> "If it had been on the doors there, it would have stopped people getting in."
Problem? People blowing themselves up on airplanes.
Solution: Check them for bombs before they board the airplane.
Next Problem? People blowing themselves up in the lines before the bomb check in the airport.
Solution: Check people outside the airport.
Next Problem? People blowing themselves up in the lines outside the airport
Solution: Check people for bombs before they board the trains for the airport.
Next Problem? ...
s/[airplanes|airports|trains]/<crowded place>/g
Apparent Actual Problem? Crowds of people are hard to protect without making the crowds live's very uncomfortable.
Actual problem? People want to blow themselves up in crows of people.
Solution: Spend more effort making the world a place in which people do not like blowing themselves up anymore and/or in which they are too lazy to be motivated to do it.
First, get news media to lift their embargo on trying to understand the motivations of people who perpetrate these awful attacks. Right now, it seems the only acceptable explanation is comic-book evil plus religious prejudice ("they hate our freedoms!"). This is basically a taboo on the application of reason, and we'll get nowhere until it goes away.
Second, reflect a little on the possible motivations of these people.
Third, I suspect, attempt to persuade Western governments to stop (or significantly scale back) blowing people up, murdering them without trial, etc, in other parts of the world. Best estimates for the body count in Iraq, for example, are in the many hundreds of thousands, and many of those cannot be combatants. I absolutely condemn terrorism, but if I were a terrorist, I'm pretty sure this would be my motivation.
Speaking of which, the dumbest NYT editorial I've read in the past decade was their nonsensical insistence on airport-style security for "international trains" in Europe.
Trains are not an especially interesting target for terrorists! I have no idea how this piece could have been written without any of the editors putting the tiniest bit of thought into the basic premise.
Problem? People blowing themselves up on airplanes. Solution: Check them for bombs before they board the airplane.
Next Problem? People blowing themselves up in the lines before the bomb check in the airport. Solution: Check people outside the airport.
Next Problem? People blowing themselves up in the lines outside the airport Solution: Check people for bombs before they board the trains for the airport.
Next Problem? ...
s/[airplanes|airports|trains]/<crowded place>/g
Apparent Actual Problem? Crowds of people are hard to protect without making the crowds live's very uncomfortable.
Actual problem? People want to blow themselves up in crows of people.
Solution: Spend more effort making the world a place in which people do not like blowing themselves up anymore and/or in which they are too lazy to be motivated to do it.
Plan?