For the last week, the airwaves have been filled with a never ending stream of stories about body scanners and pat downs at airports. The arguments are at once idiotic and important. First, it is idiotic to discuss whether it is worse to have terrorists get on planes or to have people searched and scanned in order to get on planes. Clearly, the choice has to be to keep people alive rather than to protect their dignity. Nevertheless, it is important to realize that those are not the only choices. Indeed, only in a politically correct world is it necessary to put everyone through these searches. Behavioral profiling could reduce the number of folks who need to be searched to a great extent.
The Israelis have done this for decades with great success. The first time I flew on El Al, the Israeli airline, I was going abroad to meet a group of students for a low cost tour. I was supposed to fly to Israel and meet the group in the airport when we landed. I got to the airport and the baggage folks for El Al looked inside my bag. (It was before there were baggage scanners) I had batteries for my electric razor, so they asked me where I was going in Israel. I told them that I was going with a group and did not know where we would be exactly. They then asked me who else was in the group and who was the leader. I told them that I did not know. That led to a rather thorough search. But that made sense. I was a young guy with suspicious things in my baggage who could not explain where I was going or with whom.
Maybe if the government applied intelligence instead of political correctness to the problem, we could all have avoided this unnecessary upset.
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