I'm getting on an airplane this weekend for the first time since Sept. 11 to fly to Chicago. I'm pretty scared. Last week, a man who had seven knives, a stun gun, and a can of pepper spray in a duffel bag passed through a security checkpoint at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport.
The security officials checking passengers at the gate, or the security screeners, found knives on his person and still cleared him into the terminal because they didn't think he was a hijacker. Nice thinking.
A major problem with security on U.S. airlines is that it is not under sufficient federal control. Screening at airport gates, which is obviously prone to oversight, is currently the responsibility of private security corporations. How do these corporations attain this commission?
Competing agencies propose rates, and the lowest bidder usually walks away with the job. In other words, the cheapest security companies are protecting us from this new and insidious terror threat. As Republican Sen. John McCain correctly observed, "Profit is the motive for the operation of these companies." Isn't that comforting?
The federal government's most crucial and obligatory role is the provision of national security and domestic order.
How does protecting and securing our airlines not fall under this job description? It doesn't appear to be a question of financial capability. The fed can easily fund upgraded airport security screening.
If this is an inaccurate assumption, then someone tell the government to take a chunk of the billions of dollars we're currently spending on missile defense to protect our airplanes. After all, being that our enemies are transforming our airplanes into missiles, isn't airline security sort of like missile defense anyway?
It seems that our government is once again allowing corporations to control a function that should be relegated to the public sector. We should not be so hesitant to nationalize in areas that demand this radical step. Airline security is not the only example. Consider the pharmaceutical industry.
The federal government refuses to control drug prices or finance the production of generic drugs with public funds. Bayer, the maker of the anthrax antibiotic Cipro, charges $350 for a month's dosage. Generic versions of the drug could be sold for as little as $10 per month. Thankfully, most Americans do not currently need Cipro.
However, the Cipro example merely depicts the pervasive inflation of pharmaceutical costs that deny millions of Americans the drugs that they so desperately need.
We lack necessary government intervention in public health, but politicians are too timid to intrude on the turf of multi-billion dollar private corporations. It appears that the effectiveness and regulatory potential of our government is being hindered by big business.
We must all ask ourselves who really runs this country, politicians or CEOs? Consider the recent "economic stimulus" bill that was passed by the House.
The bill provides tax cuts and special favors for corporations that could total $70 billion a year, as well as an overall reduction in taxes for America's wealthiest millionaires.
Offering corporate benefits in a time of national emergency is not the way to stimulate our dwindling economy.
Despite the shortcomings of our system, I will be getting on an airplane this week destined for Chicago. Sometimes, we all need to fly, no matter how vulnerable we may feel.
As I approach the entrance to my gate, I'm going to see a disgruntled security screener who gets paid peanuts above minimum wage and who is employed by a corporation that was hired not for its superior competency and meticulous care, but rather for its reasonable and affordable price. Then I will go to the nearest airport locale with a liquor license, binge drink until my nervous anxiety turns into a hazy euphoria, stumble to my terminal, pass out in my assigned seat, and hope to awake in time to get off the plane in Chicago.
Wish me luck.
