Full Body Scans for Republicans Missing Yemen Cruise Missile Action

If you are American, and black, you have to be a little worried about this most recent terrorist incident, and the effects on those of similar skin color. While the well educated youngster from a largely responsible family was Nigerian, his appearance broadens the mental picture that we create when we think "terrorist". Not good.

Which is why the implementation of full body scans is by far the least intrusive method to harmonize safety without over the top pure profiling. If you can't use technology, then you are compelled to work off visual cues or statistical appearance data and that bodes badly for one of America's most traditional populations.

In some ways it's the standardized testing argument that can be found in education. The black community has often sided with parts of the education community in their disdain for standardized testing. The alternatives, like portfolio creation, do not in fact make for an evaluation method that is any less susceptible to racial bias. The person doing the evaluation is still subject to their own personal bias, while the standardized test presents information, if theoretically biased (and we don't concede that there really is bias), that is widely available. You can prepare for it, and very little of it is information the average American would find foreign. You cannot prepare to overcome human bias.

Which leads us back to the situation at  the airports. The body scanning technology provides a way to "test" everyone, without resorting primarily to appearance. Granted you will probably have a certain amount of profiling that is always necessary, but the use of technology is a far less biased route.

Already the politicians are sparring and trying to get in front of the issue. The head of the House Homeland Security Committee is against profiling, without offering a valid alternative.  Absurdity abounds.

"You pat down every person who's suspicious. I don't think you have to target people," Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), told MSNBC. "This Swedish grandmother could just as well be a part of a terrorist plot as anyone else. So I think we have to be very careful when we try to target people." 

(The Hill)

I'm betting you can put about 10,000 Swedish grandmoms on planes around the world and the likelihood of disaster is betwen non-existent, as in zero, or some negative number value, where planes begin to materialize out of nowhere, as opposed to disappearing in explosions. Or a sudden explosion of meatballs materializing ala Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. (Great flick by the way).

The solution, civil libertarians be darned, is to use technology broadly versus profiling narrowly or not at all.

*

Other News:

• Republicans are saying the Administration is soft on terrorism.while Republican Senator Jim DeMint simultaneously holds up the naming of a new head for the Transportation Security Administration. Discounting Obama's escalation of resources to Afghanistan and actions in Pakistan, if you squint, and close your mind, maybe the Republicans are right. On the other hand, the fact that Obama fired cruise missiles, two of them, into Yemen a week or so before the Detroit plane bombing attempt tells you he is probably not quite so soft after all.

• Over at True/Slant, healthcare policy expert Rick Ungar asks how old are you, and how much you need Obama to hold your hand with this latest terrorist escapade.