The TSA and Congress

Perhaps we should not be too surprised by the enthusiasm with which congress has embraced the procedures at the airport that passengers have to go through in order to fly on a plane. Congressman Barney Frank may have found his dream job or at least live vicariously through the TSA's current technology.

As a physician, I studied immunology, allergy, and autoimmune diseases. Generally speaking, each of these is an exaggerated response by the body to an outside stimulus. We have all heard stories about people going into anaphylactic shock following a bee sting or eating some food like peanuts or shrimp. In other words, an attack on our system by an allergen like bee venom, which though painful, is met by an overreaction by the body to this stimulus, and it the response that actually kills us. Perhaps this is a suitable metaphor for the way terrorism works. We are attacked by a bee sting or a fire ant and in response we muster all of our defenses and shut down our bodies far in excess of the injury. In terrorism, one act in a town like Portland by a 19 year old loner, and thwarted by the FBI, becomes national news. I fully expect that someone somewhere is crafting legislation to set up metal detectors and such at public gatherings. Sooner or later, the America we know will destroy itself in a governmental anaphylactic reaction and, in an attempt to save ourselves, we will actually destroy ourselves.

All this is happening incrementally. First in air travel but sooner or later, when someone puts a bomb on some other form of transportation, or in a commonly found and deeply American public place like a fast food establishment, we will expand this intrusion into our lives with the justification that it will somehow make us SAFE. And like the frog who is placed in a pot of cool water, and heated on the stove, we will accept each degree of heat because it is doled out incrementally, and we will remain in the pot until we are boiled to death. If we attempted to place that same frog into a pot of boiling water, he would have jumped out instantly. Imagine the outcry if all of these draconian travel rules were instituted overnight and we went from traveling freely without metal detectors, exposure to radiation, and intrusive genital frisking to what we have today....I think we would have rioted. But maybe I am wrong. The sheep always gather to the shepherd when the wolf howls. When you are willing to trade your freedom for safety you will have neither.