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• Thursday, July 10, 2008 11:49 PM

  it's all arbitrary

  So, a couple of months after 9/11 I'm at Kennedy airport waiting for a Vegas flight (they gave it away back then, including a hotel package, and a refund of all money paid in the form of chits), and one of the gate alarms goes off. Full blazing alarm, red lights flashing and all. There's an entire complement of armed National Guards not 300 feet away. Nobody came over to check. Gate door is fully ajar, no one in sight, alarms blaring. But that - not in the list of things that have to be checked.

  Fast forward five months. Same airport. I'm flying to Canada because I'd been so sick that I'd been hospitalized for three weeks, and I need the tender loving care only my mom can give. I look like a skeleton. I am so weak that I was taken from the cab and put directly into an airport wheelchair and then taken through all the usual hoops by an airport employee. At the gate, I'm selected for random screening. They have to check the wheelchair. Did I mention it was an airport wheelchair, with a big JFK stamped on it and "driven" by an airport employee? I am told I must stand through the inspection. I tell the guy at the gate that I'm likely to faint - my blood at that point, although boiling, was still ridiculously low pressure. He tells me to keep standing. I faint. I'm sure he thought I faked it.

  Reason? There is no reason and no common sense. Just a checklist. I'd be angry about it, but the fact is that none of the TSA people are given more than cursory training. None of them are security experts. Someone upthread mentioned Israel. No question, that's the way to do REAL security. But keep in mind that all Israelis go through the army. And many of them work security posts. All airport security people in Israel have either worked Intelligence in the army, or MP security posts. But that's easy to do there - Israel only has 1.5 airports. Still, I would think it would be more efficient in the long run to hire and train people with security background all across the US too.

  But here I go looking for common sense again...

  BTW, being super-nice to them works really well. They are so used to being the butt of people's frustration that anyone who smiles at them and makes life easier for them gets by. I'm not sure what that says about actual security, but it sure makes my life easier when I have to fly. Still, if the taser bracelets come into play I'm done flying in this country. I can always cross the border into Canada and fly from there...

  —Irit Read Irit's other letters
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