TIPS AND OTHER BAD IDEAS

If there were a contest for post-Sept. 11 bad ideas, Operation TIPS would be the undisputed champ. The only good thing that can be said about the Justice Department’s plan to enlist a million or more Americans – truckers, letter carriers, parcel delivers, meter readers, cable installers and the like – to keep their eyes peeled and to report suspicious activity is that such snooping and squealing is so contrary to the very essence of what it means to be an American it has had a powerful unifying effect across the American political spectrum.

So, instead of getting under way next month as Justice proposed, TIPS is likely to be little more than an unpleasant memory. A House select committee has begun consideration of the bill to create President Bush’s Homeland Security Department and killing TIPS is a high priority for Republicans and Democrats alike.

This is welcome because TIPS not only is a bad idea, it is a needless distraction. And as the first anniversary of Sept. 11 draws near, the distractions that have bogged down Congress are piling up to a distressing degree. Although it has some bright spots, the 216-page bill before the House adds to the clutter.

Sponsored by Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Texas, it gives the president most of what he sought, including consolidating the Coast Guard, Customs Service, Secret Service and Federal Emergency Management Agency into the new Cabinet department. It also gives him a lot he doesn’t want, including an indefinite – and indefensible – extension of the Dec. 31 deadline for nationwide airport baggage screening.

There is no greater single point of vulnerability than the airport baggage system. The ability of terrorists to take hundreds of innocent lives with one explosive-packed suitcase remains, so to speak, unchecked. The foot dragging by the airline industry on this issue and the fumbling at the Department of Transportation (culminating in the unceremonious firing last week of John Magaw as the head of the new Transportation Security Administration) reeks of a lack of resolve. There are 429 commercial airports in the United States: Screening every bag for explosives is a big job but it certainly is doable. The current law, part of the post-Sept. 11 industry financial bailout, allows individual airports to get an extension if they can show cause. The president should make it clear he will accept no reneging on that deal.

Other ground upon which Mr. Bush should stand firm is his proposal for the states to develop uniform rules for issuing drivers’ licenses as an anti-terrorism measure – uniform rules, not a uniform license. Given the extent to which drivers’ licenses are the identification gateway to everything from getting on board an airliner to getting a passport, uniform standards on how one is obtained and what information they provide is both common sense and in the national interest. Such standards are not, as conservatives (including Rep. Armey) and civil libertarians hysterically allege, the first step toward a national ID card and the government’s ability to track the movements of citizens. Such exaggeration is a bad idea; almost as bad as TIPS.