More than a hole in your underwear?

Wasn’t the underwear bomber enough of a warning? Now airline passengers are stuffing lizards into their shorts. It’s clear that we need to initiate more intensive screening before boarding or there’s going to be more extensive screaming afterward. Snakes on a plane are just the tip of the iceberg, there’s no telling what people will be trying to sneak past security. What about small rodents like mice or gerbils or lemmings? How many ferrets can fit in a pair of boxers? And is that a Komodo dragon on your head or just an unusual hat? We’re also going to have to start worrying about scary multi-legged creatures like spiders, scorpions, and centipedes. Any of these varmints can be secreted in clothing and won’t trip the metal detector. And bees in a rubber-stoppered glass vial should breeze right through. Why is the person going thru security in front of you twitching so much? Does he have ants in his pants? Does he literally have ants in his pants? Those little bitey red ants? Is he going to set them loose in the plane? For the love of god, isn’t somebody going to do something????

Okay, calm down. Full-body scans should take care of the problem – after all, something actively squirming isn’t going to escape detection. Even if the perpetrator sedates the critters first, the presence of a ferret or two in the x-ray is going to arouse some suspicion. (Isn’t it?) But if something else is squirming, I don’t think that guy should be let on the plane either.

Let’s face it, we’re not gonna feel safe(r) until those f-b scans are in place and in use at every airport. (“Excuse me, sir, is that a ferret in your shorts or are you just happy to be here?”) And you can carp about invasion of privacy all you want, it’s not like the TSA crew is gonna be gathered around the screen cracking wise about everyone who goes thru. (Okay, maybe about the people who need to pay for two seats.) The novelty will wear off after about, oh, half an hour, and the constant stream of boobs and peckers will become a disgusting blur. Besides, you think you have a constitutional right to get on an airplane? Don’t like it? An erosion of liberty? Take the train. (Joe Biden does.)