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Author Topic: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?  (Read 21128 times)

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alexis

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Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« on: December 29, 2009, 01:06:26 AM »

What with all the new security measures instituted after this latest bombing attempt?

As of now, I heard that you can't get out of your seat for the last hour of a flight, can't have a laptop open during that last hour, and have to listen to Oasis for the last hour also. OK, I made that last one up, but only the last one. It seems that only people who really really need to travel are going to put up with all that hassle.

What do you folks think?
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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #1 on: December 29, 2009, 01:24:39 AM »

Well, there's always the train!

Arlo Guthrie /City of New Orleans
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JimmyMcCullochFan

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #2 on: December 29, 2009, 04:12:05 AM »

or you could be cool and take the bus like I did this past holiday season.
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emmi_luvs_beatles

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #3 on: December 29, 2009, 05:22:27 AM »

We just flew from Minneapolis Minnesota to Clearwater Florida and it really wasn't that terrible of security. Now international flying might be a different story :P
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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #4 on: December 29, 2009, 05:44:18 AM »

Now international flying might be a different story :P

That it will! 

Air Canada announced today that passengers are limited to one carry-on item, all electronics are banned, they must remain in their seats and not access their carry-on luggage during the final hour of flight, and passengers may not hold any item in their lap during this period.


Flew in from Miami Beach BOAC
Didn't get to bed last night
On the way the paper bag was on my knee
Man, I had a dreadful flight



Just throw up on the passenger next to you.
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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #5 on: December 29, 2009, 05:57:13 AM »

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Bobber

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #6 on: December 29, 2009, 08:56:22 AM »

It seems that only people who really really need to travel are going to put up with all that hassle.

This may solve some environment issues.
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Joost

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #7 on: December 29, 2009, 03:40:58 PM »

This year I flew from the national airport in Amman, Jordan and there was hardly any security at all. You know you have to put your suitcases in that x-ray machine? It was unmanned for a few minutes and nobody was watching the screen while they just kept the suitcases coming. The guy that checked the passports? He only stamped them and didn't even bother to check the names or photos. And I saw a guy board a plane while he was holding an unsealed bottle of water in his hand.
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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #8 on: December 30, 2009, 03:37:58 AM »

We already have to take off our shoes and put them in the bin.  Will we now have to take off our underpants and put them in too? 
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alexis

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #9 on: December 30, 2009, 03:52:35 AM »

We already have to take off our shoes and put them in the bin.  Will we now have to take off our underpants and put them in too? 

There's a joke in there about "hot pants" somewhere, but I'm too tired to figure it out ...  ha2ha
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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #10 on: December 31, 2009, 06:35:34 AM »

Plane crashes and being killed by terrorists seems to be a bigger hassle to me so i'll gladly accept the pat down before boarding.

Joost

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #11 on: January 03, 2010, 04:31:56 PM »

Plane crashes and being killed by terrorists seems to be a bigger hassle to me so i'll gladly accept the pat down before boarding.

I agree. When I was flying from Jordan I was more nervous that I usually am on a plane because security was a joke. But everyone I know that has flown to the US complains that it's just gotten out of hand at the US airports, and that they're all completely paranoid. A friend of mine was interrogated for half an hour in San Francisco because he didn't know how much money he had on his bank account.
« Last Edit: January 04, 2010, 03:27:22 PM by Joost »
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Kevin

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #12 on: January 04, 2010, 04:05:20 PM »

The lowest estimates in the War on Terror have 100,000 dead civilian Iraqis, 15,000 civilian Afghans and still counting. If the best they can do back to us is inconvenience our travel plans then it seems to me we're in credit.
War is hell.
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alexis

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #13 on: January 04, 2010, 06:53:31 PM »

The lowest estimates in the War on Terror have 100,000 dead civilian Iraqis, 15,000 civilian Afghans and still counting. If the best they can do back to us is inconvenience our travel plans then it seems to me we're in credit.
War is hell.

Yes it is. Don't forget roughly 3,000 civilians who died on 9-11. It's not all just travel inconvenience.
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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #14 on: January 04, 2010, 09:16:18 PM »

Yes it is. Don't forget roughly 3,000 civilians who died on 9-11. It's not all just travel inconvenience.

First of all: I don't want to downsize how horrible the 9-11 attacks were the slightest bit. They were horrible. No discussion there. And any reasonable actions that can be taken to prevent that from happening again should obviously be taken.

But you've got to put things in perspective.

Every year, about 435,000 Americans die because of smoking. 111,909 because of overweight and obesity. 85,000 because of alcohol abuse. 75,000 because of infectious diseases. 55,000 because of toxins. 43,000 in motor vehicle collisions. 16,586 commit suicide. 10,801 people get murdered with firearms. 776 die in accidents with firearms. 20,000 die because of sexually transmitted infections. 17,000 die of drug abuse every year. And 90 get hit by lightning. And how many people got killed by foreign attacks on American soil? 3,000 in the last 68 years (since Pearl Harbor). So that's an average of less than 50 a year in the last 68 years. So purely statistically speaking, your chances of getting killed by a foreign terrorist in the USA are extremely low. Not even half as high as getting killed by lightning.

Which, once again, doesn't mean that America doesn't have has the right to do whatever they can to prevent something like 9-11 from happening again.

But how are things going with the "War on tobacco"? Any progress yet in "The war on obesity"? How about the "The war on alcohol"? Any news on "The war on firearms"? Or that "War on lightning"?

And yet, the "War on terror" was important enough to invade two countries and pretty much abolish the right to personal privacy. It's mostly mass hysteria and stimulated paranoia that's shamelessly being exploited. And you can never have any guarantees anyway. The attacks in London and Madrid weren't even on airplanes or airports.
« Last Edit: January 04, 2010, 10:56:55 PM by Joost »
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alexis

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #15 on: January 05, 2010, 03:08:23 AM »

First of all: I don't want to downsize how horrible the 9-11 attacks were the slightest bit. They were horrible. No discussion there. And any reasonable actions that can be taken to prevent that from happening again should obviously be taken.

But you've got to put things in perspective.

Every year, about 435,000 Americans die because of smoking. 111,909 because of overweight and obesity. 85,000 because of alcohol abuse. 75,000 because of infectious diseases. 55,000 because of toxins. 43,000 in motor vehicle collisions. 16,586 commit suicide. 10,801 people get murdered with firearms. 776 die in accidents with firearms. 20,000 die because of sexually transmitted infections. 17,000 die of drug abuse every year. And 90 get hit by lightning. And how many people got killed by foreign attacks on American soil? 3,000 in the last 68 years (since Pearl Harbor). So that's an average of less than 50 a year in the last 68 years. So purely statistically speaking, your chances of getting killed by a foreign terrorist in the USA are extremely low. Not even half as high as getting killed by lightning.

Which, once again, doesn't mean that America doesn't have has the right to do whatever they can to prevent something like 9-11 from happening again.


But how are things going with the "War on tobacco"? Any progress yet in "The war on obesity"? How about the "The war on alcohol"? Any news on "The war on firearms"? Or that "War on lightning"?

And yet, the "War on terror" was important enough to invade two countries and pretty much abolish the right to personal privacy. It's mostly mass hysteria and stimulated paranoia that's shamelessly being exploited. And you can never have any guarantees anyway. The attacks in London and Madrid weren't even on airplanes or airports.


I think the problem is that governments (plural, it's not just the US, is it?) don't know how to prevent this from happening again. When you're a hammer, everything looks like a nail. When you're a big government, and you're attacked militarily, everything looks like a military target. I don't think it's "exploitation", I think it's generally not having a clue as to what else to do.

If you ask me (didn't you?), we're doing nothing but creating 2 martyrs for every one we actually capture or kill; many more for every new set of villagers we drone-kill. The only way out of this I see is to give the potential bombers an alternative that looks more attractive than martyrdom. If they had a course of action open to them that involved bringing security and freedom from want to their loved ones, and if martyrdom put that at risk, wouldn't they choose another option? iPods for peace? Maybe not quite, but I think the only way out of this is to convince these people to educate their kids in something besides "theological studies". How about some engineering, or medicine, or construction skills?

People aren't stupid, and it's rare that they act against what they perceive to be in their best interest - IMO, even bizarre behavior can usually be explained by examining the incentives and penalties as understood by those involved. As long as martyrdom looks better than the alternatives (hey, the way it stands now, their families are often elevated socially for having raised such a "hero"), that's what people are going to do.

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Just my two shekels. How do you see an end to the madness  :)
« Last Edit: January 05, 2010, 04:03:31 AM by alexis »
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Joost

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #16 on: January 05, 2010, 08:32:03 AM »

If you ask me (didn't you?)
It's an open forum, so I'm asking anyone who feels like answering. :)

we're doing nothing but creating 2 martyrs for every one we actually capture or kill; many more for every new set of villagers we drone-kill. The only way out of this I see is to give the potential bombers an alternative that looks more attractive than martyrdom. If they had a course of action open to them that involved bringing security and freedom from want to their loved ones, and if martyrdom put that at risk, wouldn't they choose another option? iPods for peace? Maybe not quite, but I think the only way out of this is to convince these people to educate their kids in something besides "theological studies". How about some engineering, or medicine, or construction skills?
Amen! :)

I think that the biggest mistake that the Western countries made is that they underestimated the cultural differences between the West and the Middle East.
1. They assumed that they would be welcomed as liberators in the Middle East once they'd gotten rid of Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden. What I think they failed to realize is that people will never feel free as long as they're controled by people who don't understand their religion, their traditional values and their culture. And if given the choice, I think anyone would rather be oppressed by their own people than by foreign forces.
2. They underestimated the decisiveness of their enemies. I don't think there are many Americans or Europeans who'd be willing to blow themselves up for their homeland. But if you don't have much to live for anyway and you firmly believe that you will be rewarded in the afterlife if you die a martyr, it's an entirely different issue. So you're never going to solve anything here by simply killing more people or blowing stuff op. Cause like you said, for every person you kill there's a family, a tribe, a village that's going to be pretty p*ssed off. And if you can't kill your enemy, you'd better try to give it less of a reason to be your enemy. That might seem like "chickening out" or something, but realistically, I think it's really the only sollution. We're all stuck on the same planet so we'll have to learn to live with each other.
« Last Edit: January 05, 2010, 09:39:28 AM by Joost »
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Kevin

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #17 on: January 06, 2010, 10:12:11 AM »

Sorry Alexis - my post was a bit crude and I didn't mean to diminish the loss of life in New York (or Bali, Kenya, Istanbul, Madrid, London.) Just sometimes people (not your good self) don't seem tio make connections with what is happening and the actions of our governments (and, being in the democracies we so so noisily tout to the rest of the world, for which we each as individulas bare (bear?) a share of the responsibility for.)
Love watching the Rocky movie set in Afghanistan, when the muhjahadin (sp) are the good guys and the Soviets the baddies. 1984 and newsspeak is alive and well.
Britain solved the Northern Ireland problem by talking to the enemy.
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alexis

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #18 on: January 07, 2010, 04:05:49 AM »

Sorry Alexis - my post was a bit crude and I didn't mean to diminish the loss of life in New York (or Bali, Kenya, Istanbul, Madrid, London.) Just sometimes people (not your good self) don't seem tio make connections with what is happening and the actions of our governments (and, being in the democracies we so so noisily tout to the rest of the world, for which we each as individulas bare (bear?) a share of the responsibility for.)
Love watching the Rocky movie set in Afghanistan, when the muhjahadin (sp) are the good guys and the Soviets the baddies. 1984 and newsspeak is alive and well.
Britain solved the Northern Ireland problem by talking to the enemy.


No problem at this end, Kevin thanks!

I saw this movie, or at least the end of it, a few weeks ago. It was a dramatization of the last days of arpatheid in South Africa. Apparently nothing got done until the two sides sat down and spoke, imagine that. Seems the one guy that was able to get these two sides in the same room was a mid-level manager at one of the diamond firms. Though his company's sympathies might at first glance seem to be with support of the apartheid regime, they were farsighted enough to see that change was going to come either in a controlled fashion or through catastrophic revolution, and they wanted to control the direction (I wonder if Rhodesia had started it's chaotic downward spiral by then?).

Anyway, in the epilogue to the movie they interviewed the actual guy. Very unassuming, unprepossessing sort of guy, hard to believe he had the cojones of steel to force these two groups together. Made me wonder who else I see every day and don't think much about, who might be just as strong inside ...

Anyway (again!), in the epilogue, they said that when Northern Ireland and England started their peace process, they sent folks down to South Africa to see how it was done.

I can see that approach ("talking"  :o ) working for Palestine and Israel. I have a harder time imagining it when not all parties are nation states, as in the case of Islamic extremist/terrorists vs the West. Who would do the talking?

Just my two cents,  ;sorry for the rambling, it's late/I'm exhausted!
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Kevin

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Re: Is flying just going to be too much of a hassle?
« Reply #19 on: January 07, 2010, 12:49:32 PM »

I can see that approach ("talking"  :o ) working for Palestine and Israel. I have a harder time imagining it when not all parties are nation states, as in the case of Islamic extremist/terrorists vs the West. Who would do the talking?

Just my two cents,  ;sorry for the rambling, it's late/I'm exhausted!

Cheers Alexis. Always enjoy our chats.

We would have to talk to the Taleban. Get the Shia's talking to the Sunni's. Israel must talk to Hammas.
We solved Northern Ireland by power sharing - guys that would have killed each other ten years ago sit together in power now. (though bare in mind that many terrorists/freedom fighters walked free. Think of our reaction to the Lockerbie release.)

I think we managed to convince them that they had more to gain by peace than war. God bless Game Theory. And they were people divided by culture, ethnicity, allegance, religion, in some cases language,with a history of violence and animosity going back centuries. I can't see any obvious reason why it can't work in those other places.
« Last Edit: January 07, 2010, 04:37:51 PM by Kevin »
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