Bush recently directed Attorney General John Ashcroft to work with Congress to end it. The issue, however, is more complex than politicians often make it. And while racial profiling is understandably objectionable to those who are the targets, a statistical case can be made that it also is an effective tool that shouldn't be dismissed too quickly. Assume that there is credible information that terrorists are planning new attacks here.
Airports are on heightened alert.
You, a law enforcement officer, are told to scrutinize incoming travelers. As thousands stream by, you focus only on young males because most terrorists are neither women nor old, and gender and age can, as a rule, be established at a glance. But if the logic of those who seek to ban racial profiling is followed, all innocent young males should be offended. Like all statistics, these are subject to controversies. But any way one slices them, the basic correlation stands.