Years ago when the new security precautions were put in place, security experts had nothing but criticism. The model they said should be followed (obviously in the expectation that it was completely impractical for America), that they pointed to as successful, was the Israeli airline El Al. Despite Israel's place as the principle target for terrorist action, El Al has had an astonishingly good record at flying safely. What was their secret? Exactly the kind of intensive, personalized attention which is now being criticized. El Al investigators are trained to observe passengers closely, to ask them questions and watch for just the signs of nervousness and evasion which this Ivan Eland treats with such mockery.
Yeah, but there's a big difference. The Israelis probably have actual Agents doing this work. We've got minimum-wage, one-step-above-welfare high school dropouts doing the work. Witness the recent "screening" of a 4-year-old whose name was on the Do Not Fly list. That's the kind of quality individuals we have deciding who can fly and who can't. -TD