I flew in yesterday and there was some kind of a "nation-wide computer-system outage", so there was a 1.5 hour line at border control. Apparently the CBP officers were getting a bit frustrated with all the travelers. My officer made a couple of offhand jokes about the idea of sending me back where I came from. Apparently he didn't like that my visa type was too fancy for my job title.

If the airport did not have American flags all over, I would have thought that I'm in a third-world country.

If you're American, you dont really have to tell anything to the US border control.

Meh. I'm sure it's worse for non-Americans, but US border control is more of a hassle for me than any of Europe or China. Africa was pretty bad (they confiscated my passport...?) but otherwise the US is generally the worst.

The US charges $100 to sign up for Global Entry, while Australia is trying to force as many people as possible to use SmartGate with no fee and no registration required...

I travel internationally maybe 6 times a year and on average spend maybe 10 minutes waiting in line and 30 seconds talking to the officer at CBP without global entry.

I've timed it with friends with global entry going through at the same time and they shaved off maybe 5 minutes.

Either ATL, SEA, LAX, JFK, and MSP are way better than average, or global entry isn't worth it except for the tiny percentage of international travelers that commute that way.

Point being, for US citizens, CBP is plenty fast enough without global entry.

I have waited 2 hours at sfo just recently

And they don't really have to let you in the country.

American courts have ruled that it's unconstitutional to bar American citizens from entering America.

I don't think you understand the context of that decision. You do not have a right to enter the USA as a US citizen under all circumstances. You can be denied entry based on suspicious behavior and circumstances, and the border agents have plenty of free reign to interpret that as they will.

Would you care to provide links to cases or law that shows US citizens can be stopped by CBP for refusing to answer questions?

Disagree with "Security Theater". Look up older aircraft types in Wikipedia, like "Boeing 727" or "DC-9" and look at their incident lists and why they crashed. Many of them were destroyed in bombings or were hijacked. Nowadays, this kind of crime has become a rarity and it can be attributed to much higher security levels at the aiport. While I oppose total surveillance strongly, this kind of "direct protection" where you look into the eye of the security guys directly might help sometimes.

The TSA does not have to be anywhere near as bad as it is right now. We could have similar levels of security without millimeter wave scanners or pat downs, and without removing shoes, belts, etc.

The reinforcement of cockpit doors and additional sky marshals are what keep that incident list short today.

Also, add that the passengers will not sit idly by any more.

In the past, the message was, give the hijackers what they want and no one will get hurt.

Of course, every one knows, sky marshals and enforced cockpit doors keep bombs out of the plane...

Of course you can always do better. But compared to Europe, I've found the TSA to be very quick working and quite friendly. I worried a bit after reading so many bad articles, but then wondered that most of them kept smiling and being polite despite their intense work.

> Of course, every one knows, sky marshals and enforced cockpit doors keep bombs out of the plane...

This presumes that the TSA keeps bombs out of the plane, which does not seem to be the case.

http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/homeland-security/2449...

But metal detectors aren't that much better than millimeter wave scanners.

Shoes, belts, and taking the laptop out are the only significant pain point that America has that the rest of the world doesn't. And the shoes thing is a the result of someone walking through security with bombs in his shoe, so it's hard to be too critical.