As IF Times

link BAA backs call to end redundant airport security checks | World news | guardian.co.uk.

It’s starting to happen!  Not long after the report of the pilot who refused to be molested at airport security points, the Brits are bringing some sanity to the process as well.  Finally! 

After all this time some movement to curb the ridiculous tactics employed at airport security checkpoints is at hand.  The hamfisted methods used at US airports were emulated at airports throughout the world for the past 10 years.  This article brings a glimmer of hope that this will change.

While they screened 100% of the passengers to filter out 0.000001% that posed any danger to the public, they failed to guard against much more pressing and dangerous issues affecting fliers.  Far more dangerous to most travellers are the other fliers who are allowed on board with obvious illnesses such as hacking coughs.  Anyone who has ever had to suffer sitting next to a wheezing and hacking passenger for greater than 4 hours knows how terrorized and trapped they can feel. 

Same thing for body odors.  It is very traumatic and inhuman to be forced to sit next to someone with blatant disregard for personal hygiene.  You are essentially marinating in the sweet fragrance for hour after tortured hour.  Having the plane go down in a fiery ball may be considered merciful in comparison.

The third horror is to be seated next to someone who clearly requires the space of 2 seats to support their massive bodies.   There are few things less appealing in life than to sit nose to armpit with someone overflowing like lava into your seat space.  

If you happen to get all three of the above scenarios all rolled into one, well, that should  be grounds for some kind of compensatory damages from the airline and perhaps even a tax holiday for one year. 

If you asked  most people if they’d prefer to take their chances with more logical and less invasive screening with the slim likelihood of terror action or the chance to have the above 3 described experiences removed from possibility, I’d bet lots of money they’d vote for  the latter.   The only terror most people face is to look about the boarding area and pray that someone with any of these issues won’t be seated next to them.  It’s time to recognize that the only people who’ve really been terrorized all this time have been air travellers.  Time to end the terror.

link Sources: Sheen Hospitalized After Trashing Plaza Hotel Room « CBS New York – News, Sports, Weather, Traffic and the Best of NY.

Here is another example of bad media reporting.  Shouldn’t this article read:

A respectable escort was found in the company of Charlie Sheen.  The woman who didn’t want to be identified, was quite embarrassed to be seen associating with the likes of Charlie Sheen.  She was apparently turning her life around, trying to save enough money for her young son, when in a moment of weakness, she became entangled with Sheen at a local club.

Friends of the woman were at a loss to explain her behaviour.

“She normally doesn’t hang around that element, I don’t know what could have got into her.  Even as tough as things were for her, we never thought she’d fall that low.”

The woman will volunteer for counselling and suffer at least 3 months of penicillin shots. 

“I want to put this shameful episode behind me and I hope my friends and family will forgive me.  I know this showed an incredible lack of judgement on my part, I must have been very depressed and not thinking correctly.  Hopefully, time will erase the shame of my association with him.  I knew I should have avoided him when he showed up wearing the same bowling shirt, short pants and continued to recite the same tired double entendres the whole night.  I just hope other women don’t get drawn into his world one day.”