Charles C Mann writing on Smoke Screening in Vanity Fair, spends an afternoon at the airport with Bruce Schneier looking at the TSA in action and asks whether any of it actually makes is safer? His conclusion is obviously no, locked cockpit doors and aware passengers are the only things that work. Even the $1.2b worth of scanners and another $1.2b in air marshals are totally useless.

We’re spending billions upon billions of dollars doing this—and it is almost entirely pointless. Not only is it not done right, but even if it was done right it would be the wrong thing to do.
Bruce Schneier

Have fun removing your shoes, getting swabbed, radiated or sexually assaulted, opening your laptops, removing your coats and taking loose change from your pockets this holiday season at the airport for no reason at all.