[Infowarrior] - OpEd: Flying? Increasingly for the Birds

Richard Forno rforno at infowarrior.org
Sat Aug 20 14:48:53 CDT 2011


August 19, 2011, 9:00 pm
Flying? Increasingly for the Birds

By DICK CAVETT

Dick Cavett on his career in show business, and more.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/19/flying-increasingly-for-the-birds/

“I’ll be passing the back of my hand over your buttocks and then come up the insides of your legs up toward the private parts. Is that O.K.?”

“Sounds peachy to me,” I knew not to say. You’re not supposed to joke with airport security, as people have learned the hard way.

This makes sense, but as with so much about airport security — or as someone has called it, “Security Theater” — it seems a bit silly. Are terrorists known for their tendency to joke? (Is there a paperback called “Jokes for Jihadists”?)

When you refuse, as I do, to be ordered into the big scanner with its “safe” amount of X-ray, you are made to feel like a wimp and told to “Stand over there!” And over there — with maybe one or two others who have also noted that whatever X-rays you are urged to get in life are invariably “safe” — you stand, a little ashamed, waiting until the patter gets back from the toilet.

On a recent patting (and the patters, I should say, are a nice lot, picked perhaps for their demeanor) the description “toward the private parts” had a grain of inaccuracy. The rising hands didn’t stop short,  causing a slight “ow” on my part. “Sorry” was delivered feelingly (no pun intended).

Another time, after having been felt up in public, I fell into a pleasant chat with the man with the business-like hands. He’d recognized me, and there were no other pattees waiting.

I asked, “What sort of jokes are you tiredest of by the one patted?”

“Oh, you can probably guess,” my guy said cheerfully.

“Something like, ‘Hey, cute stuff, whatcha doin’ after the show?’ ” I guessed.

“You got it.”

“Any of the would-be humorists ask what sort of man would seek a job patting other men?”

“You got it again.”

“How are you supposed to behave in the face of such wit?”

“Smile and keep patting.”

I’m sure no professional patter lives in fear that an accumulation of such micro-erotic experiences will endanger his orientation. Or the passenger’s.

As you know, if you endure the increasingly dismal experience of flying, some airports are markedly better then others.

Detroit Metro Airport deserves a valentine.

My wife, a million-miler out of Detroit from years lived in Ohio, views it as an oasis. The employees seem to have been picked for their helpfulness. And you never stand in a line that seems to stretch to the horizon while additional lanes are closed for no apparent reason. (Saving money with fewer employees?)

And the security is just plain better. They find things other places don’t. A friend states, “I’m horrified at stuff I mistakenly put in my carry-on. And it’s been missed everywhere. Except Detroit.”

In my case, a lethal-looking metal letter-opener stuck to the lining of my carry-on bag had passed undiscovered at various less diligent airports by who knows how many previous “inspectors.” In Detroit it was rightfully seized; but seized in a nice, unnecessarily apologetic — but professional — manner, rather than with that cold air of enjoyed power so often seen in the airport worker. Bringing to mind Shakespeare’s “Dress’d in a little, brief authority.”

(A chilling note: another affable patter in another major city, when I asked him if anyone was still dumb enough to try to get bad stuff through security, said, “Mr. Cavett, you’d be amazed at how many guns we get this way.” I gulped and asked what would be happening to me now if I had one. “See that guy at the coffee counter? He’s a cop. I raise my hand and next thing you know you’re wearing his ‘bracelets.’ You go away for a good long time.” “Thanks,” I said, too stunned to ask who those reckless heat-toters were. From his manner it was clear they weren’t merely licensed gun-carriers who wear them all the time and just forgot.)

Another thing about Detroit: they don’t run out of those plastic tubs so you stand around in your stockings while a new load eventually arrives, apparently from another state.

Why should there be such a contrast between flying from Detroit and, say, from that bad dream posing as an airport, grubby LaGuardia?

Is there a director of some special genius behind the operation? If so, would that person please publish his secrets in a book and pass it around?

At LaGuardia, my wife, a seasoned traveler, dutifully presented the see-through plastic bag containing a few small bottles of the approved size containing liquid. One was seized. It contained something she valued. Pointing out that it was regulation size, she got, “It ain’t labeled, lady.”

Supposing whatever possibly dangerous substance it contained had, say, “olive oil” written on it, I inquired, then would it be O.K.?

“Yes.”

“Do you see anything a little stupid about that?” I asked in my sunniest manner. He appeared not to. He dropped the bottle into the barrel beside him.

“One more question. Do you ever feel a little funny about standing eight inches from a barrel full of possible explosives for the rest of the day?”

He went into that mode of looking into the distance, instead of at you. I leaned into his gaze, just for fun.

“Move on,” he sort of belched.

Security Theater. That fun house, LaGuardia.


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