Chemistry 101

[filkertom]

Jayzus H. Christ on a bicycle.

Even if you completely buy into everything the Bush Administration has ever said about terrorism, this is just insanely stupid and incompetent. And, if you don't... it's right in line with every other damn thing.

Comments

[vixyish.livejournal.com]

The liquids folks bring onto plains are basically innocuous - mostly potable fluids and toiletries. And those are perfectly safe to dump together. There are no powerful acids or really noxious things in the mix.

That's the point, though. Either one believes that the precautions really are necessary-- in which case, one believes that there *might just be* dangerous or noxious things in the mix, and therefore they shouldn't be mixing them-- or one believes that the liquids people carry are innocuous, in which case the precautions are unnecessary. What's being pointed out is that the implementation of the policy is inconsistent with believing it's actually a necessary policy.

I, too, think the precautions are unnecessary and being done just for show, so they can look like they're doing something. (Other arguments for that include the point about a liquid attack being a known danger since the 90s, and also the point that baby bottles and medicines are being allowed on, which couldn't be that difficult to fake.)

I think all the photo really illustrates is that the people on the front lines, the minimum-wage TSA employees actually doing the implementing, they aren't buying it, either.