RE: Full Body Scanners

Dear TSA:

I can’t help but notice that you’ve somehow got it into your head that we need full-body scanners now at every US airport. Well, I have a suggestion for you while you’re at it: instead of adding full-body scanners on top of everything else you’ve got to delay me while trying to get to my plane, why don’t you replace all the x-ray machines and other nonsense with just the one single (and hopefully, quick!) full-body scanner?

Think about it: you wouldn’t have to ask people to take off their shoes, unpack laptops from their bags, empty spare change from their pockets, remove belts, take of scarves, and so forth. Just the one scanner could scan EVERYTHING on the person. Just a few seconds, and BAM! you’re done. How nice would that be?

Of course, this idea hinges on the full-body scanner actually being useful for scanning people. If, on the other hand, it is just a huge, expensive, time-wasting machine to check for explosives in people’s underwear, then I have to tell you, respectfully, that this is a complete waste of time, money, and effort. So just knock it off already.

But if it works, and if you could replace all the other nonsense at security checkpoints in airports with one quick, fast, non-invasive scan, then by all means, go ahead!

Just a thought – but one I hope you guys take seriously!

Dear TSA:

It’s time and past time for you guys to stop “declining to say” when asked anything about the insane so-called “security” procedures or tools you’ve put into place.

I know most of your top brass are probably still in the mentality of the cold war, but trust me guys – it doesn’t matter whether you keep the design of your x-ray machines or body scanners or neutron detectors or whatever secret, or whether you put up huge billboards of their internal schematics in Afghanistan.

I’m not being facetious here either – it really doesn’t matter. If the security systems you have put in place are truly well-designed and well-thought-out, then they will work regardless of whether their internal workings is common knowledge or not.

And, since we are still (the last time I checked) a free country (as we like to proclaim ever more loudly, while at the same time we become less and less free), your default reply should ALWAYS be to be totally up-front about security and to provide any details that anyone asks about the internal workings of things.

If you were SERIOUS about security – real security, not just “pretend” security that only serves to “cover your ass” in case something bad happens – you’d welcome the feedback and massive talent pool that being in the public eye could give.

Just a thought, from a concerned citizen.

All I want from a state (as in, the state I live in) is:

• To not be taxed into oblivion (I know I’ll never get away from taxes entirely, so just… take it easy on me, OK?);
• To have a reasonably efficient state government (i.e., to not have to go into a 1960’s era building with insufficient parking and fill out forms in triplicate on carbon paper with a No. 2 pencil just to get the license plate for my car);
• To be reasonably easy for people to exercise their 2nd amendment rights (that is, don’t make it so I have to apply to the chief of police for permission to apply for permission to own a gun, have 6 personal references, provide a DNA sample, and an affidavit from my 3rd grade teacher attesting as to how often I used to play “cops and robbers” at recess); and most importantly,
• The right to own (and better yet, carry in public) a sharpened 26 inch samurai sword. (For protection, of course – because “swords don’t run out of bullets.”)

That’s really all I want.

Is that too much to ask?

Found this over on a Slashdot story about how attacks on voting machines are practical (despite arguments to the contrary):

The problem is our elections are supposed to be transparent by law.
The problem is our elections are supposed to have public oversight.
The problem is a private company can not provide public oversight.
The problem is electronic vote tabulation devices use invisible signals which no human (especially a poll watcher) can see.
The problem is China or North Korea could decide our elections and we wouldn’t know.
The problem is there is no electronic vote tabulation device (or electronic vote registration poll book device) which can be validated with public oversight.
The problem is without public oversight, no election can be validated.
The problem is if our elections can not be validated, we can not hold our representatives responsible.
The problem is if our representatives can not be held responsible, they tend to ignore the rule of law.
The problem is if our representatives ignore the rule of law, they tend to ignore protecting the US Constitution against all enemies.
The problem is when the US Constitution is ignored, we no longer live in a Constitutional Republic.
The problem is when we no longer live in a Constitutional Republic, we slip into fascism.
The problem is we have slipped into fascism.
The problem is ignorance is no longer an excuse for corruption.

It was, of course, posted Anonymously… but that doesn’t make it any less meaningful.

I’ve often said that: Laws are only needed when you can’t trust people to do the “right thing.” Looking at another way, you could say that the honor system only works when you can trust everyone involved to be… well, honorable.

Because of the simple facts of probability, as a population grows larger and larger, the probability of everyone being “honorable” decreases, until you reach a population size where it is 100% certain that some people will be dishonorable. At this stage, laws are required if you wish to retain any semblance of order.

When people are left alone in a situation where there are no laws, no outside authority, chaos results – call it the “Lord of the Flies” effect.

Flickr image by Enrico Fuente

This has ramifications for what is traditionally called the “free market.” Remember that the entities involved in a “free market” are, if not people themselves, they are companies which are run by people (and are treated legally as people).

The ideal “free market” is one “free” of any regulation – letting the market “regulate itself.” When you consider that the “market” is just people (acting through companies) – you realize that the “free market” approach is, essentially, leaving corporations (run by people) alone in a situation with little to no laws or regulation.

Obviously, the idea of such a group “regulating itself” is absurd. The inevitable end result of such a system can only be chaos: a “Lord of the Flies” situation, but with companies instead of people. Brutal authority from the strongest, meanest, most vicious and largest. Innocent people – the ones who try to do the “right thing” are pushed aside and eventually killed.

Consider this carefully. This is a very disturbing consequence for those of us on the “outside” of the market, because we are effectively the “Piggies” in this situation.

Traditionally we have tried to deal with this situation with laws – the rallying call of “regulate! regulate! regulate!” But laws have their own problems, which stem from deep, fundamental flaws with our classical lawmaking mechanism.

The problems with laws are that laws reflect the culture of the lawmakers. (I don’t mean the “culture” in the larger sense of the people from which the lawmakers come, although that plays a factor. Instead, I refer to the culture of lawmakers themselves.)

In a society where lawmakers’ primary vested interest is not the “rightness” of what they do, but rather their own welfare (in the form of being elected again), the resulting policy created will be one reflective of these values – short term solutions that only serve to get lawmakers elected again, rather than doing the “right thing.” Problems are pushed on the next generation, after the current generation (of lawmakers) is gone (term limits). The “planning horizon” of such a government is limited to the length of the terms of its constituent members. This creates a problem in that these term lengths are usually much less than the lifetime of the people who are governed. As a result, laws are short-sighted and ill-conceived – the “law of the week” effect.

It would seem then that the challenges involved in solving the problems which afflict us are so deep-seated as to be unsurmountable. But I do not counsel despair!

We know the changes we would like to see, the behavior we would like to encourage – so the answer is to simply reward the behavior we want, and discourage (or punish) the behavior we don’t. This answer is so simple and obvious as to be almost laughable – but it has been proven to work, in more ways than you might realize.

We often use these same techniques on our children – allowances for when chores are done and behavior is good, revoking privileges (TV, access to the car, computer time, etc.) when behavior is bad. We use similar techniques when training animals – reward desired behavior, punish (by way of revoking attention or treats) undesired behavior.

These then are our possible solutions: to make lawmakers accountable to the laws they create long after they have left office. In democratic societies, perhaps to make the people who elected lawmakers accountable for the mistakes of the lawmakers after they have left office. In other words, make the primary motivating factor of the lawmaker not be their immediate re-election, but rather their long-term reputation; the long-term reputation of the laws they create.

When we have done this, then we can give proper attention to the “markets” which seem to dominate so much of our society in this day and age, and make laws that are not just punitive, but thoughtful and deeply connected to encouraging good behavior in all respects.

If we can do these things, we will have set up a situation where markets can truly be both “free” and “good” in that they will be encouraged to do the “right thing” always. Instead of enforcing arbitrary “thou shalt not” laws, we will have set up a system which by its very nature is conducive towards creating and maintaining a responsible, ethical, and fundamentally “good” market. I think that such a market will be infinitely better – and, arguably, more free than our current, so-called “free market.”