Jewish World Review Oct. 1, 2001/ 14 Tishrei, 5762

Marianne M. Jennings

Marianne M. Jennings
JWR's Pundits
World Editorial
Cartoon Showcase

Mallard Fillmore

Michael Barone
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Larry Elder
Don Feder
Suzanne Fields
James Glassman
Paul Greenberg
Bob Greene
Betsy Hart
Nat Hentoff
David Horowitz
Michael Kelly
Mort Kondracke
Ch. Krauthammer
Lawrence Kudlow
Dr. Laura
John Leo
David Limbaugh
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
Chris Matthews
Michael Medved
MUGGER
Kathleen Parker
Wes Pruden
Sam Schulman
Roger Simon
Tony Snow
Thomas Sowell
Cal Thomas
Jonathan S. Tobin
Ben Wattenberg
George Will
Bruce Williams
Walter Williams
Mort Zuckerman

Consumer Reports


Post-September 11 security


http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- I'VE mustered up the fortitude to take to the skyways six times since air travel resumed. Not much has changed in the post-Mohamed Atta skies

Using data processing in my travels, not racial profiling, I saw no one of Arabic descent save it be security employees. One asked, "You are bag?" He then dusted my purse for explosives. But they did the same when I flew to Albuquerque in August.

Security personnel remain a strange lot. Entering their domain, you are forced to eavesdrop on their incessant banter, the type found in my mining hometown when the neighbors argued and Iron City beer had become a part of the equation. A little bit threatening, a little bit flirtatious and a lot loud. National security should have more je ne sais quoi than, "Hey, bag check! Charlie, move your sorry behind! Bag check!"

Charlie searched my purse and focused on my mascara wand. Ah, the damage one can do wielding Maybelline Royal Bleu Great Lash mascara. Brandish it about with under-eye concealer and the world is your oyster. He missed my nail scissors.

Laptop checks, except in Phoenix where security is most lax, have changed. You must remove your computer from its case before it goes through the X-ray machine. This way it can tumble out at the other end and destroy your gigabytes. When I retrieved my laptop from its roller coaster ride down the ramp, the crackerjack security agents asked me to turn on my computer. Luckily, it still worked.

We swear to ticket agents, gate agents and anyone who asks that we do indeed keep our bags in our "control at all times." Yet the security checkpoint finds utter is utter chaos with bags, passengers and Pentium chips strewn everywhere.

Most airports, except Phoenix, hand search even checked baggage. More passengers now check their bags because under new rules, aerosols (i.e., mousse, hair spray) and razors are confiscated. If you carry on your bag, your trip will be nothing but bad hair days, and a great deal of hair at that.

In the Spokane airport, at a table placed in full view of all entering the terminal, an airline employee donned surgeon's gloves and searched my bag. Most of the Spokane metropolitan area saw my dirty underwear, knows my bra size, and covets my black pumps. Spokane missed the mascara wand, something I had transferred to checked baggage after the Phoenix humiliation. Sacramento Airport has placed black fish net material hung on shower curtain rings around the check table for "passenger privacy."

My only full flight was one from Spokane to Seattle because I shared the plane with a women's soccer team. It was like traveling with 17 Gwyneth Paltrows. Very blonde, very bubbly and very concerned about the pregnancy on "Friends," a show whose season premiere they would miss because of their travels. One of the soccerettes misplaced her boarding stub. The flight attendant rechecked her ID and bag and admonished her about keeping boarding stubs. The other Gwyneth Paltrows giggled at their teammate's national security breach.

Passengers are on high alert, something that has the unexpected benefit of keeping them off their cell phones in the waiting area. They're too busy studying other passengers to be yapping on their phones. I saw no passengers who made me nervous except a couple of Seattle grunge types who looked to be self-contained biological weapons, personal hygiene lacking as it was.

Flying now is a surreal experience. Four airplanes crashed just a fortnight ago, killing all aboard as well as thousands on the ground, yet no one speaks of it. The only reminders are discarded newspapers that blare out information on arrests, the fatal flights and hijackers' training. Except in Yoko Ono Seattle. Its newspaper told of the Peace Café. Its theme: "Espresso. Pastry. Politics." Parents take children there for full immersion in posters, to wit, "His whole life is ahead of him. Or is it? War kills." Terrorists kill -- more in one day than war ever did and we fret over stopping them.

There was also a full section entitled, "Understanding Turbans," complete with color drawings of the chapeau difference among Sikhs, Muslims, and desert people. I envision editors of the Seattle Times saying, "Let's give everyone a handy take-along guide - a reference to avoid offenses and misjudgments."

What utter silliness this all is as we face a diabolical enemy. My freedom and privacy are sacrificed for ludicrous security precautions constrained by political correctness that forbids confronting the enemy within our borders. It is an act of courage to board a flight. We have only self-reliance because the media and security will not allow a fair fight. My son Sam yelled to me as I left for the airport, "If there's a hijacker, Mom, throw your purse at him. It'd wipe him out." He didn't know of my secret weapon: the mascara wand.


JWR contributor Marianne M. Jennings is a professor of legal and ethical studies at Arizona State University. Send your comments by clicking here.

Up

09/20/01: No tinhorn terrorists can frighten us
09/06/01: If there is no honor in youth sports, it is because of the adults
08/27/01: The draw of Condit
08/23/01: Lowering expectations and flying high
08/17/01: Thoreau, Walden and stems cells
08/13/01: Our masters: The animals
08/02/01: FRAN, MARY JO, MONICA & CHANDRA
07/30/01: When principle hits too close to home
07/13/01: Rage born of sublimation
07/06/01: Patient's rights and the Valley of Death
06/29/01: There is no excuse
06/21/01: I want an eternal soulmate, but the marriage thing is another issue
06/14/01: Which way maverick McCain? An Arizonan's perspective
06/07/01: No stroke of genius
05/30/01: The lesson of the Mr. Green Jeans senator: 'Moderate' is a classy term for wishy-washy
05/25/01: Baseball has not been so good to me
05/18/01: Clothes make the woman
05/11/01: Selective precaution
05/04/01: Grades: Equality of students, by students, for the students
04/27/01: The Horowitz revelations as seen by a college professor
04/20/01: First, let's kill all the tests
04/13/01: The continuing mistake of underpricing electricity
04/06/01: That pill, Julia Roberts
03/29/01: If it weren't for the parents, we might accomplish something
03/23/01: The melt down of the academy
03/15/01: Columbine redux: Moral infants
03/09/01: The lessons of Tom and Nicole
03/01/01: Pardon the temporary outrage
02/23/01: In defense of homework
02/20/01: A Message for faith-based organizations: Don't take the money, just run
02/06/01: Enough already with the Clintoons
01/26/01: The challenge to be better than we have been
01/19/01: Where have you gone Frieda Pushnik?
12/29/00: The year that was
12/23/00: Litigation: It's the American way
12/15/00: In defense of rhetoric
12/06/00: The company we keep: Lawyers and elections
12/01/00: Liberals' art of trashing of women
11/20/00: Put me out of my misery
11/17/00: On being a statesman
11/13/00: When it's broke, fixing it wouldn't offend the Framers
11/08/00: ELECTION 2000: I SURRENDER
10/27/00: Al in the package? Memo to women: Choosing presidents and husbands
10/20/00: Ten things the gay community should understand
10/13/00: "You Have a Lump."
10/06/00: The government as the pharmacy: Don't
09/29/00: The capacity for truth
09/22/00: Charity with strings and an agenda
09/15/00: The taming of the shrew: Gloria Steinem takes a husband
09/09/00: Why rich folk don't bother me none
08/28/00: Survival of the not-so-fit but conniving
08/25/00: Conventions: A study in contrasts
08/18/00: Resenting the accusations of racial prejudice
08/04/00: Women: Their own worst enemy
07/21/00: Hillary: Our longshoreman First Lady
07/21/00: SUVs: The root of all evil
07/14/00: The basketball gene and white men not jumping so well
07/07/00: I wanna be around
06/23/00: The liberal conversion
06/14/00: Sex and the City: The shallow but vulgar female
06/08/00: No excuses schools
06/02/00: Oh, Canada: Our Nutty Neighbors to the North
05/23/00: The new mollycoddling coach
05/16/00: On adultery and leadership
05/12/00: Taking your lumps
05/02/00: Elian: There's never a liberal around when you need one
04/25/00: Life's circle and tenderness
04/18/00: Womyn who want it both ways
04/11/00: The monsters we're raising with the ergo proposition
04/05/00: Endowing the Hooters Chair for Literature Appreciation
03/28/00: Dr. Laura: The passive/aggressive kid's mom
03/21/00: Dough and campaigns
03/14/00: The volunteerism of conscription and pomp
03/07/00: Hope and pray that religion remains a force in politics
02/29/00: Ditzes in TV Land
02/22/00: Cranky nitpickers make writing a [sic] experience
02/15/00: Those chameleon 60s activists
02/08/00: McCandidate McCain: Flirting with principles
02/01/00: The demise of marriage
01/25/00: Stroke of the pen, law of the land: Clinton's Camelot
01/18/00: Off the Rocker Rorschach Test
01/11/00: Oprah's lemmings
01/04/00: Struggling mightily amidst the comfort
12/23/99: Confused fathers
12/14/99: Drop-kicking the homeless
12/07/99: Turtles and teamsters, side-by-side in Seattle
11/29/99: When conservatives behave badly
11/22/99: Compassionate conservative: Timing and targets
11/18/99: The elusive human spirit and accountability
11/11/99: Succumbing to the intellectual child within with the help of crackpots and screwballs
10/28/99: Live by litigation, die by litigation
10/22/99: Jesse, Warren, Cybill, Donald and Oprah
10/14/99: Inequality and injustice: It's the big one
10/05/99: Dan Quayle, morals and schoolyard bullies
09/30/99: The monsters of epidermal parenting
09/21/99: The Diversity Hoax
09/15/99: Waco Wackos
09/09/99: Selective censorship
09/01/99: The village, the children, judicial imperialism and abortion
08/24/99: Naughty Newt?
08/17/99: In defense of Boy Scouts and judgment
08/10/99: Ruining the finest health care system in the world
08/03/99: Nihilism and politics: ethics on the lam
07/26/99: Of women, soccer and removed jerseys
07/23/99: Not in despair, a mere mortal doing just fine
07/20/99: "Why me?" How about "Why us?"
07/13/99: Bunk, junk & juries
07/06/99: An Amish woman in a Victoria's Secret store
06/30/99: That intellectually embarrassing Second Amendment
06/24/99: Patricia Ireland eat your heart out --- but check out the recipe in 'women's mags' first
06/22/99: Dems and the Creator coup
06/17/99: True courage is more than just admitting troubles

© 2000, Marianne M. Jennings