Potential acts of terror stopped at the checkpoint by the TSA since 2001:
0
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Knitting needles confiscated and grannies fondled: Classified as it pertains to Homeland Security
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Knitting needles confiscated and grannies fondled: Classified as it pertains to Homeland Security
[1] http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/investigation-breaches-u...
Slate has another article from 2010 you might enjoy http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/20...
Security guards don't go trumpeting how many bank robberies they've thwarted, because they simply don't know.
However, they will tell you about all the contraband they've confiscated simply because that's measurable.
Their justification is that they stop hundreds of bits of contraband (of which they control the definition) daily in the ongoing war on terror.
They failed to detect the other 67 who were able to embark planes with weapons end explosives[0]. But that's just a detail... You know, these agents were instructed to avoid TSA screening. Who trains to do that in the real world, right? [sarcasm]
[0] http://abcnews.go.com/US/exclusive-undercover-dhs-tests-find...
Pick the right time and you get a few hundred casualties and shutdown US air travel for a few days.
Surely if terrorists had wanted to undertake an airline attack and were put off by the TSA presence, they would simply have hit an easier target? There are plenty of public spaces with a lot of people around, malls etc, or even inside the airport itself?
The fact that we don't see attacks is surely more likely to mean that there just aren't many such people on US soil with the means and motive?