Not in any order:

1) Any announced policy would be ineffective. Muslims, radical or otherwise, come in all colors. Changing one's name to make it appear less Muslim requires minimal effort, as does dressing generically, shaving, etc. Passports and other identification do not reveal your religious beliefs, if any. As a matter of fact, any announced policy might end up counter-productive, as groups choose members who are less likely to be stopped.

2) An unannounced program would be challenged in a court of law once someone watched who screeners were pulling. A secret program would also require the complicit silence of thousands of screeners and police, some fraction of which would be morally offended by it. In either case, it will leak, hit CNN, and you're back at #1.

3) Any such program is an ugly precedent. Statistically, African-Americans commit violent crimes at a higher rate than the baseline. This is not causative-- African-Americans are more likely than the baseline to be poor for historical/prejudicial reasons, and poverty is the dominant causative factor in violent crime, for obvious reasons. Yet it's the argument you hear for racial profiling, and (because prejudices run in all occupations, police included) why even wealthy African-Americans have frustrating encounters with police at an unacceptable rate.

4) A significant fraction (majority?) of terrorist acts perpetrated on American soil have been committed by white, American-born, middle-class men. Racial profiling isn't nearly as precise as behavioral profiling is. Put your resources in the latter.

5) Diplomacy matters. Muslim groups will (rightfully) feel slighted by government policies discriminating against innocent members. Muslims who are singled out for time-consuming and embarrassing searches will likely develop negative opinions of America. These negative opinions provide the support, funding, and manpower that terrorist organizations need to function.

By all means, profile by personal histories. Someone has three felonies? Someone is sweating in a cold airport? Someone just wired $50K to a group on the State Department's watch list? Someone went to flight school and didn't want to learn how to land? Check them twice. But leave the innocent people alone. (And give me back the soda I bought inside the sterile zone for $2.50. I'm not finished yet.)

valguarnera@carrionfields.com