House rejects creation of federal work force for screening (Airport Security)

StLtoday.com ^ | 11-1-01 | Jim Abrams

[FairWitness]

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The House rejected a plan Thursday to turn airport screening operations over to federal employees, handing a major victory to the White House and its Republican allies.

The 218-214 vote to defeat the Senate-passed, Democratic-backed alternative set the stage for passing a GOP aviation security bill that would allow screening to be contracted out to private employers. A vote on the Republican bill was to come later Thursday evening.

[jojonomo55]

Thats why the folks here at FreeRepublic coined the term sheeple.

How does that apply, though, to people who would feel safer in the skies with federal employees checking peoples baggage before they board an aircraft?

[VA Advogado]

I saw Lott on Hannity and he was glad this passed yet the senate passed it 100-0 sounds to me like the Clinton Impeachment. What up with that? Let the house repub's fry. So the senate Rebub's look good.

Lott is a pansy ass. The House is where the real work gets done. Delay has to constantly clean the mess left by Lott and his choir boys.

[6ppc]

I thinnk you are wrong. The American people know what's going on. The press will play it up big, but I doubt the polls will show it's a big deal as long as they work something out on the House version fairly quickly.

[6ppc]

Lott is a pansy ass. The House is where the real work gets done. Delay has to constantly clean the mess left by Lott and his choir boys.

Sadly true.

[No Truce With Kings]

There are a lot of scared people out there who would have felt a lot better with federal employees (me included) and this just might sink in with them.

I fail to see why implementing ineffectual actions to placate Chicken Littles gets us anywhere but into debt.

Federalizing baggage handlers will make you feeeel better. So to make you feeeel better we need to enact a law that will (a) cost a bucketload of money; and (b) probably decrease the safety of air travel because Federal civil servants who cannot be fired, and have no incentive to do a good job are now checking luggage. (The essence of a Civil Service position is that you put in your 40 hours and you get your pay. You do not get rewarded for doing a superior job, nor do you get punished for doing a bad job.)

Tell me -- are you or your immediate family trying to get into civil service? That would be a rational reason that this would make you feel better. Otherwise it is do-nothing feel-good bilge, and your feeeeelings mean less than dog droppings.

[NonZeroSum]

A victory for the Republicans; a defeat for the people.

No, a victory for the people.

Now, instead of immediately having an improved federal force checking luggage, we have to wait for a committee to reconcile the two bills, then a further vote, etc. etc.

There's no reason to think that the "improved (unionized and unfireable and undisciplinable) federalized work force" would do anything to improve airline safety.

The patriotic thing to do would have been to swallow a loss for the country and vote for the Senate bill in its entirety, politics and political ideology be damned. At least we could fly safely immediately.

We can fly safely now. No one will ever hijack an airliner again--after what happened on 911, they'll get torn limb from limb. Both versions of the bill are unnecessary, and don't address the real problem--the government-enforced inability of Americans to defend themselves. I hope that it does get bottled up in committee, until they can come up with something sensible, instead of stupid knee-jerk nonsense.

[FairWitness]

"Let me try to understand this. The Repub Senators vote in total for the demo version. Yet the G.O.P. House stands solid for what I thought is a bedrock Republican principle.

One thing hasn't changed since 9/11. The heroes are the same and the idiots are the same."

I always thought in the past that it was great to have the Senate, in addition to the House, because the Senate "represents the states". However, their recent behavior indicates they need some radical shakeup, like repealing the 17th Amendment.

[jojonomo55]

Obviously, since you've only been here since Oct. 20, 2001, you haven't had the opportunity of being educated. Please do a little research into the Medicare, Social Security, Welfare etc. systems (run by federal workers) and consider how well they have worked over the last 50 years.

Attempting to determine ones educational level by the date of their registration is completely silly. If you want to do some research, do some research on the Secret Service, the military and the people who protect the congress (all federal employees). How well have they worked in the last 50 years?

[6ppc]

If private companies are contracted to do it, and proper standards are set, it will be cheaper and more efficient.

[jojonomo55]

Making people feel better about flying would get people back on airplanes. I am sure that you can figure out the benefit from that.

[jokemoke]

The margin of victory!!!! The bill, which takes steps to make airplanes and airports safer from attack, passed 286-139.

[supercat]

I always thought in the past that it was great to have the Senate, in addition to the House, because the Senate "represents the states". However, their recent behavior indicates they need some radical shakeup, like repealing the 17th Amendment.

After the passage of the Seventeenth Amendment, the states have no longer had any representation in the Federal government. While the Seventeenth Amendment was intended to solve some real problems with corruption in the appointment process, the consequences have been even worse.

[Bill Rice]

I don't know who it was, but I heard a Republican tonight on the news point out that it was the Federal employees in INS who left these terrorists in into our country in the first place. He said this right after Gephart and Daschle had their spew.

I'd have thrown popcorn, if I had any!

[Jodi]

How is the GOP going to look like they are sucking up to "big business" when THEY are the ones who want to privatize????!!!!! Aren't middle to lower income people hired for these jobs?

Sounds to me like democrats are against the working man.

[No Truce With Kings]

If private companies are contracted to do it, and proper standards are set, it will be cheaper and more efficient.

Yup. But to some people it does not feeeel safer. And what is more important -- results or feeeelings?

Given a choice between getting a job done by a civil servant or a federal contractor, I would choose the contractor every time. You can fire contractors. You cannot fire civil servants or motivate them.

[supercat]

A victory for the Republicans; a defeat for the people. Now, instead of immediately having an improved federal force checking luggage, we have to wait for a committee to reconcile the two bills, then a further vote, etc. etc.

So, get rid of all the stuff that there's disagreement about and pass a bill which allows pilots to carry sidearms. Training could begin within days, and Gunsite has agreed to pick up most of the costs.

[No Truce With Kings]

Making people feel better about flying would get people back on airplanes. I am sure that you can figure out the benefit from that.

Not unless you can guarantee that we load the cretins that will get on airplanes because they feeeel better when ineffective and expensive measures are implemented onto planes that we are going to crash into the Atlantic Ocean. I figure the benefit of that is cleaning the stupidity out of the gene pool.

[ninenot]

There were a bunch of other wacked-out problems with the Senate bill--for example, passengers departing Green Bay or Appleton would pay MORE for "security" than those departing O'Hare--and provisions for "security" at the small-town airports were VERY lackadaisical. WHY? Terrorists found the airport in Maine, for crying out loud--why not Green Bay??

[ninenot]

I think your comment ignores history. From 1945 (?) until 2001, airline travel was "safe." The only reason you won't fly anymore is because it is apparent to you that the regs imposed by the FAA (!!!!) are no longer sufficient to deter a bunch of determined people with a good plan.

Guess what? The same bunch, with another good plan, will pass through the same gates with EVEN MORE FAA regs--and Gummint schleppers paid five times the rate of today's 'screeners.' Same security, bigger payroll, no accountability. By the way, those 28,000 people--all of whom will vote their union pocketbook-- will STILL not get the job done.

[Let's Roll]

Excellent points, piasa!