the "no active threat" argument by itself doesn't get us very far. By that logic, we should remove security at Fort Knox because it never gets robbed.
Security needs to be proportional to the risk. We know there are plenty of people who would make off with the gold in Fort Knox if they could because hold-ups and bank-robberies happen all the time.
We do know the level of risk that the TSA is defending against is minuscule because of these basic facts:
(1) The TSA is not catching terrorists: No TSA action has ever resulted in a conviction on terrorism related charges. To the best of my knowledge, the only actual arrest on terrorism charges turned out to be completely bogus.[1] Meanwhile they crow about stupid little things like the guy with a funny looking water bottle.[2]
(2) The TSA is not deterring terrorists: Someone bent on spreading terror doesn't just give up because good security scared them off - they find another target. There are all kinds of high-profile soft targets: Shopping malls, the line at the airport, bridges, tunnels, movie theaters, derailing passenger trains, etc. It does not require much imagination to come up with a very long list of easy targets.
But so far we've seen just one effective attack like that - the Boston marathon and it was super easy for those guys to pull off. It is so easy, yet it is a once-in-a-decade event. That is unequivocal evidence that for all intents and purposes nobody with the ability to carry out attacks is actually attacking us.
Given those two facts, we can have very high confidence that the TSA is not providing useful security.
That doesn't follow. The TSA may be deterring terrorists for airlines, or they may not.
But the fact that they don't protect other things, like malls, doesn't change that possibility. You are right terrorists can target softer targets, and have recently done just that. And it may be because because of heightened security at other places that they are starting to choose softer targets. If you want to kill a lot of people and get a lot of attention, go where lots of people are that will have a big media reaction and where the security sucks.
Security needs to be proportional to the risk. We know there are plenty of people who would make off with the gold in Fort Knox if they could because hold-ups and bank-robberies happen all the time.
We do know the level of risk that the TSA is defending against is minuscule because of these basic facts:
(1) The TSA is not catching terrorists: No TSA action has ever resulted in a conviction on terrorism related charges. To the best of my knowledge, the only actual arrest on terrorism charges turned out to be completely bogus.[1] Meanwhile they crow about stupid little things like the guy with a funny looking water bottle.[2]
(2) The TSA is not deterring terrorists: Someone bent on spreading terror doesn't just give up because good security scared them off - they find another target. There are all kinds of high-profile soft targets: Shopping malls, the line at the airport, bridges, tunnels, movie theaters, derailing passenger trains, etc. It does not require much imagination to come up with a very long list of easy targets.
But so far we've seen just one effective attack like that - the Boston marathon and it was super easy for those guys to pull off. It is so easy, yet it is a once-in-a-decade event. That is unequivocal evidence that for all intents and purposes nobody with the ability to carry out attacks is actually attacking us.
Given those two facts, we can have very high confidence that the TSA is not providing useful security.
[1] http://www.clickorlando.com/news/TSA-exaggerates-claims-abou...
[2] http://boingboing.net/2008/07/30/tsa-proud-of-confisc.html