I am no fan of the TSA.  Over and over again they have sexually harassed passengers, been caught stealing (the TSA fires an average of 40 employees/year for theft), and most recently failed tests designed to test how effective they are at uncovering contraband, achieving a failure rate of 95%.

We’ve been told that the purpose of the TSA is to make airline travel safe after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.  The TSA is actually nothing more than a federal jobs program dressed up as security theater and has never stopped an impending terrorist attack at an airport.  What they have managed to do is create a scenario for immense amounts of power to go right to agents’ heads and empower them with a God-complex when it comes to airline passengers.  It is a hostile, reactive, expensive, ineffective, and wasteful organization and has made airline travel not only worse, but actually less safe for every traveler.  But don’t worry, they recently doubled their tax that you’re forced to pay to them on every ticket.

And now, reports the Dallas Morning News, TSA agents are protesting for wage increases.  TSA agents want to be added to the regular federal wage scale instead of the one created, you know, specifically for the TSA.  This would mean raises for most agents.

In an absolutely tone-deaf and stunning claim, Walter Greely Jr., an organizer for the American Federation of Government Employees representing these federally-employed agents in North Texas, justifies this by implying that the TSA alone is the reason there have been no terrorist attacks since 9/11.

“If the American public would understand since the TSA was federalized, there has never been another 9/11 and we want to keep it that way.” (quote taken from Dallas Morning News article linked above)

I can only imagine the thousands of veterans and families of fallen veterans who would take exception to that statement.  I’m all about standing up for what you feel you deserve, but pointing to the lack of another 9/11-like attack and saying that justifies a wholesale rewrite of the entire TSA’s wage scale is garbage logic and should be mocked as such.

Get rid of the TSA, don’t try to keep fixing it.  Changes made to aircraft (locking and bulletproof cockpit doors) and restricting airside access to only passengers with boarding passes got rid of much of the threat, the rest can be handled by returning airport security to the way it was on 9/10.

Rant over.

Quick note: this doesn’t give you license to treat TSA agents like garbage

You are free to disagree with the purpose, scope, role, and everything about the TSA, but that doesn’t give you any sort of permission to treat them like garbage.  The people you’re talking to at an airport are trying to do their job the best they can and are in no position to change federal policy.  Treat them with respect although you disagree with their policies.