August 5, 2004 by s.z.

This Week's 'Scary Skies' Update 1.  Dave Adams, Federal Air Marshal spokesman, told the NY Times that, contrary to what Annie said, seven of the musicians did not get up during the plane's final approach and take positions at the forward and rear restrooms.  No, per the flight attendants, they were already standing in the aisle when the seatbelts sign was illuminated.  At that time, the flight attendants asked the men to take their seats, and they did.  2.  One of the Air Marshals on the flight told Time that none of the men gathered at the First Class restroom during final approach, like Annie said.  And he said there was no terror. He watched the men and saw nothing out of the ordinary. In a long, single aisle plane like the Boeing 757 that was carrying Flight 327, there are often many people standing or moving around. That was the case on this flight, says the FAM, who has flown hundreds of missions in his two and half years on the job.  ... The FAM's take? "I understand why the passenger felt some anxiety about activity on Flight 327," he says. "But that kind of activity was unusual but not a security incident. There was never a threat to the plane."   So, to quote the concluding narration from the "Mystery Science Theater 3000" favorite, Monster A Go-Go, "Suddenly there was no trace. There was no giant, no thing called Douglas to be followed. There was nothing in the tunnel but the puzzled men of courage who suddenly found themselves alone with shadows and darkness... Frank Douglas was rescued alive, well, and of normal size some 8,000 miles away in a lifeboat."   Of course, in the Annie Jacobsen version, this would have to be changed to: "Suddenly there were no terrorists, no bomb built from a Big Mac container and a disposable camera.  There was nothing on the plane but the hysterical man and woman of scaredycatness who suddenly found themselves alone with shadows and darkness, their invitations to Scarborough Country and Hannity & Colmes rescinded.... The Syrian musicians were found alive, well, and of normal size some 8,000 miles away, performing at a wedding in Damascus." 3.  Shorter Moonie Times editorial from yesterday: Even though the Jacobsens' story has been discredited, and so has John Lehman's claim that airlines were fined by the FAA for having more than two Arab males in "secondary questioning"at the same time, one good thing has come from all shoddily-done stories we ran about the incident: many wingnuts are now demanding racial profiling of airline passengers. Really, that was the gist (or jest) of their editorial.  Here, I'll show you: One positive thing seems to have resulted from the harrowing experiences described by Annie Jacobsen aboard Northwest Flight 327, where 14 Syrian men behaved in a bizarre, menacing way on a June 29 flight from Detroit to Los Angeles, and similar stories reported by this newspaper: the start of a long-overdue debate on whether political correctness is putting the traveling public in jeopardy. [...] We would welcome Mr. Mineta's response — and an explanation of why he apparently takes such a dogmatic position against a limited, common-sense use of ethnic profiling at the airport — now very much a part of the modern battlefield.  4.  Over at Slate, Steven E. Landsburg, who seems to be an economist (and, thanks to Thomas Sowell, we know that many economists are nuts), has come up with a "better" racial profiling plan -- we go ahead and do intensive searches and questioning of Arab males, but then we pay them $100 for their trouble. If Northwest had had a policy like that on Annie Jacobsen's flight, it would have paid out $1,400 to the 14 Syrians. Assuming there were another 200 passengers on that board, they could have covered that cost with a $7 hike in ticket prices.  I am guessing that Annie Jacobsen would have been thrilled to pay a $7 surcharge for the comfort of knowing that her Syrian co-passengers had been thoroughly vetted before takeoff. Well, they presumably WERE thoroughly vetted before they boarded the first leg of their flight, but that wasn't good enough for Annie.  So, to make Steven's plan work in a case like Annie's, the passengers would have to be able to demand that Arab-looking passengers who seem to know each other, and who then go to the lavatory a lot, be searched and vetted during the flight.  It's possible, of course, that a majority of passengers would balk at paying an extra $5 or $7 or $10 for a little extra security. If so, then so be it—if the passengers place so little value on this particular form of insurance, then the airlines probably should provide less of it. But I'm guessing otherwise  Under the modified version of the plan, if Annie and hubby were the only ones who wanted the musicians searched, the airline would still do it, but they would tack an extra $1400 on the Jacobsens' fares.  If the Jacobsens balked at the price of a little extra security, so be it -- they would either have to pay, or shut the hell up. A cold-blooded economist might argue that the last thing we want to do is subsidize air travel for the very people who trigger our search instincts. Searches, after all, are expensive, and therefore often best avoided altogether. So, ideally we'd charge these people extra to discourage them from flying in the first place. Innocent or not, their very presence imposes costs on the system, and economic logic says they ought to bear those costs. But to this there are two replies. First, who says we have to be cold-blooded all the time? When there's a conflict, why can't we sometimes be fair instead? Second of all, even if your own blood runs cold as ice, you're never going to enact a policy that runs so counter to the general public's sense of fairness. Paying people for their inconvenience is a good idea first because it is fair, and second because its very fairness makes it a plausible alternative to the current policy of pretending that old Midwestern women are as dangerous as young Middle Eastern men. If all of our attention is focused soley on young Middle Eastern men, then I would imagine that you'd eventually see some dangerous old Midwestern (or pseudo Midwestern) women doing terroristy stuff.  See, terrorists change their strategies to reflect the current security policies and conditions. Anyway, Steven anticipates that the Middle Eastern men would gladly agree to the extra scrutiny: The Syrian musicians, in turn, would have picked up a hundred bucks apiece in exchange for, oh, 15 minutes or so of answering questions. How many musicians do you know who would turn down a gig at that hourly rate? Barbra Streisand?  But since the musicians wouldn't be able to turn down this gig, the issue of consent is moot.  They get searched and questioned and then get $100 bucks, like it or not. But I think we can see that Steven, while possibly a good economist, has failed to learn the lesson of Thomas Sowell's kidneys: which is, that many people will do stupid stuff for money.  So, if Steven's plan was put into place, I can envison that we'd soon see airports full of men wearing jackets with Arabic lettering, all of them carrying McDonald's sacks, using the restrooms a lot, and glaring at jittery blonde women.  You'd be creating a market FOR scary-looking swarthy men who glare at twits.  Heck, people would be coming out of the woodwork to glare at Annie, even if it did mean they'd be strip searched and grilled by Homeland Security for their dough.  And then maybe some of them would use the money to make chemical weapons to set off in the Minneapolis Mall, since James Lileks was their real target all along . . . 8:20:41 AM

Self-Medicated Family Circus Okay, Thursday isn't supposed to be a Family Circus day, but we haven't done one this week, and anyway, it's a Very Special Family Circus today (kind of an Afterschool Special one) which will teach us many important lessons about just saying no to family vacations. Today's cartoon (you can see it here): The Circus family is still in the damned Grand Canyon.  My guess is that Daddy gambled away their house, and this extended "vacation" is just the start of their new life as itinerant beggars and scam artists. Anyway, the desert landscape is bleak.  Even the sky looks depressed, the clouds flattened by despair.  Mommy is in the distance, her face to the horizon, her back to her family.  As we join the cartoon already in progress, Daddy is taking the kids and leaving her.  Daddy's eyes are the same color as those squashed clouds, and he is burdened by his camera, a diaper bag, and the parasitic PJ.  While it had to be done, it doesn't mean that Daddy is happy about it.  But Billy is charging forward, ready for his new life with New Mommy.  Jeffy looks back, meaning that he will be turned into a pillar of salt.  Big-mouth Dolly, who can't leave things alone, asks Daddy, "Why does Mommy hafta be alone to medicate?" Yes, Dolly, Mommy wants privacy to shoot up.  The intervention went badly.  Daddy is leaving her, hoping she will die of dehydration so he will be free to marry young Cookie Bumstead.  Happy now? Prediction: After George takes the twins, the dog, and the National Security Adviser, and leaves Laura, her chemical dependency will be revealed.  She will be sent to the Betty Ford Clinic, but will escape to the Grand Canyon.  There she will meet Rush Limbaugh, who, jealous of Bill O'Reilly's Parade feature, will buy himself some friends and do his own camping trip.  Rush and Laura will find they have much in common, and a tempestuous romance will commence.  It will be Sid and Nancy all over again. Of course, Alison and Pete, who know more about these things than I do, have a slightly different take on this cartoon: "Why does Mommy hafta be alone to medicate?" Well, Dolly, Mommy/SZ hasn't been feeling very well the last couple of days and she's done a whole shitload of drugs. Right now, looking out across the desert and swaying in the wind with her hair all tousled (Pete's gonna go nuts!), she's thinking, "If I could just ditch these shmucks, I could walk to Burning Man from here." Alison •   Burning Man!  Of course!  That's why the family is still in Arizona.  And if they return home with a couple less children, who's to know?   Now, here's Pete: Boy, Alison, this latest cartoon is unbelievable. Apparently S.Z. is so liquored up that the entire predicting team is fleeing in terror. Well, except for Turkee. He seems to be "fleeing" by running in a circle. Take special note of little Seb (being held by Daddy/Ted). He's looking back at a very dazed S.Z., who's staggering around in a drunken stupor. This whole Amber Pawlik mono scandal seems to be hitting the family pretty hard. I'm just glad Bil Keane has never seen fit to draw me into one of these cartoons. He makes you guys look like a bunch of crazies. Pete M. •   Pete is, of course, the late, lamented Barfy.  When he comes back from his stay in Pet Cemetary, I'm sure he'll be featured in many memorable cartoons.   Feel free to make your own observations regarding  this cartoon, Pete, or dead Grandpa. 6:45:16 AM

Deep Thoughts, by Peggy Noonan Peggy made a surprising announcement today: she's taking a leave of absence from the Wall Street Jounal to serve her country!  As the header to her column says, "Now Is the Time: We must do what we can to win this war. "  So, she's enlisting in the Army as a sniper, and heading out to Iraq to win one for the movie Gipper.  Well, not really -- here's her plan: I am going to take three months' unpaid leave from The Wall Street Journal and attempt to support the Republican Party in the coming and crucial election. (Every four years everyone says "this is the most important election of my lifetime," but this year I believe it is true.) I'm going to give whatever advice and encouragement I have in terms of strategy, approach, message--I hate that word--and issues. Peggy explains that this doesn't mean that she thinks that Rove and Hughes are incompetents who need Peggy's help (although I'm sure that's what she believes), but that she hopes that her modest talents might be of some use to the Bush campaign flunkies.  And in this way she will be aiding the war effort: With the decline of the Democratic Party I have become convinced there is a greater chance we will win the war if the Republican Party wins the election. Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for the Bush-Cheney campaign.  And even though it might seem like all that encouraging, advice-giving, and Reagan-idolotry would leave Peggy with plenty of time to dash off a weekly column, the WSJ said they don't employ "political operatives," even on an occasional basis, so Peggy would have to take unpaid leave. And she bought it!  If she would have taken the time to read their editorial section and see how many political hacks get stuff published there, she'd have known that the WSJ was just using this as a graceful way of telling her that her services are no longer required because she's loony.  But maybe it wasn't all her fault, for, as we learn near the end of this week's column, her editor for the past four years has been James Taranto -- and he just doesn't seem like he'd be able to help anyone tone down their craziness. Anyway, here are today's Deep Thoughts -- enjoy them, because these will be the last ones for three months.  Or maybe forever, if Peggy is killed in political combat.  Peggy: It is a great relief to see there are actually a number of little fish like you, trying hard to swim upstream. Jack Handey: If you saw two guys named Hambone and Flippy, which one would you think liked dolphins the most? I'd say Flippy, wouldn't you? You'd be wrong though. It's Hambone. The Pegster: Actually most of us, when we die, wind up with a few thousand dollars in the bank. Jack: I hope that after I die, people will say of me: "That guy sure owed me a lot of money." Pegaloon: President Bush has his sound, and it's a good one. He's getting his sea legs on the stump--it's hard to go from being-president to being-president-and-running again-for-president, it's a bit of a shift and is always awkward. Jack: It seemed to me that, somehow, the blue jay was trying to communicate with me. I would see him fly into the house across the way, pick up the telephone, and dial. My phone would ring, and it would be him, but it was just this squawking and cheeping. "What? What? " I would yell back, but he never did speak English. So, this is the end of Deep Thoughts, by Peggy Noonan ... or is it?  Personally, I expect to see her writing the weekly Team Leader newsletters in the near future. 3:59:01 AM