&nbsp All,
somewhere down the line, this thread changed into a rant about the TSA. I recommend printing out this page from the TSA website. Carry the printout with you as you go through security, then when the knucklehead at the x-ray machine trys to take your nail file you can show them that the TSA specifically allows them. Often, the folks who are doing the screening have no real idea what is allowed or disallowed.

&nbsp I'd like to join the rant and offer some insight. One of my cronies at Chase Field had a day job as a high mucky-muck at Sky Harbor's TSA office. He was second in command for one of the busiest airports in the USA. I've asked him about this stuff and he's always been honest with me. For example, nobody's ever going to hijack an airplane by holding a boxcutter to a stewardess' throat, ever again. The pilots simply won't open the cockpit door. It's not going to happen. She's expendable and she knows it. Is somebody going to hijack a plane with a nail clipper? No, it's just not possible.

&nbsp Orville has since moved on to be the top man at another big airport, I think it was Atlanta. Before he left we talked about security in general and the TSA in particular. Here's the concepts that I came away with: Security can't become static or it becomes too easy to breach. If the policies of a security operation don't change, opponents have an easier time planning to overcome those policies. Now, many of the TSA's random changes are simply poor training. For example, some of the rank and file still want to take your corkscrew, even though you are specifically allowed to have one in your carry on. On the other hand, some of the stratigic changes are there to keep the TSA policies fluid. Some of those changes make no sense, but they're changed just to keep things changing.

&nbsp The TSA is secutity theater, by and large. Orville was candid about this. The organization does have a function making air travel safer, but it also exists to provide the illusion that the government has things under control. In reality, terrorists can down aircraft under tight security. Wasn't an El Al jet downed a few years back? The Israelis are highly experienced in counterterrorism, and the lost a jet in the post-911 timeframe. Are the USA's counterterrorism efforts in the same league? Probably not, but we tend to feel safer when the TSA hassles us.

&nbsp When the TSA hassles me, I know it's phony. But I try to take it in stride. After all, a little security theater isn't too high a price to pay to take a trip by air. I'll trade a few minutes spent with a pimply-faced kid in a TSA uniform to save a few hours driving time, any day. It sucks, but not as much as the alternatives.

&nbsp &nbsp Dan

[end rant]

&nbsp

"Facts are the enemy of Truth"
Don Quixote