Shortly I will be driving to Denver. I could have flown, but that would have been wasteful, and I would have to adhere to an airline’s schedule, not mine.

The issue of government and security is a thorny one. Some will say the issue of security should have been handled completely by the airlines, and I understand and respect that point. Some things the TSA do and have done resemble an incentive of quotas (how many people did we frisk today) rather than an incentive of quick safety. We hold the airlines accountable when we’re late, through our choice of carriers, but there’s not a good way to hold the TSA accountable.

I do have to consider what it would be like to have free market security. September 11, 2001, is one single data point, a rather nasty one, but hardly the norm. Airline vendors, seeing what could happen, would raise prices to buy whatever security they think they would need. If they buy too much, customers would balk at the higher prices. Too little, and a terrorist attack happens, and people wouldn’t want to fly the not-as-friendly skies.

In order to establish that security point in the middle, one would think we need more data points. In order to establish what minimum level of security is required, an airline with a lower level of security would have to fail (not deliberately, of course) to stop another attack. The history before September 11 may seem invalid because more people are now willing to try, but the airlines are also shaken out of their denial that it could happen.

I wasn’t impressed with the government bailout of the airlines. Northwest, Delta, and United went bankrupt anyway. That was our tax dollars going bye-bye. American Airlines was able to avoid it. The others should have been able, too. There would probably be more airlines like airTran, Southwest, JetBlue, and SkyBus. So be it. I like $10 tickets, given enough notice of travel.

An appropriate use of the government would be in threat profiling. The FBI has Wanted posters up 24/7. That wouldn’t be the only way, of course, but that type of information sharing would provide more efficiency than frisking old ladies and random searches of people who travel three weeks a month. Yes, I would employ public indications of creed, such as prayer at certain times, dress, or language. We get suspicious of certain Christian clerics that have a history of sexual abuse. That kind of discrimination is natural and useful.

When the government mandates a level of security, a traveler’s choices between airlines get narrowed to a choice of two: use the airlines, or don’t. If the government were to mandate the kind of scanners that give agents a skin-level view of one’s body in order to detect weapons, either the airlines would go under or we lose another level of human decency and respect. We should allow individual airlines to assess that risk and make that determination.

The threat color system should be scrapped. Airlines have been at orange for as long as I can remember. The next level up is red, imminent attack. The TSA is going to do what it is going to do. It can always do more to inconvenience us before we get attacked. More travelers might seek more airline travel if we were green or blue, but we’ll never get there.

We do not live in a pre-September 11 world. We should be thankful that some people designated to perform security functions at airports seem to be doing their jobs, even if it may not be appropriate in the interest of freedom for them to be doing so. The fact that we haven’t been attacked again is evidence that given enough diligence, we can protect ourselves.

I do not look forward to the day when we are attacked again. Someone will find a chink in the armor. Someone will blame the government, and the government will impinge on us again. I’m sure the terrorist would prefer that we convert and join the 7th century, but he might accept making it even less convenient for us to live our lives the way we want.