Sen. Bob Bennett, Rep. Jason Chaffetz at odds on whole-body imaging

A security officer at Salt Lake City International Airport essentially saw tall, skinny, 76-year-old Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, naked this week.

Bennett not only doesn't care, he called Tuesday for expanding the use of machines that generate such bare computer images to help make flying safer.

That puts him at direct odds with Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, who has been leading a drive to ban using "whole-body imaging" machines as the primary airport screening method, and famously told the House last year, "You don't need to see my wife and 8-year-old daughter naked to secure an airplane."

Bennett called for expanding use of the imaging machines during a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing on the "underwear bomber" who allegedly attempted to down a Northwest Airlines flight on Christmas. Bennett also obtained support for the machines during the hearing from leaders of the former 9/11 Commission.

"I think we should get TSA (the Transportation Security Administration) to deploy technology with the capacity to detect plastic explosives and liquid explosives, nonmetallic threats, and so on," namely the whole-body imaging machines, Bennett told the hearing.

Later, he told the Deseret News, "The Christmas bomber was a wake-up call, because this sort of imaging presumably would have discovered that he had that sort-of (explosive) material on his body."

Bennett said he will introduce legislation as early as this week to move the use of the imaging machines from the current experimental phase to a permanent phase, and help further develop ways to blur faces and body parts to ensure privacy.

He added in the Senate hearing, "I very much support what TSA has done with respect to privacy in these technologies," including having officials view images in remote rooms and not storing images.

Bennett said that when he was leaving Salt Lake City this week to travel to Washington, he decided to go through an imaging machine himself to see the process firsthand.

"Most of the other lines were shut down, and that was the quickest way to move through. I thought, 'OK, let's move through and see what happens,' " he said. "I did not find it to be unduly intrusive."

In contrast, when TSA officials last year tried to force Chaffetz to go through such a machine, he resisted in a tussle that included some cussing, and Chaffetz opted for a pat-down search instead. (Bennett's legislation would still allow passengers to opt for pat-down searches instead of whole-body imaging if they choose, his office said.)