Granted the percentages are low, so many people fly every day and so few are caught with guns. But the fact that there are ANY is amazing to me. What's wrong with these people?Two other things seem to be at work here, and neither involves terrorism. The first I’ll call the knucklehead factor. A majority of passengers found with firearms in their carry-ons explain sheepishly that they simply forgot they had them in their bags. This seems plausible since many states have been steadily relaxing laws regulating the possession and carrying of firearms.
The other factor is more serious. A small percentage of firearms detected at checkpoints have been “artfully concealed,” as the T.S.A. puts it. That is, the traveler made an obvious attempt to hide the guns as they passed through metal detectors or as screeners inspected bags. The agency won’t speculate on this, but I’m guessing that certain misguided people are determined to have their weapons with them, even if it means risking arrest.
It will probably come as no surprise to anyone that I blame the gun-rights movement itself. All the talk about needing a gun, about how normal and natural it is to have one, all the justifications and rationalizations they keep bouncing off each other, that's what's to blame in my opinion.
The TSA head, John S. Pistole (terrific name for a story like this) left out one thing. He didn't allow for the fact that some guns get through the system. If they catch so many hundreds of guns every year, imagine how many they don't catch, what with the average competence factor of your TSA workers and the ingenuity of gun owners in "artfully" concealing their weapons?
Indeed, the problem is much bigger that it seems.
What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.
Why, we must have hundreds of airplanes dropping out of the sky every year because of this--oh, wait. . .
ReplyDelete" If they catch so many hundreds of guns every year, imagine how many they don't catch, what with the average competence factor of your TSA workers and the ingenuity of gun owners in "artfully" concealing their weapons?
ReplyDeleteIndeed, the problem is much bigger that it seems."
If there is such a big problem, why haven't there been any hijackings?
FatWhiteMan,
ReplyDeleteMust be all those X-ray glasses that the TSA goons have been issued.
I wish I could find the article, but there have been tests on TSA performance where guns have gotten through, so clearly it can happen and surely does.
ReplyDeleteI blame the gun lobby to a large extent, too, but the gun lobby wouldn't talk their talk if they weren't backed up by the extremists who are in their membership, so it goes both ways.
And how, exactly, do you accidentally forget you have a gun in your bag? If you aren't responsible enough to know where your lethal weapon is at all times, then you aren't responsible enough to have it, PERIOD. We're not talking about the occasional bottle of water or a pair of knitting scissors here. These "knuckleheads" and the knowing offenders both need to have their guns removed - permanently.