Does the TSA Give You Good Service? (HuffPo Poll)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christopher-elliott/does-the-tsa-give-you-goo_b_3729333.html

The poll results are way too close for my liking. Either there was a massive influx of AFSers or TSA has put clerks on PR duty to vote in these things to boost reputation.

Anyway, I posted the following comment. I'm assuming it's awaiting moderation as it's not appearing after a couple refreshes and verifying my login.

 

Not a safe assumption. Most TSA employees are very well aware of the public opinion of their "job," and will respond to these polls without being paid to do so because they're all too aware that lying to the public is the only way they can get a paycheck.

For a microcosm of this effect, simply look at the TSA blog and what those lying wanks on the "TSA Blog Team" are willing to sign their own names to.

 

Or a lot of non-flyers or very occasional flyers who haven't dealt much with TSA. Unless the poll adjusts for the background of the respondents, it isn't worth much.

 

I got my 2 cents in.

 

Does the TSA give you good service? It's going to take me a minute or two to even wrap my head around that question. They don't keep me safe, they steal stuff, molest people, harass people, are petty, some are incredibly stupid, among other things. The words 'good' and 'tsa' are just not words that go together, at least not for me.

In the years since they came into being, I can honestly say that I have never ever thought about their 'service' being 'good'. The best I can say about them is that on rare occasion they aren't actively bad (in all of the many ways in which they can be bad-see above).

The TSA is a thing to be endured, like waiting for multiple mosquito bites to go away .

P.S. I'll go do the poll.

 

Over time you build up immunity to the toxins in mosquito bites and quit scratching them.

TSA just gets worse & worse.

 

The rest are either so delusional as to believe in the "work" they do, or so evil as to enjoy that "work."

 

We get "service" from the TSA the way a cow gets service from a bull.

 

I saw it!

 

Not even that, at least the bull has a goal in mind... TSA combined doesnt have the brain cells to have that high of a level of functioning.

 

Chris Elliott is selling out to the travel industry just like Seaney and Frommer. He has a new book coming out that I helped edit (my mistake) and needs to be "mainstream", aka PC, in order to promote it.

He bashes TSA for the past 2-1/2 years, opts out and goes to all this effort to help try to rein in TSA then sells out for a book deal. Apparently money really is the most powerful aphrodisiac.

 

Elliott moved all anti-TSA articles from his main site to TSANews. He clearly distanced himself from the more outspoken. Now I know why.

 

I don't think that's completely true. Articles where TSA is the subject might be concentrated in TSA News, but his newspaper columns have featured many anti-TSA articles. When you see on those in the TSA News Blogs, often as not it's also been syndicated.

When do we get to see the book?

 

But he's not even doing those, RB.

 

Recently?

 

Doober's right.

Christopher Elliott last posted (Tagged as a troublemaker by the TSA) in TSA News Blog on 22 July.

However his last previous post was in May, when he made 7 posts -- so he's down from up to 7 posts in a month to only 1 in almost three months. Their main attraction now is Lisa trying to drive traffic to her new fringe blog.

If we start discussing any specifics as to what we should do, let's take it to the private forum.

 

Not suggesting we do anything. Just thinking Chris has moved away from TSA stories.

 

But TSA News really does seem to be southbound.

I remove links to Lisa's fring blog as they show up here -- I'm not going to drive TUG's traffic there.

When TSA News started I, I let her post countless links to it here at the expense of TUG -- it resulted in about a 1/3 drop in our own traffic. It seemed like a good idea at the time because it was a "common purpose" and they were striving to to make the postings more objective and professional than what appears here in TUG. A lot of folks don't want to roll up their shirtsleeves and join the fracas in a forum environment; they would rather just read the "news". At its peak, it appeared to have about 4X TUG's traffic -- Lisa & Chris really did a bang-up job with it for the first year.

 

So... who's surprised? I called this back when Elliott softballed his "interview" with Boggy Bob.

 

TSANews started strong, but the postings have gotten more... eccentric over the last couple of months. It is obvious that they never truly wanted balanced coverage of TSA, simply a larger stage to wield the club from. I still read almost every post there, but they have strayed so far from presenting points (or counterpoints depending) into a more commentary based format. I understand that TSA generates strong emotions on the part of many people, I understand that most of the people that post there are intrinsically against TSA in any format (abolish being the overall theme). The challenge, is to build their audience and retain them, so their message gets across to more people - the same thing that most sites are after. Drifting towards a more opinion based format, with a few facts thrown in is contributing to their decline. They would do better if they presented fact based articles as newsworthy information, and then presented opinions as editorial content. It would provide a clear demarcation. If they truly wanted to live up to their cover statement about fair and balanced coverage, then they would include articles like this one by Chris, in order to present both sides of the subject - they would also print articles and editorials in favor of TSA, and then provide counterpoint/editorial responses.

Chris is a pragmatist, he dislikes TSA in its current format, he has made that abundantly evident by his past posts, to begrudge him an article here and there to provide context and human element to the issues is simply making him a better journalist, not selling out. I am fairly certain that he will write more articles and posts about what he does not like about TSA. Just my two cents worth.