All their disads are non-unique – a Privatization’s inevitable internationally
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Fails Oh 6/2 – staff writer @ MotherJones (Inae Oh, 6/2/15, “This Is How Miserably the TSA Is Failing at Airport Security,” http://www.motherjones.com/mixed-media/2015/06/tsa-security-failure-investigation%20)//twemchen An undercover investigation lead by the Department of Homeland Security uncovered devastating holes in the Transportation Security Administration's security procedures, with investigators able to smuggle fake explosives and banned weapons 67 out of 70 times at some of the country's busiest airports. "In one case, agents failed to detect a fake explosive taped to an agent's back, even after performing a pat down that was prompted after the agent set off the magnetometer alarm," ABC News reports. The alarming 95 percent failure rate, during an investigation that spanned a decade, has lead to the reassignment of the agency's chief Melvin Carraway. "The numbers in these reports never look good out of context but they are a critical element in the continual evolution of our aviation security," Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said in a statement. "We take these findings very seriously in our continued effort to test, measure, and enhance our capabilities and techniques as threats evolve." Following the internal investigation, Johnson also ordered for more routine undercover investigations and mandatory retraining for all TSA officials. The full Homeland Security report is slated to be released later this summer. 2ac – terrorism – tsa fails – unions Unions ensure the TSA fails Edwards 13 – Director of Tax Policy Studies at Cato (Chris Edwards, 11/19/13, “Privatizing the Transportation Security Administration,” No. 742, Lexis)//twemchen The recent unionization of TSA’s workforce could make effective management even more difficult. The Bush administration blocked attempts to unionize TSA workers; TSA administrator Admiral James Loy argued in 2003 that “collective bargaining is not compatible with the flexibility required to wage the war against terrorism.”35 The Obama administration, however, has been very pro-union, and it pushed to cover TSA workers with collective bargaining. In 2010, the Federal Labor Relations Authority ruled that TSA workers should be allowed to vote on a union, and in February 2011 TSA approved an election for the exclusive representation of TSA’s nonsupervisory workers.36 Later that year, the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) was approved as the monopoly union for TSA. In 2012, AFGE and TSA signed a collective bargaining agreement covering 44,000 employees after very contentious negotiations.37 Collective bargaining means monopoly union control over a workplace. Monopoly unions tend to reduce workplace efficiency by protecting poorly performing workers and pushing for larger staffing levels than required. They tend to resist the introduction of labor-saving technologies and create a more rule-laden workforce. TSA managers, for example, have to negotiate with union representatives regarding the reassignment of employees, which is problematic for an industry as dynamic as aviation. Air carrier schedules and route volumes often change, which creates fluctuating demand for airport screeners. Collective bargaining also gives unions the exclusive right to speak for covered workers, many of whom may disagree with their views. And it gives government insiders a privileged position to push their own agendas at the expense of the general public good. For example, unions have lobbied heavily to end the Screening Partnership Program (SPP), which allows private airport screening at some airports.38 As discussed below, SPP has been a successful program, yet federal unions have been using their clout to try and kill it. When Sacramento officials were considering private screeners, for example, the “AFGE rallied its allies in organized labor and lobbied supervisors, city council members and state legislators in an attempt to block the plan.”39 Congress should not give labor unions such power to sway public policy decisions. 2ac – terrorism – tsa fails – conflict of interest Ybarra 13 – senior transportation policy analyst at the Reason Foundation, a nonprofit think tank (Shirley Ybarra, July 2013, “Overhauling U.S. Airport Security Screening,” Policy Brief 109, http://reason.org/files/overhauling_airport_security.pdf)//twemchen Therefore, when it comes to screening, TSA has a serious conflict of interest. All other aspects of airport security—access control, perimeter control, lobby control, etc.—are the responsibility of the airport, under TSA’s regulatory supervision. But for screening, TSA regulates itself. Arm’s-length regulation is a basic good-government principle; self-regulation is inherently problematic. In practice, no matter how dedicated TSA leaders and managers are, the natural tendency of any large organization is to defend itself against outside criticism and to bolster its image. And that raises questions about whether TSA is as rigorous about dealing with performance problems with its own workforce as it is with those that it regulates at arm’s length, such as airlines and airports. This comes up again and again in news stories—such as a USA1Today investigation in 2007 that found TSA screeners at Chicago O’Hare International Airport and Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) missed three times as many hidden bomb materials as did privately contracted screeners at San Francisco International Airport (SFO). TSA’s 2007–08 studies comparing TSA and private screening costs were criticized by GAO as highly flawed and misleading.1 2ac – terrorism – tsa fails – split security Ybarra 13 – senior transportation policy analyst at the Reason Foundation, a nonprofit think tank (Shirley Ybarra, July 2013, “Overhauling U.S. Airport Security Screening,” Policy Brief 109, http://reason.org/files/overhauling_airport_security.pdf)//twemchen Second, having TSA operate airport screening conflicts with the principle that an airport should have a unified approach to security, with everyone responsible to the airport’s security director. Numerous problems with split security have been reported at U.S. airports over the past decade, where certain responsibilities have fallen between the cracks, and neither the airport nor the TSA was on top of the problem. Examples include video surveillance cameras at Newark Liberty International Airport and access control doors at Orlando International Airport.2 2ac – terrorism – tsa fails – AIT AITs are LOL Edwards 13 – Director of Tax Policy Studies at Cato (Chris Edwards, 11/19/13, “Privatizing the Transportation Security Administration,” No. 742, Lexis)//twemchen TSA’s most costly investment in technology has been the controversial Advanced Imaging Technology (AIT) machines. These are the “full-body scanners” that the agency began deploying in 2008. The scanners see beneath passengers’ clothing, causing major privacy concerns. The high costs of AITs, the extra airport congestion they cause, and the questionable detection benefits of the machines make them a dubious investment. Remarkably, TSA did not do a cost-benefit analysis of the machines before it rolled them out across the country.50 Indeed, TSA ignored GAO requests to perform such an analysis. In July 2011, a federal appeals court effectively ordered TSA to perform an analysis, which is still pending at this time.51 Scholars John Mueller and Mark Stewart have performed a cost-benefit analysis and found that AIT machines failed “quite comprehensively,” based on their assumptions regarding the probability of attack attempts and other factors.52 Advocates of AIT machines argue that they can find explosives hidden under clothing, such as the bomb carried by Farouk Abdulmutallab in the attempted Christmas Day bombing on a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit in 2009. However, the GAO concludes that “it remains unclear” whether an AIT machine would have detected a bomb such as this.53 And the Congressional Research Service notes that “experts are divided about the effectiveness of AIT systems.”54 One problem with AIT machines is that human error can undermine their effectiveness. In 2011, an undercover agent snuck a firearm through AIT machines at the Dallas-Fort Worth airport several times, apparently due to the inattentiveness of TSA officers.55 The GAO has also noted that currently deployed AIT machines have not been used consistently, which reduces their security benefit.56 Another issue is that even with TSA’s planned roll-out of the machines to all major U.S. airports, future terrorists may respond by boarding planes at smaller airports, as some of the 9/11 terrorists did.57 And even if every American airport had AIT machines, terrorists could still board planes overseas on U.S.-bound flights, as the shoe bomber and underwear bomber did. AIT machines are effective in detecting high-density objects, but less effective with low-density materials such as gels, powders, and liquids. At least one airplane bomb plot, uncovered in 2006, has focused on liquid explosives.58 Terrorists can also undermine AITs by placing explosives inside their body cavities, a technique often used by criminals in prisons.59 Given these weaknesses, TSA’s large investment in AIT machines seems unwarranted. As noted, Mueller and Stewart found that the machines failed their cost-benefit analysis.60 The machines cost $250,000 per unit to acquire and install, and each requires five TSA employees to operate—costing about $315,000 in annual wages.61 By 2012, there were 754 AIT machines deployed across the nation, which cost almost $200 million for the machines and about $240 million in annual wages.62 The Congressional Research Service puts the current annual costs even higher than that.63 And the costs will grow because TSA plans to deploy a total of 1,800 machines.64 2ac – terrorism – tsa fails – SPOT Who thought this was a good idea? Edwards 13 – Director of Tax Policy Studies at Cato (Chris Edwards, 11/19/13, “Privatizing the Transportation Security Administration,” No. 742, Lexis)//twemchen Another TSA program with high costs, but apparently limited benefits, is the SPOT program. It employs about 3,000 officers at 160 airports to identify possible terrorists on the basis of behavioral indicators such as signs of stress.65 SPOT costs about $230 million a year.66 The scientific theories behind the SPOT approach are unproven. The idea is that terrorists can be detected through small behaviors that reveal stress, but people in airports rushing to catch planes are often under stress. The GAO is skeptical of the SPOT program, and it prompted TSA to perform a study of SPOT’s effectiveness.67 The resulting study did show some positive results, but the GAO argues that more thorough testing is needed.68 The SPOT program illustrates the problems with top-down federal control over aviation security. The TSA “deployed SPOT nationwide before first determining whether there was a scientifically valid basis” for it, notes the GAO.69 Nor did the TSA perform a cost-benefit analysis of SPOT before it was deployed.70 That is the way that the federal government often works—it rolls out an expensive “solution” for the entire nation without adequate research and resists efforts to cut programs, even if the benefits do not materialize. Despite the large investment in SPOT of more than $1 billion over the past decade, the GAO found 23 occasions in which known terrorists have breezed through airports where TSA was operating SPOT.71 SPOT has not caught a single terrorist over the years.72 For example, TSA did not catch the attempted Times Square bomber, Faisal Shahzad, in 2010 when he boarded a plane at New York’s JFK Airport—an airport that has an active SPOT program. Shahzad paid cash for his flight to Dubai days after his bombing attempt, and he boarded a plane even though he was on TSA’s “no fly” list.73 Luckily, Customs and Border Protection officials realized the mistake and grabbed Shahzad just before takeoff. Having caught no terrorists, TSA is using SPOT to catch run-of-the-mill lawbreakers. TSA apprehended 1,083 criminals with the program between 2004 and 2008 for such infractions as breaking immigration rules and having outstanding warrants.74 But that small number was out of two billion passengers going through airports that had SPOT programs during that period.75 Between 2010 and 2012, just 353 arrests were made in the SPOT program for nonterrorism offenses.76 So even if it were appropriate to use SPOT for non-aviation policing purposes, SPOT has a high cost with meager results. House Republicans have called the SPOT program “one of TSA’s largest failures.”77 Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC), who is on a House committee overseeing the TSA, summed up the failure of SPOT: “Skip the humans, spend the money on canines. They are more effective, better trained, do not feel the need to unionize and you can still keep the same name ‘SPOT.’”78 Like actually lol Poole 13 – Searle Freedom Trust Transportation Fellow, Director of Transportation Policy at the Reason Foundation (Robert Poole, 12/3/13, “Airport Policy and Security News #96,” http://reason.org/news/show/1013650.html#a)//twemchen In one of the hardest-hitting GAO reports I've ever read, Congress's auditing organization has, in effect, said that the TSA's Screening of Passengers by Observation Techniques (SPOT ) program does not work and should be defunded. Members of Congress asked GAO to answer two questions: To what extent does available evidence support use of behavioral indicators to identify aviation security threats? To what extent does TSA have data necessary to assess the effectiveness of the SPOT program in identifying threats to aviation security? The answer to the first is that there is no such evidence, and to the second is that TSA does not have such data. This is laid out in 55 pages of text plus seven appendices. ("TSA Should Limit Future Funding for Behavior Detection Activities," GAO-14-159, November 2012) TSA says the purpose of the program is to identify high-risk passengers based on behavioral indicators that indicate "mal-intent." Accordingly, its cadre of Behavior Detection Officers (BDOs) are trained to size up passengers as they await screening using a memorized checklist of behaviors indicative of stress, fear, or deception. Passengers with a sufficiently high point score are taken aside for an interview, a pat-down, and a search of their belongings. Assuming nothing bad is found, and the person's behavior does not "escalate," that's the end of the process and the passenger gets back in line. But if the behavior reaches a pre-defined threshold, a law enforcement officer (LEO) is summoned to further question the passenger and decide if an arrest is warranted. The initial (pre-LEO) encounter takes an average of 13 minutes. The program started in 2007 and has grown to about 3,000 BDOs working at 176 airports, at a current annual cost of around $200 million. The GAO team reviewed two TSA studies of the SPOT program and found both to be non-rigorous, with considerable flaws in their methodology. It then carried out a literature review and a meta-analysis of research studies on "whether nonverbal behavioral indicators can be used to reliably identify deception." And the answer is that "research from more than 400 separate studies on detecting deceptive behavior based on behavioral cues or indicators found that the ability of human observers to accurately identify behavior based on behavioral cues or indicators is the same as or slightly better than chance." GAO provides excerpts from several of these studies, by entities such as RAND Corporation, DOD's JASON program, and MITRE Corporation. Another section of the report documents the wide variation in referral rates by BDOs at various airports, as well as presenting evidence on the subjective nature of some of the behavioral indicators BDOs are taught to look for. But the most damning information of all is who actually gets identified as "high risk" and referred to a LEO. Not a single potential terrorist was identified by the BDOs. Those who ended up arrested were for such matters as possessing fraudulent documents, possessing prohibited or illegal items, having outstanding warrants, being intoxicated in public, being in the country illegally, or disorderly conduct. While all those things may be law violations, not a single one is, per se, a threat to aviation security. And yet the only measure TSA has for the alleged effectiveness of the program is the referrals to law enforcement. Nonetheless, TSA has recently conducted a "return-on-investment analysis" which it claims justified the SPOT program. Despite zero evidence that the program can detect or deter aviation-oriented terrorists, the analysis assumes that the BDO "layer of security" prevents a catastrophic (9/11-type) attack. GAO dryly notes that "the analysis relied on assumptions regarding the effectiveness of BDOs and other countermeasures that were based on questionable information." In response to previous GAO and Inspector General criticism, TSA is developing a new set of metrics about SPOT, but says it will require at least an additional three years and additional resources to report on the program's performance and security effectiveness. Meanwhile, it is asking for a budget increase to add 584 more BDOs so the program can expand to smaller airports. In other words, to paraphrase a familiar line about the recent federal health-care law, we have to keep running and expanding the program to see if it works. GAO sums up this comprehensive assessment as follows: "10 years after the development of the SPOT program, TSA cannot demonstrate the effectiveness of its behavior detection activities. Until TSA can provide scientifically validated evidence demonstrating that behavioral indicators can be used to identify passengers who may pose a threat to aviation, the agency risks funding activities that have not been determined to be effective." 2ac – terrorism – tsa fails – at: deterrence This is stupid Sanchez 12 – researcher at Cato Institute (Julian Sanchez, 3/29/12, “Debating TSA’s Effectiveness,” http://www.cato.org/blog/debating-tsas-effectiveness)//twemchen Hawley falls back, repeatedly, on the claim that the new measures must have been effective and worth the cost, since there have been no successful attacks on airplanes over the past decade. By which logic my magical tiger-repellant rock is also highly effective—I’d be willing to part with it for a few thousand dollars, which when you think about it, is a small price to pay for peace of mind. As Schneier observes, successful attacks were an extraordinary rarity before 9/11 as well—and academic studies, the excellent work of our own John Mueller—provide no support for the thesis that the enormous expenditures on airport security since have meaningfully reduced the risk. Oddly, neither do any of Hawley’s anecdotes about various foiled plots—which involve admirable intelligence and law enforcement efforts disrupting terror cells long before they get anywhere near an airport. Schneier concludes with a look at the positive costs of all this questionable screening. If time is money, Schneier estimates that the economic costs of travel delays, multiplied by millions of passengers, dwarfs TSA’s budget each year. Moreover, as those delays—and “enhanced” procedures that sometime seem deliberately designed traumatize survivors of sexual abuse—push travelers into riskier modes of transportation, more lives are likely to be lost without terrorists having to lift a finger. But the most profound cost may be our acceptance of the procedures themselves—and of a society where intrusive searches and arbitrary rules are just a normal part of getting around: Even the TSA administrator agreed CNN 7 – CNN (8/1/7, “The CNN Wire: Wednesday, Aug 1,” Lexis)//twemchen TSA critics say plan to put trusted travelers in 'fast lane' has been 'slow tracked' WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Registered Traveler program, which promised life in the fast lane for any air traveler willing to shell out about $100 bucks and undergo a thorough background check, is stuck in neutral. At a Congressional hearing Tuesday, the founder of the nation's largest Registered Traveler program charged that the Transportation Security Agency is trying to "stunt" the program, while the head of the TSA said the program is "not ready for prime time." TSA administrator Kip Hawley said the program currently is not an effective tool against "clean skin" terrorists. It would not deter those who have no criminal or terror-related background but who still want to hurt air travel, he said. The Registered Traveler program was born of the lengthy airport security lines that followed the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. As envisioned by Congress, passengers who volunteered to undergo in-depth criminal background checks would be sped through security lines while unvetted passengers received more scrutiny. (Posted 8:49 p.m.) You can’t do deterrence without effective personnel Hawley 7 – Assistant Secretary of the TSA (Kip Hawley, 2/6/7, “Statement of Kip Hawley Assistant Secretary Transportation Security Administration U.S. Department of Homeland Security,” Lexis)//twemchen Since the security of these systems is a shared responsibility among Federal, State, and local partners, the Administration has provided significant resources to bolster these security efforts since 9/11. Funds from DHS grants programs may be used for planning, training, exercises, equipment, and other security enhancements. DHS has provided roughly $18 billion in awards to State and local governments for programs and equipment that help to manage risk. In addition to visible unpredictable deterrence, TSA believes that training for key personnel is essential to rail as its baseline of security. There are numerous passenger transit training courses available today. TSA is working with FTA to identify the specific type of training required for employees (i.e., train operators, station managers, and control system personnel, among others) in order to provide guidance to systems. 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