I Didn't Take Her Seriously At First – I really thought Tami was joking when she first said, "Ron, they think I’m a domestic terrorist." While she had mentioned several times about always being singled out for special treatment and inspection on most flights, I didn't give it a second thought.
Yes, airport security is a joke and considering they’ve never even caught a terrorist, means a real person attempting to do harm on an airplane would probably have more to fear from a stray bolt of lightening than these "security personnel." Still I understood the system. It is and always has been a make-work project designed to hire people unable to compete in the private sector. I passed off her concerns as just a function of her overall dislike of useless government bureaucrats. After all, bureaucrats will always be bureaucrats and I often think of Cicero’s quote. I didn’t thank about her complaints until early one morning in May 2002.
A bureaucrat is the most despicable of men, though he is needed as vultures are needed, but one hardly admires vultures whom bureaucrats so strangely resemble. I have yet to meet a bureaucrat who was not petty, dull, almost witless, crafty or stupid, an oppressor or a thief, a holder of little authority in which he delights, as a boy delights in possessing a vicious dog. Who can trust such creatures? ~ Cicero
The First Incident – On this very rainy morning, we were both scheduled to fly together to Las Vegas as she was coordinating the FEE National Convention and I would appear on two workshops. We were loaded down with suitcases, banners, and boxes for the trip and I helped unload the car at curbside before driving to the long-term parking area of the Asheville airport.
When I finally returned to the terminal, Tami was almost in tears. Due to the driving rain, she had been trying to carry some of the bags and boxes just inside the terminal door, when a large, burly security guard came running up to her yelling at the top of her voice, "Ma’am, you cannot leave your bags unattended." Tami's polite response, "Well I have some bags outside the door, see there through the glass, and then these on this side of the glass, which bags do you want me to leave unattended? How about watching these bags while I get the others?" No answer from the irate guard as she stomped off in the other direction.
I arrived as Tami finally had her bags up to the check-in counter where a very professional airline person went carefully through each bag, checking the contents, our IDs, and then the bags in question went down the conveyor belt and we headed through the security screening process without any delay or problems to the gate area.
Airport Revenge – We were about to board the plane when the first security guard noticed Tami and said, "Hey, you, over here for more inspection, as your bags were left unattended." Tami replied, "Well, they were all searched and are now on the plane." Then the five foot tall, square shouldered security guard went through the drill of making her take off her shoes, checking her watch, looking in her shoes, basically flaunting her power, then she said, "now I am going to wand you and where ever it beeps, I will touch you there."