On September 10, 2001, this incipient no-fly list had about 20 names on it.  By comparison, the State Department’s TIPOFF watchlist (created in 1987 to track known or suspected terrorists of all stripes, colors, and modi operandi), had about 61,000 names on it.  This discrepancy positively outraged several members of the 9/11 Commission.  In a rather harsh cross-examination in early 2004, several commissioners jumped on this numerical disparity between tens of thousands of people that the State Department suspected to be bad enough to deny a visa, and the dozen or so that the FAA suspected were about to try to blow up an airplane.

By that time, however, the list had expanded rapidly.  And with this numerical expansion, the list’s intended purpose broadened as well.  The No-Fly List — an actual list now known by that name had been created to replace the piecemeal system of FAA Security Directives as new agencies like the TSA were formed — was no longer to be a protection only against concrete threats to particular planes or routes (although this obviously remained a core purpose).  The list was now conceived to serve other purposes, too.