Schneier on Security

George • August 31, 2011 4:23 PM

I guess they urgently need more staff to prepare their barrage of self-congratulatory propaganda in celebration of the Big Anniversary of 9/11. They presumably believe that if they flood the media with greatly exaggerated accounts of the TSA's great accomplishments, containing very many words and very little truth, all the critical commentary about the TSA's massive waste of our time, money, and civil liberties will be drowned out by the sheer volume of official lies.

George • August 31, 2011 5:10 PM

Too bad Joseph Goebbels is dead. The job description sounds like they need someone with his exquisite genius for the Big Lie. Perhaps they've recruited some of the former Soviet Union's master propagandists. Or better yet, maybe they've persuaded George W. Bush to come out of retirement, to again apply his gift for bending the truth beyond recognition to the cause of Protecting the Homeland.

All kidding aside, I doubt anyone who isn't a certified psychopath could be in charge of public relations at the TSA, an agency that seems to have done everything it possibly could over the last decade to truly earn the anger, hatred, and incredulity of the public.

They have to defend an indefensible agency whenever it (too frequently) gets caught with its (figurative) trousers down. They have to justify every inexcusable violations of civil liberties and/or human decency as "a necessary and appropriate response to classified robust intelligence concerning the current threat environment," and perhaps even wrap it in the flag. They have to spin highly visible Keystone Kop incompetence and inconsistency into "layers" or a "security strategy" that keeps us safe.

They have to continually insist that anyone reporting abuses or inconsistencies checkpoints is lying, since such things cannot and do not happen because they violate procedures that are (conveniently) classified. They have to dispose of every instance of documented outrageous conduct by a screener with a claim that the TSA's "investigation" found the screener acted properly in accordance with those (classified) procedures.

They have to deny or spin away the all-too-infrequent reports from the GAO and other independent auditors that a TSA program is an ineffective waste of money. And all the while, they have to put on a happy face and exhort us to practice Orwellian doublethink: Ignore everything we see and hear about their agency and give them our unquestioning faith and trust.

In light of those job requirements, the only possible conclusion is obvious, but all too terrifying: They've chosen Dick Cheney as their new Press Secretary!