We were looking at 16-18 hours of flight time over two or three days, five or six stops, and a bill of about $2400 to $2700 for the rental -- each way. Even without the rental fees, it would be something in the neighborhood of $650-$730 in fuel each way. That assumes no diversions and reasonable weather the entire way. It would be an incredible trip and a lot of fun, but it would also be much more financially difficult.
Being a private pilot works when you can get a few friends to go in on a trip to someplace that can be pricey even commercially. Flying from the LA Basin into Sacramento, for example, the numbers and time just about even out. More popular places like San Francisco, Las Vegas, or even Phoenix are tougher to match, and most long-distance flights are just right out. Until one gets into higher-performance aircraft (175 knots or faster and 800NM range or more), long-distance travel just doesn't work economically, and often not even then. For example, the above trip in a Cessna 350 would be a two-hop flight requiring about 12 hours in flight, give or take, depending on the cruise speed. At the common rental rate of $350/hour, that would be $4200 each way.
I love to sit in the left seat, but for most serious trips, I turn it over to the professionals.
Anyway (Score:2, Informative)
I hope the truth results in action.
Once I can enter an airport without being molested and/or photographed nude, I might actually start flying once in a while again.
A lot of people think I am silly for valuing my sovereignty over my own body. I think they are silly for letting the government treat them like animals.
Eternal September (Score:5, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September [wikipedia.org]
Re:Who'da Thunk? (Score:4, Informative)
It really seems like the TSA grope had much more to do with distracting peoples attention away, from how much lobbyists and private corporations where extracting in profits from the TSA.
The old, look here, look here, subterfuge. Billions in profits but all of you are now focused on being sexually assaulted at airports. No testing, no external corroboration, no valid tenders, no safety, no independent medical evaluation and testing, just billions done the rabbit hole and some sexual abuse to distract everyone attention from it.
I still find it unbelievable that Americans put up with it, what happened to you people, has baa, baa and, cluck, cluck become you national anthems.