Jaunted

The operation was conducted under TSA's Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response program, the abbreviation for which is VIPR, because giving things spooky names is fun. These are the TSA operations that revolve around highways, ports, tunnels, rest areas, etc. The sweep of the Iowa Greyhound station was a VIPR operation and the Tennessee highway stuff is under VIPR as well. Given the program's increasing scope, you'll be glad to know—per Wikipedia—that "various government sources have differing descriptions of VIPR's exact mission." Terrific.

So if you're a conspiracy theorist who thinks that TSA is just a covert way to soften Americans up for a police state, it's a very good week for you (or a very bad week, depending). As for the rest of us—who just think that national security has become kind of a bumbling, bureaucratic, directionless mess—the prospect of dealing with the agency's notorious incompetence in more and more of daily life is also less than thrilling.

Not for nothing, the TSA recently missed its own deadline (again) on its promise to inspect 100% of passenger plane cargo entering the United States. Instead they're limiting themselves to only inspecting "identified high-risk" cargo, an approach that skeptical members of Congress will be asking them about. One additional question they might ask is how TSA has enough resources to patrol highways but not enough to check airplane cargo, which sounds like something that's closer to "doing their job."

[Photo: U.S. Coast Guard photo by Petty Officer 2nd Class Lauren Downs / Wiki Commons]