Losers who work at the TSA (Doug Casey)

All bureaucracies inevitably become sodden, counterproductive, and centered mainly on their own agendas.

But the TSA is on an extraordinarily steep downward trajectory.

I suspect that is for several reasons. One is that the TSA is on the “front line,” as they pathetically describe it, of an unnecessary and illusory war on terror, so they’re very sensitive about somehow justifying their existence.

Another is that they’re dressed up in uniforms and organized in a paramilitary manner; once you put people in costumes, they become much more obedient chimpanzees.

Another is that their employees are actually the dregs of US society.

It amazes me that when Congress created it, they found 50,000 people, practically overnight, who thought that getting paid to go through fellow citizens’ dirty underwear at airports was a good deal.

[....]

This is unskilled labor of the most menial sort.

But these are not, by and large, teenagers with no skills; rather, they are middle-aged people who should be able to find some more productive—or at least higher-paying—use for their time.

I suppose it was perceived as a step up for those who were Walmart greeters or packing bags at Safeway—although that’s incorrect, because although those are low-paid, unskilled, and unchallenging occupations, they are at least honorable work.

From 'Totally Incorrect: Conversations with Doug Casey (LFB)' by Louis James https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00AZMKGE8/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_U_x_vKdAAbAPKG5EN via @amazon