The Reg reports on a recent survey that conclusively shows that “the majority of Americans think the Transportation Security Administration, which handles security screening at US airports, is doing just fine…”
Overcoming the initial shock, my conclusion is that if the government keeps something up long enough, people will just swallow it in the end because they will no more know any better. Duh, the humanity.
I’d tag it also as “inane use of statistics”: from the article “Not all of those surveyed had recent first-hand experience with the TSA. In fact, nearly half had never boarded an airplane during the last 12 months, which at first blush would seem to cast their opinions of the agency into some doubt.”. And the article/press release draws all kind of conclusions out of this ~1000 people measurement of mostly non-fliers.
Sigh.
Sounds like the TSA is using the loophole that cosmetics companies have been using so long: just repeat doing “research” until you hit a random group that actually agrees with your claim, and then publish it as the only one. You can even publish the selection criteria and all, because no one will make a stink out of it big enough to matter.
Yes, they abuse statistics all they want. However, the article also states that “according to Gallup, among the 52 per cent of respondents who had flown, opinion of the TSA was actually higher than among those who hadn’t.”