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July 31, 2005
Profiling: A Common Sense Approach?
Charles Krauthammer proposes a common-sense approach to "leveraging our resources" in the search for possible suicide bombers in the U.S.:
The American response to tightening up after London has been reflexive and idiotic: random bag checks in the New York subways. Random meaning that the people stopped are to be chosen numerically. One in every 5 or 10 or 20.
This is an obvious absurdity and everyone knows it. It recapitulates the appalling waste of effort and resources we see at airports every day when, for reasons of political correctness, 83-year-old grandmothers from Poughkeepsie are required to remove their shoes in the search for jihadists hungering for paradise.
Assuaging feelings [of minorities] is a good thing, but hunting for terrorists in this way is simply nuts. The fact is that jihadist terrorism has been carried out from Bali to Casablanca to Madrid to London to New York City to Washington by young Islamic men of North African, Middle Eastern and South Asian origin.
This is not a stereotype. It is a simple statistical fact. [...] But the overwhelming odds are that the guy bent on blowing up your train traces his origins to the Islamic belt stretching from Mauritania to Indonesia.
Yet we recoil from concentrating bag checks on men who might fit this description. Well, if that is impossible for us to do, then let's work backward. Eliminate classes of people who are obviously not suspects.
We could start with a little age-pruning -- no one under, say, 13, no one over, say, 60. Then we could exempt whole ethnic populations, a list that could immediately start with Hispanics, Scandinavians and East Asians. Then we could have a huge saving, a 50 percent elimination of waste, by giving a pass to women, except perhaps the most fidgety, sweaty, suspicious-looking, overcoat-wearing, knapsack-bearing young woman, to be identified by the presiding officer.
I still have a smoldering anger at the exact scenario Krauthammer cites: my 76 year old mother in law was required to remover her shoes in the Houston airport last summer. Is there a serious advocate of true multiculturalism who would deny the absurdity of this scenario?
Actually my reference to Krauthammer's proposals as being "common sense" is a little misleading. I'm quite in favor of a rigorous profiling scheme based on an extensive (and fair) analysis of potential perpetrators. But in lieu of that, eliminating 76 year old women as a class, is a good start.
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Comments
I have to tell you, Jeff: my family and I have all experienced this firsthand. We are all obvious examples of what a terrorist isn’t. Yet, we have all been searched down in “random” searches.
My latest “random search” happened just a couple months ago. I was in Manhattan for a business trip (which was purchased in advance by the company I work for). I flew out to the east coast on this itinerary and had no problem. On my way back, the wonderful people of New Jersey had a warm Bon Voyage for me.
The dribbling idiot at the Continental Airlines counter began to explain to me that I only had reservations rather than an itinerary. It didn’t matter to her that I was HALF WAY through the itinerary, which was obviously paid for! Long story short – this is what happens when you try to book trips through Expedia.
Anyway, after much conversation with moron number one, I finally convinced moron number two that having a supervisor come by and have a chat was a good idea. Less than two minutes after speaking with the supervisor, I was told that the problem was solved and I could now go to security. I, strangely enough, was expecting some sort of an apology for being treated like an asshole, and I told the supervisor this. I never once raised my voice and I was in the right. I never got the apology.
Instead, I was singled out of line through security. I am not a Muslim (made fairly obvious by the Saint Christopher hanging around my neck). I was not disruptive (quite conversely, the employees of Continental made three times the noise I did). Nonetheless, there I was getting frisked by TSA as if I was about to be arrested.
While I did see men of middle-eastern decent passing through security without so much as a second glance, I was off to the side with the nefarious company of a man easily in his seventies and in a wheelchair. This is a firsthand account and I shit you not, this is not an exaggeration.
Funny – they still sold me four beers on the flight!
Posted by: The_Bad at August 2, 2005 12:11 AM
I've always thought that the human race was barely, just barely, smart enough to ensure its own survival--50.00001% smarter than stupider.
But that still leaves plenty of idiocy, and there's no guarantee that that fraction might flip-flop.
Posted by: Jeff at August 2, 2005 08:55 AM
