I’m glad that after 10 years, Osama bin Laden is finally gone.  He brought it on himself.  But, the impact on our airline industry will forever live in memorial to that black-hearted terrorist. 

To give a bit of a preview into what promises to be a major story breaking on Channel 9 at 6 pm one week from today, on May 9th 2011, I’m providing you with a look into the work of Brendan Keefe.

Brendan, the I Team reporter does some great reporting. One of his stories that I feel most passionate about involves transportation. Anyone familiar with my site here knows that I’m a tremendous supporter of Skycar Technology, which will dramatically reduce congested roadways. But one of the other big reasons is that the airlines are too highly regulated, and now with the TSA becoming too aggressive coming alarmingly close to becoming unionized, options seem limited. Airports since 9/11 and the creation of the TSA along with Homeland Security have become a real pain in the neck.

Well, it doesn’t need to be. In fact, many of us have watched this whole transformation occurring right before our eyes, the kinds of things that brought us Social Security, Medicare, and even the IRS are happening to our airline industry right now by panicky politicians. Their motive is to obtain a vote from a terrified public by clamping more and more regulations onto air travel to the point where flying is no longer enjoyable. In fact, it’s to be dreaded. It is now normal to catch a flight to Chicago which is only a 4 to 5 hour drive by car, arriving at the airport an hour and a half before the flight, to ensure that you can get through security. Then by the time you are seated, the plane taxi’s to the runway and you actually get into the air, make your flight, land, taxi into your terminal, pick up your luggage, you could have driven your car and arrived at the same time and not had to deal with intrusive TSA agents or lost luggage.

Instead, this clip by Brendan Keefe is how flying is supposed to be. People that need to be in New York, or Chicago for a morning meeting don’t need their time wasted by government bureaucrats. Bureaucrats make their living wasting time, so that is why they don’t value it. The people in the clip below should be able to get to the city of their destination, have their meeting, do some shopping, and be back home for dinner with their families without any trouble what-so-ever. The only difference between the traditional airlines and the clip below is the government regulation and interference which they impose on everyone under the guise of “protection.”

Terrorists have accomplished what they intended scaring our policy makers into over-reacting like cowards at every dropped pin, taking every precaution of a useless neurotic to further expand the intrusion of government. But for the movers and shakers of the world, where time is valuable, government openly wastes their energy in lines like cattle to be processed, when in reality they should arrive at the airport, park their car, get on the plane and be in the sky within minutes. Anything less is unacceptable.

Instead, this is what air travel has been reduced to. Here is a clip of former Miss USA being groped by TSA agents. Not only is her time wasted in the lines, but she is physically molested. Is this what the value of her ticket buys her?

The function of flight is the same between the large airport with the major airlines and the smaller airport with the smaller, individually owned planes. The only difference is government interference, and nothing displays the complete failure of government endeavor better than this obvious difference shown in the clip by Brendan. The function of flight is to get where you want to go and to get there without your time wasted. It is not acceptable to endure extra pain or suffering because our government couldn’t do its job to begin with failing to recognize the role of radicals in the world and how to spot them in an airport.

I’ve thought about the 9/11 hijackings a lot over the years, which is what started all this mess. The terrorists used box cutters to run airplanes into the World Trade Center buildings which caused so much devastation to the American psyche it’s almost unfathomable, even to this day. I can say that if I had been on that plane a knife would not have held back a whole plane full of people from stopping the terrorists. I mean a knife cuts, but there’s ways to deal with that, even with multiple attackers. I can only offer that people were so shocked by the act that they were frozen with surprise. If America should have learned anything from 9/11 it’s how to deal with that kind of situation in the future, and that instead of complying with a terrorists demands, two or three of the passengers would overwhelm the attackers before trouble got out of control in the future. Not what has happened, which is to avoid every possible danger in every possible circumstance, and to stop being Americans.

The terrorists succeeded.

Americans need to stop being wimps that just take this kind of stuff without a fight. It’s not a big deal to get 20 or 30 stitches if you can stop a plane from crashing. If the pilots are killed, the tower can talk down a bold passenger into a large river or lake for a controlled crash landing. But the key here is in being bold. There are still bold people in America. But, because of the TSA rules, they’ll fly themselves instead of being inconvenienced by the larger airlines which isn’t good for business.

So once again, government hurts business. The movers and shakers of the world will stop flying first class and just get a private plane. The strong will find some other form of transportation. That leaves everyone else to travel with the traditional airlines and to put-up and shut-up to follow the ridiculous rules of the TSA which is just one more nail in the coffin of freedom.  That coffin was buried at sea long before the body of Osama hit the water. 

Rich Hoffman

https://overmanwarrior.wordpress.com/2010/12/04/ten-rules-to-live-by/
http://twitter.com/#!/overmanwarrior
www.overmanwarrior.com