> An officer who conducted a pat-down of a 6-year-old girl in the New Orleans airport last week “followed proper current screening procedures,” the Transportation Security Administration said Tuesday.
via [cnn.com](http://www.cnn.com/2011/TRAVEL/04/12/tsa.pat.down/index.html?eref=rss_topstories&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_topstories+%28RSS%3A+Top+Stories%29)
This is actually the problem. It’s the “proper current screening procedures” that are broken.
I’m not saying that a 6-year old should never be patted down. But you should have a legitimate reason to do so. Not just because she was randomly selected.
We have a system built on keeping up appearances, instead of identifying real threats. We use random searches instead of targeted searches, because they make people feel better. But that leads us to a situation where we’re safe from 6-year olds, but vulnerable to underwear bombers.
How many more of these videos are we going to have to watch before someone at TSA wises up and just copies the Israeli system?
