This is a joke, right?

I'm sure there are people out there who are willing to say this is a swell idea:

Of the more than 104,000 air travelers who were plucked out of security lines and subjected to a more intense level of screening because of something suspicious in their demeanor, fewer than 700 were ultimately arrested, officials said.

Many more — about 9,300 — revealed something during the screening process that caused the TSA to call in law enforcement for a more thorough investigation.

About half of those passengers weren't suspected of any particular crime, but behaved suspiciously enough that screeners thought police should be called anyway. More than half of the other referrals involved people carrying fraudulent documents, the TSA said. A small percentage involved drugs, contraband currency, immigration violations, or discoveries that a passenger was wanted by police.

Dubbed the SPOT program, for Screening Passengers by Observation Techniques, the effort is shrouded in some secrecy that makes it difficult to evaluate its worth.

TSA officials refuse to say exactly what sort of behavior can make them suspicious, but part of the effort relies on watching for fleeting facial expressions that indicate a person is under stress and has something to hide. Behavior agents also casually question people about where they are headed and look for clues in their responses.

Federal officials said the program, which requested a $45 million budget this year, is a worthwhile complement to random searches and an alternative to racial profiling.

Words fail.

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