...Reggie Jackson v. Frank Drebin...

I am going to do the impossible, the thing that nobody says anyone can, or should do…and I’m going to go out on a limb and say that it is actually possible that both sides are right on an issue…(GASP!)

So here it is, Thanksgiving weekend and everyone is travelling. On a side note, how do people travel on Thanksgiving at the airport? They jack ticket prices up so high I cannot imagine spending that kind of dough to fly anymore. It was always expensive, but over the years, things have gotten nuts. Trust me, I follow these things. I go on kayak for fun, I am not kidding. I think looking at flight prices is interesting.

Anyway, millions flock to the airport and have to go through security, and every single one of them is inconvenienced, without question. The insane rules that seemingly make no sense actually may make no sense. Some airports require you to do certain things, and we’re more strict on domestic flights than other countries are with flights coming into the US, so you have to ask yourself, “what the hell are we doing?!”

People are freaking out b/c a scanner can tell if you have big feet or not, but whatever, at some point you’d think that looking at thousands of body-scans an hour would cease being interesting, and personal freedoms in this sense are under attack only in the mind of the person being scanned – its sort of a “get over yourself” type of thing. But I get it, I see how it’s something uncomfortable, and I understand that the inconvenience of it all is there, I wouldn’t argue that.

However, there are a few things. First, flying isn’t a right. Don’t fly, then. Don’t get on a plane if you don’t like the rules. I say this over and over again, consumers in this country think they are slaves to the developer/seller of the goods – we aren’t! WE HAVE ALL THE CONTROL!!!!

If you don’t like what airlines are asking of you, you don’t need to write a letter or protest violently, you simply can stop using the airline and convince your friends to do the same. It’s that easy. It really is. Short of that, then what you’re protesting is a personal dislike for a policy, and why would a Company change it’s policy b/c a vocal minority doesn’t like the policy? It has to grow to the majority stage.

But beyond the annoyance of it all, and beyond the fact that people are acting as if they can expect 100% convenience from every single thing they do in their lives, I feel like the bigger issue is that we are convincing ourselves we are stopping the next 9/11 from happening because we make me put my laptop in a separate bin.

These policies aren’t secret, we know what they are, and so do the terrorists. The people who orchestrated 9/11 weren’t aliens who guessed right and got “lucky”, they knew our culture, our rules, our methods, and understood how to circumnavigate the system. They will do the same next time, if there is a next time.

Yes, we’re making it more difficult for the terrorists who aren’t skilled to get things done. But the TSA regulations, in my view, aren’t going to prevent a years-long, well devised, intricate plan from happening. I am sorry if that makes people uncomfortable or angry, I just don’t see how pat-downs will change anything except catch the obvious terrorists.

At the end of the day, it reminds me of The Naked Gun. Watch this scene, and my view is Frank Drebbin is TSA (from about minute 4:20 on) and our National Security Administration. Reggie Jackson is the next terrorist, and #20 on the Angels with the nail file on the mound is the underwear bomber or the unsuccessful buffoon in Times Square. Sure, we’ll catch the obvious, but good old fashioned luck is the only way to stop Reggie from poppin’ out of the pile and attempting to kill the queen.