Thanks For All The Security

Since we've once again heard Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts remark you don't have any civil liberties if you're dead, a cowardly, historically ignorant comment if there ever was one (see Matthew Yglesias' takedown), let's examine just what is being done to keep us safe. Like what they're doing on, say, airplanes.

The head of a group of Federal Air Marshals says the service is badly broken.

"Right now we cannot protect the public," says Frank Terreri, an active duty air marshal who represents a group of 1,500 air marshals. "And not because we're not proficient, not that we're not capable, it's because federal air marshal management, along with the Department of Homeland Security, won't let us do our jobs."

Terreri says air marshals are not able to work undercover because check-in and boarding procedures at airports make it impossible for air marshals to maintain their anonymity:

"We're supposed to be undercover. But basically when everybody knows who you are, you're just the guys on the plane with the gun. Either they're gonna avoid you or overcome you, you're at a severe disadvantage."

Apparently DHS and the air marshals management have attacked this whistleblower by investigating him repeatedly and generally trying to get him kicked out of the program. Brian Ross updated his report here. This is insane:

The investigation also found air marshals are required to stay in the same hotels, which often advertise their presence.

"Welcome Federal Air Marshals, Company of the Month" read the sign outside a Sheraton hotel in Florida.

At a Holiday Inn, a list of the air marshals with their names and room numbers was kept in public view at the front desk.

Why don't we just have them wear "I Am A Federal Air Marshal" T-shirts, while we're at it?

I could go on and on about the ports, the chemical plants, the container shipments, the nuclear plants. Practically none of them are secure either. This Administration and its supporters in Congress pay lip service to security. They use it as a means to strip Americans of civil rights and civil liberties (not to mention a political cudgel to bash Democrats). But they don't actually do much of anything to make Americans more safe or secure.