Yo, British Airways: Google This

Some marketing genius at British Airways thought it would be a grand idea to nose around online information about its best customers to compile useful personal information, including private photos, that could be used to "essentially [...] recreate the feeling of recognition you get in a favorite restaurant when you’re welcomed there," as one British Airways marketing genius explained in the Daily Mail newspaper in the UK.

Yo, British Airways: That is a stupid, annoying idea, and whoever came up with it deserves the boot. Facebook users are already increasingly wary of corporations nosing around in their private matters, of course -- and this idea is absolutely nothing like a "favorite restaurant" where you might be known and greeted by name.

Here's another take from the useful Big Brother Watch blog in the UK.

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Border Patrol Nabs Castro Sneaking Dirty Bomb Into U.S. ... Oops! Make That Ex-Arizona Gov. Castro, 96, and He'd Just Had Radiation Treatment

[Photo: Mr. Castro, the suspect in suspected nuclear-bomb plot that was thwarted by vigilant U.S. Border Patrol agents]

The former governor of Arizona, 96-year-old Raul Castro, of Nogales, Ariz., was waylaid recently by intrepid agents of the U.S. Border Patrol in southern Arizona, where they don't have as much to do these days because fewer Mexicans are risking death illegally trudging 100 miles through the brutal heat of the Sonoran Desert.

A radiation detector, it seems, signaled some radiation on the elderly gentleman's person during one of those pesky stops by the Border Patrol agents who are all over the region.
Governor Castro, it seems, was emitting traces of radiation from a medical procedure. So he was detained and humiliated in the 100-degree heat because he could have posed a "nuclear threat" to the Homeland.

This occurred a good ways from the border itself on Interstate 19 north of Tubac, Ariz. (Border Patrol claims to have martial-law authority in a zone within 100 miles of the border, which includes the city of Tucson.)

You think I'm kidding? Read this.

Mr. Castro was elected in 1974 as the first (and only) Mexican-American governor of Arizona. He is also a former U.S. ambassador to Argentina, Bolivia and El Salvador.

This appalling incident has been well-known in the area since it occurred three weeks ago, and I've been amazed that the national media ignored it for so long, till it got picked up out of a local Nogales publication. (The Phoenix and Tuscon media are too lazy and too craven to rouse themselves much and report this out. They're afraid some right-wing screwball might write them a stern letter of complaint, after all.)

Finally, Salon has got on the case. Here.

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TSA 'Business As Usual," Defending the Indefensible. Again

I bend over backwards at times giving the TSA the benefit of the doubt, including in its remarkably timid responses to the guns that more people are trying to bring through checkpoints because those people think they have a God-given "right to carry" their firearms anywhere they choose, including onto an airplane.

TSA=We're vigilant about old ladies in wheelchairs, but we're terrified about upsetting the gun lobby.

Now here, as if to prove that the TSA just doesn't make sense many times, is the agency's intrepid mouthpiece, "Blogger Bob" Burns, defending the indefensible -- that is, he airily waves off protests about TSA agents waylaying passengers as they queue to board airplanes, and "testing" whatever beverages they have in hand.

Now, it's a given that if you have a soda or a bottle of water in hand at the gate, you have purchased or obtained that drink within the secure area of the airport, because they wouldn't have let you carry it through the checkpoint in the first place. The TSA says, as a matter of optics and a tactic of preemptively covering its butt, that of course nothing is "100 percent secure," yada-yada. Yes, that is correct. Except when the TSA has some asinine gate-theater to defend, and then it's "CSI Airport."

"Blogger Bob" is correct in saying that this is nothing new, despite the current outpouring of online protest about the agency testing drinks at the gate. And, let note here the absolutely predictable response from the Brigade of Official Reassurance on public radio that there's nothing to see here, folks. Why, silly, the government told us so!

Yes, they have had this ludicrous procedure in place for a while -- but my guess is that they've stepped up the performances lately of this particular comic act on the security-vaudeville playbill.

Agents waylaying passengers at the gate may be designed to present "another layer of security," as "Blogger Bob" says, but in fact what we, the public, see is another ridiculous manifestation of make-work for a vastly bloated federal jobs program, the TSA -- which is without doubt the most hated agency of the federal government. The most hated, yes. The possibly also the least trusted. And lack of trust in your security is a basic security flaw, as any expert in the field will tell you.

Here's "Blogger Bob" on the TSA blog today, pooh-poohing objections to this nonsense by insisting that this all is "business as usual." Business of security theater as usual, I would add.

Emphasis is mine:

"While browsing the web this morning, I saw that the topic de jour was that TSA was now screening liquids at the gate. We've talked about random gate screening here before, and if you travel frequently, you've likely experienced a gate screening. Not a big deal really... Heck, even I have been pulled aside for random gate screening.

So, the most popular question that comes up with this topic is: "Isn't this redundant?" On the surface, it does seem that way, and it's the first logical thought that many have. However, any security expert will tell you that nothing is ever 100% secure. So, gate screening is kind of like our safety net to keep up with anybody who might be trying to get things past conventional screening.

We stay away from static security tactics. Layered security is common practice, providing the necessary unpredictable measure that makes it more difficult to do malice to the transportation infrastructure. If everything we did was always the same, it would provide a checklist for people to know exactly what to expect. While this would be extremely helpful for passengers, it would also be useful to those wishing to do us harm. ...

As far as the testing of liquids at the gate, this is just one of the many options we have to choose from when deciding what additional tactics to use each day. We started using test strips back in the summer of 2007 and continue to do so. The test involves a test strip and a dropper containing a nontoxic solution. In case you're wondering, our officers don't place the test strips in your beverages/liquids. They simply have the passenger remove the cap/lid and they hold the strip over the opening of the container. Procedures call for moving the test strip to the side and applying the solution from the dropper to test the strip. If the test results are positive TSA will conduct additional testing to make a final assessment.

In a nutshell, liquid screening at gates is random and it isn't happening at every airport every day. So other than possibly taking a few moments of your time before boarding your flight, it's business as usual."

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On July 4th: Veterans By the Numbers, and a Grand Old Flag

I was at a minor-league ballgame in Tucson last night, on the eve of the Fourth of July, and was surprised when the 10,000 people at Kino Stadium were asked to "honor" the "active-duty and retired" military veterans in the crowd.

Yay for them. But hang on a minute, I thought. In jingoistic circles, it's become increasingly popular to exhort people to jump to their feet to salute "our veterans." But we seem to be forgetting (not just at this ballgame, but elsewhere) that our "military veterans" are mostly not active-duty and retired people on the government payroll.

I wish we would start better defining what we mean by "veterans." The fact is, most military veterans are not "retired," that is, receiving lifetime pensions from the government after being on the active-duty military payroll for at least 20 years.

Rather, the vast majority of living veterans are those who honorably did their service, usually at extraordinarily low pay, and then returned to civilian life after their hitches were up. In general, unless they were injured in combat, those veterans receive no benefits from the government. They don't even quality for treatment in veterans' hospitals unless they are flat-out destitute, with no other access to medical care. I think we're entitled to a free flag at our death, is all. Fair enough; that's the deal.

In 2010, according to the Veterans Administration, there were 21.8 million living veterans of the armed forces in the United States. Of those, 1.9 million were retired after having spent at least 20 years in the military -- and are receiving veterans pensions that totaled, in the 2011 fiscal year, $51 billion, not counting other benefits such as health care.

The rest of our veterans -- that is, 19.9 million of them -- are just men and women who were in the service, during World War II and Korea, Vietnam and the Gulf wars, and in peacetime as well, who did their duty and were honorably discharged and went on to normal civilian lives.

My concern here is that in professionalizing the military, which we have done, we've lost the grounding we once had in the idea of military service that once included the general population.

The jingoists have forgotten that many, many Americans served and then went quietly about their lives. They don't require public "honoring" -- but they still should at least count when we talk about veterans.

And speaking of ballgames, when did it become common to have the crowd stand at honor and sing "God Bless America" at the 7th inning stretch? I felt like I was at a religious tent revival and imagined that awful tub of lard Kate Smith in a star-spangled white gown, bellowing into a microphone while jack-booted American Legionnaires stand by with truncheons to whack those who don't obediently remove their caps. When did God, baseball and Kate Smith join up? Nietzsche said God is dead; I know Kate Smith is dead, and I suspect baseball is at least dying since it became patriotic audience-participation rather than sport.

You know what I wish our National Anthem was? "You're a Grand Old Flag," by George M. Cohan, which goes:

"You're a grand old flag,
You're a high-flying flag
And forever in peace may you wave;
You're the emblem of
The land I love,
The home of the free and the brave
Every heart beats true
'Neath the red, white and blue
Where there's never a boast or brag;
So should auld acquaintance be forgot
Keep your eye on the grand old flag!"

Happy July Fourth!

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Driving in France? Blow Into le Bag Starting Today

...or at least have le bag in the car.

Starting today, the nanny state of France requires you to have an approved Breathalyzer device in your car when driving there. Actually, they're recommending that you buy two, just in case you might use one -- and do not try to suss the logic of that or your head could explode.

Here's the link with all you need to know from the Breathalyzer industry, which no doubt is busy, busy, busy lobbying to try to have lucrative laws like that one passed elsewhere.

Not here in the U.S., you say? Well, not bloody likely, I agree. On the other hand, Americans in a lot of states do kind of passively accept those disgraceful traffic red-light and speed cameras, and the road to le bag is a slippery slope.

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Whose Bloody Hand Ye Shakin'?

Depends on whose bloody hand is being shook, I suppose. But it's interesting that the old German lady Queen Elizabeth II (you don't really buy that name change to "Windsor," do you?) had no issue with ungloved hand-shakes when the Syrian tyrant Bashar al-Assad came calling in 2002.

But when the ex-Irish Republican Army leader Martin McGuinness came around the old castle last week, note that the Queen -- who sits on a throne that has known a lot of bloody hands -- was wearing protection.

And on my, the Irish-American twee brigade never misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity.

And please, spare us the tears on the odious "Uncle Dickie" Mountbatten.

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Savage Sex Assaults on Western Women in Egypt Continue

I never managed to get myself all weepy-eyed with joy over the alleged "Arab Spring," when tinpot despots were challenged and toppled, but what sometimes rose in their place were vile Islamic radical thugs with their barbaric attitudes toward women.

In Egypt, for example, there have been numerous savage sexual attacks on Western women, especially reporters, by Alahu-Akbar-chanting male thugs. The most recent occurred during the celebrations after a winner was chosen in Egypt's first free presidential election, when a British student journalist was brutally assaulted by the mob in (where else?) Tahrir Square.

That mob assault on that young woman, Natasha Smith, was similar to assaults on other female journalists, including a horrifying mob sexual attack on CBS News correspondent Lara Logan and one on Egyptian-U.S. journalist Mona Eltahawy last year. There have been other attacks on other female journalists too.

Ms. Smith, wrote about the attack on her blog and spoke about it in an interview with CNN.

Dozens of Egyptian men stripped her naked, repeatedly sexually assaulted her and dragged her by her hair across Tahrir Square. Her story is horrifying, as were the others.

Incidentally, here's an important take on the issue, and the idea of blaming the victim, on the important Web site devoted to combating street harassment against women, IHollaback.org. However, I don;t think even IHollaback is doing enough to focus on the harassment and assaults on female visitors in places like Egypt and other Moslem countries that attract foreign tourists, including Morocco. (Re Morocco, see this by a Peace Corps volunteer)

Meanwhile, officials in Egypt are hoping to repair the extreme damage that has occurred since the Arab Spring to tourism, which until recently has accounted for more than 10 percent of the country's GNP.

Not to worry, the boosters say (abetted by credulous media). Tourists can have fun in Egypt!

"There will be no bans on wearing bikinis and drinking alcohol for tourists coming to Egypt after the Islamist Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood was elected president on June 24, Rossiyskaya Gazeta daily quoted Egyptian Ambassador to Russia Alaa El Hadidi on Friday as saying. Here's a link via the travel industry trade publication Global Travel Industry News, which adds:

"Hadidi’s statement came after Morsi’s allies said during the presidential campaign that there will be a number of restrictions for tourists if Morsi is elected, including a ban on selling alcohol, wearing bikinis outside hotels and dividing beaches into male and female zones."

The U.S. State Department, which is after all the department of being diplomatic, has issued only a "travel alert" rather than a more pointed travel warning for Egypt, of which this is an excerpt: "The U.S. Department of State strongly urges U.S. citizens to avoid all demonstrations in Egypt, as even peaceful ones can quickly become violent and a foreigner could become a target of harassment or worse."

Or worse? Hey, not to worry!

Really! They probably will not behead you for wearing that bikini or drinking that beer. After all, this is the 15th, ... uh, 21st Century! Welcome!

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TSA OKs Private Screeners at Little Airport in Orlando

From the the credulous media: The TSA has green-lighted a switch from federal to private security at the Orlando airport! Poor sad Drudge even has it highlighted in red on his Web site!

I'm always amazed at how it's routinely not pointed out that the "Orlando airport" in question, Orlando Sanford International Airport (which handles about 380,000 passenger departures a year), is not quite the same as Orlando International Airport (which handles 17 million).

Here's another news report today that fails to point out the significant difference between the two. The Sanford airport is served by Allegiant Airlines, a leisure travel low-cost carrier, and a few charter operations.

There are now 16 airports that have been allowed to return to private screeners under an opt-out program that was forced on the TSA by congressional Republicans.

Also routinely overlooked is the vested interests of the congressional titan behind this move to turn security back over to the rent-a-cops companies, Rep. John L. Mica of Florida, the Republican chairman of the House transportation committee. Mica, who has five close relatives who are lobbyists, has close ties to the private security industry, one of his best campaign contributors.

You know, the industry that was in charge of airport security on September 11, 2001.

Just sayin, is all.

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Phoenix Phony 'Tough Guy' Sheriff Joe Arpaio Arrests 6-Year-Old Girl on Immigration Charges

Joe Arpaio, the silliest windbag currently holding any public office, which I know is really saying a lot, has arrested a 6-year-old little girl on immigration charges. Way to go, rootin', tootin' self-proclaimed tough guy Joe!

As if Arizona needs any more ridicule. Remember, outsiders, the insane people who are causing tourists to avoid Arizona are concentrated in Phoenix, which is basically Orange County, Calif., circa 1967, but without the ocean. The sensible people are all in Tucson, the self-proclaimed capital of the imaginary state of Baja Arizona.

Visit Tucson instead, where it's only going to be a mild 107 degrees when it's 110 in Phoenix!

From the Arizona Republic newspaper in Phoenix, which is always amusingly timid about causing any offense to the significant portion of its readership that is clinically delusional:

"Maricopa County Sheriff Office deputies arrested a 6-year-old suspected illegal immigrant Friday, the day President Barack Obama softened the country's deportation policy toward young illegal immigrants. ..."

Here's the link.

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Packing for the Airport (Continued)

[Chart shows number of guns found at TSA checkpoints, by airport, June 8-14]

Our fellow travelers who think it's okay to take a gun on an airplane are outdoing themselves lately. Usually, the TSA reports finding 28-32 guns each week in passengers' carry-on bags.

Last week (June 8-14), the total was 40, according to the always informative TSA Blog.

And remember, that's only the ones they're catching.

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The 2 Faces of Arizona

Top: What those of us in Tucson see.

Bottom: What the rest of the country sees.

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California, It's Cold and It's Damp

[Chart shows average percent of possible sunshine per month. From Curbed LA]

Here's an interesting piece via the terrific blog Curbed LA -- from The Last Word on Nothing blog, with an explanation of the cultural and scientific importance of June Gloom--the infamous weather phenomenon that casts a gray pall over the Southern California coastal region every spring and summer, prompting shock in newcomers and visitors.

From Curbed LA: "The recipe for June Gloom requires three ingredients: cold Pacific Ocean water, an ocean current known as the California Current, and a high pressure formation known as the Pacific High: "Usually, the atmosphere gets colder as you head up. But the cold water creates a situation where the air near the water's surface is colder than the air above it: an inversion. The Pacific High pushes air downward, compressing it and warming it. Together, this forms a stable inversion air that can hold a layer of cloud near the water's surface like an older brother crouching on an upstart sibling."

Aha! Finally, an explanation for my first mystifying impression of California, as a kid from Philadelphia in the service in 1970, astonished that it was (as the old Rogers and Hart song goes) cold and damp -- in June. Also, the ocean water was impressively cold. Turns out that's a year-round phenomenon, though.

Also, that the Pacific Ocean is nearly always seen from high ground, as opposed to the Atlantic Ocean, which is nearly always encountered from eye-level. That's simple geography and topography.

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Meh, Brttannia

Far be it from me to rain on some old German lady's parade (wait, the English weather already did that!) but really: Britannia once ruled the waves, but this sorry-looking flotilla on the Thames the other day [photo at right] indicates that Britannia doesn't even rule the rivers anymore.

Really, British friends: This is the best you can do in a celebratory flotilla? Where did they come up with that rust-bucket tub the poor queen is riding on -- a salvage yard near an old Arco refinery in the Philly harbor?

The red uniforms are nice, I suppose. But really, England, you are embarrassing your cousins here on the other side of the ocean with this sad-sack fleet of shrimp boats and glorified iron-ore barges.

The next time you need to come up with an impressive display on the waves, or even the ripples, why not give the old colonies a call and we'll send over some of our truly spiffy tall sailing ships like those in the top photo shown during a spectacular tall-ships flotilla in New York Harbor in 1986. (Though a heart can skip a beat to see any photo of lower Manhattan with the World Trade Center twin towers still gleaming in the sun.)

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More Than 160 Dead As Nigerian Airliner Crashes Into Neighborhood Near Lagos

An MD-83 passenger plane crashed into a building near the airport in Lagos, Nigeria, today, killing all 153 on board, and at least 10 people in the neighborhood where the plane crashed.

The plane crashed and burned in a densely populated residential area near Lagos Murtala Muhammed airport. It wasn't immediately clear how many people on the ground were killed.

[UPDATE: Here's an excellent story by the AP, via the Guardian newspaper.]

The plane was flown by Nigeria's Dana Air (here's their Website) and was bound for Lagos from Abuja.

Here's the preliminary report on the specific details of the accident by the Flight Safety Foundation. The MD83 was initially delivered to Alaska Airlines in 1990, and experienced two electrical/smoke incidents during its service. Alaska stored it at the aircraft storage "boneyard" site in Victorville, Calif., briefly in the summer of 2008 before sending it to Miami for maintenance. The plane was then delivered to Dana in February 2009.

Nigeria has long had one of the worst aviation-safety reputations in the world, though the country has been claiming improvements in that record in recent years.

For eight years until 2000, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration had signs in U.S. international airports warning that security and safety conditions at the Lagos airport did not meet international standards, and even suspended service from the U.S. to Lagos for a short period. The airport was known as a center for criminal activity, where immigration officers routinely demanded bribes, and robberies -- including robberies on parked planes -- were common. The Nigerian government eventually cracked down on the crime problem, and the FAA lifted its flight suspensions to the Lagos airport in 2001.

But today's crash occurred only a day after a Boeing 727-200 freighter operated by Nigerian carrier Allied Air Cargo for DHL Aviation veered off the runway at Accra’s Kotoka airport in Ghana, after a flight from Lagos. The plane plowed through the airport fence and struck several vehicles, killing 10 people on the ground. The four crew members survived.

In Nigeria, the last major airline crash before today's was in October 2006, when an ADC airliner crashed after take-off from Abuja, killing 96 people.

In December 2005, 103 people, most of them schoolchildren, were killed when another Nigerian commercial airliner crashed and burst into flames in oil city, Port Harcourt. Two months before that, 117 were killed in a 737 crash in Lagos.

Here's a timeline of Nigerian air disasters before today's.

One part of the overall problem in Nigeria is operating a complicated, high-cost business like an airline, which requires careful maintenance and upkeep, in a largely corrupt society. See this.

Dana Air, operator of the flight that crashed today, started up in 2008. On its Web site it stresses whjat it calls its commitment to safety, saying: "Dana Air places a high premium on safety. The airline adheres strictly to the maintenance schedule for all aircrafts in its fleet, as prescribed by the manufacturers and the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority. More detailed and scheduled checks of the Boeing MD83 aircrafts are, however, carried out at aircrafts maintenance facilities overseas."

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Packing for the Airport (Updated)

The guns keep on coming at TSA checkpoints. The chart above is the latest tally (of guns found at airport checkpoints in the week ended yesterday) on the always informative TSA blog.

As I pointed out in my New York Times column this week, the increase in guns being found at checkpoints coincides with ongoing liberalization of "right to carry" laws being pushed by the NRA in many states (and also at the federal level) and the overall increase in gun sales in general.

The TSA claims that most people found trying to take a gun onto a plane in a carry-on bag say they simply forgot they had it in the bag. Nobody really buys that, except as it might apply to a few knuckleheads who would forget their home address if it weren't printed on their drivers license. Fundamental gun-safety education says you should always know where your weapon is. Always.

There are absolutely no indications that people with terrorist intent are taking guns to the airport. Instead, the increase in guns being found is likely to be attributable to a growing belief in the gun world that people who legally own and carry guns have a right to carry anywhere.

You can, of course, travel by air with a firearm if you pack it in a checked bag and declare same to the airline when you check it. Here are the TSA regs on that.

And no one knows, of course, how many guns are actually being sneaked onto planes by passengers who manage to slip them through the checkpoints.

Incidentally, I like the TSA Blog, but I do wish that the agency would man-up more on the subject of people trying to get guns onto planes. The weekly running tally is great, but the blog takes a somewhat breezy attitude about the threats posed by firearms coming through checkpoints. In my opinion, that's because the NRA has such fearsome political clout in Congress, which can yank the TSA's chain at will, and does.

Instead of hammering on guns at checkpoints and the people who bring them, the TSA Blog puts more focus, actually, on something that is none of its business, legally: Drugs discovered by those abominable body-scan machines.

From the current blog (my emphasis):

"Body Scanner Discoveries This Week – There were nine incidents this week where body scanner alarms resulted in drugs being found on passengers using imaging technology. Items were found everywhere from pockets to the breast, to the groin area at EWR, SAT, ORD, TPA, PHX, SFO and GEG. In addition to these discoveries, there was also a passenger at Tampa (TPA) who had a white drawstring pouch concealed in his underwear containing several types of Narcotics. (See Picture) Another passenger at Chicago O’Hare (ORD) had marijuana taped to his ankle. We’re not looking for drugs, but finding these nonmetallic items in areas where explosives could also be hidden is a testament that the technology works. "

Well, not to be tendentious, but 1. Finding a wad of marijuana stuffed into someone's shorts is hardly proof that "the technology works," except to identify a wad of something in someone's shorts. There have been some disquieting studies showing that these scanners actually are pretty easy to beat by someone who knows how to conceal a weapon. And 2. Drugs, as the TSA blogger chattily notes, are really none of the security agency's business.

Somebody with a bag of pot isn't going to be able to take over an airplane. Somebody with a gun who waits for the vaunted fortified cockpit door to open so the pilot can use the bathroom is. Passenger vigilance works only to the extent that somebody does not have a gun at a flight attendant's head. Or worse.

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Giddyup! Er, Schnell! Schnell!

[Photo: Hitler henchman Hermann Goring, 300-pound Nazi equestrian, demonstrates the finer points of dressage riding to der boss in this historical photo]

An amusing story in today's Times concerns Ann Romney and her expensive hobby of dressage riding, and the various horse-tradings and associated equestrian pursuits, and legal disputes, by the Romneys.

Hey, I'm a horse guy. You won't find me carping about how much it costs to keep a horse. A horse costs dough. Nor would I ridicule high-quality dressage riding, which encompasses the most precise movements of horse and rider together and stems not from some prissy riding-circuit, but from the most exacting maneuvers of warhorse and cavalry in a very old tradition of superb ridership.

Still, it does not appear from the photo accompanying the story that Ann Romney has particularly good control of her horse, perhaps understandably because she's a relative novice as a rider, though a very well-heeled one (excuse the pun).

But I'm amazed by the Romneys' exorbitant horse expenses and their amusing relationship with a German horse-seller and dressage trainer, one of those familiar types barking away in the barns of the high-stakes, super-wealthy dressage world -- one Jan Ebeling, who is said to be a shrewd horse-trader and a very tough trainer/instructor.

Here's where I laughed out loud in the story: "Asked if she was ever unhappy with Mr. Ebeling’s instruction, Mrs. Romney said in a deposition in the lawsuit, “I think that is not a fair question because we all get upset at certain times with anybody that is — you know, especially a German.”

Several of the 1,000 or so readers who commented asked whether Ann Romney transported the horse on the roof of one of her Cadillacs, before the editors shut down the comments.

Me, I will resist the urge to elaborate on the somewhat colorful history of Mormons and disputes over horse-trading.

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New York Times Insults Arizona (Again); Javelinas Demand Apology

Tim Egan, who for my money is the best columnist writing in the New York Times, has once again insulted and ridiculed the state of Arizona. OK, he's right. The right-wing crackpots in Phoenix, who seem to have mounted a kind of coup d'lunatique, are in full moon-bay, embarrassing those of us in the sane southern part of the state, Tucson -- which we have taken to calling Baja Arizona to distinguish it from Phoenix, which we regard as Orange County, Calif., circa 1964, but without the ocean.

Here's a link to Egan's terrific column. The objection here is to the lede in the column:

"We interrupt reality to bring you Arizona, once known as the Grand Canyon state. So glorious, this home to sublime cacti and ugly javelina ..."

Two issues here right off the bat, Egan. One, and I don't care what some prissy copy-desk scold in a high-button collar says, the plural of cactus is cactuses. I ask you: Is the plural of circus "circi?" Case closed.

But more important, this insult to javelinas being ugly is unacceptable to those of us who know javelinas. (And a herd of them usually saunters in the front of our property every morning, snorting and grubbing).

Well, ok, they are pretty ugly, and they do stink. (The little javelina babies are so cute, though)

But really, Egan? In a state where the most famous elected official is the phony tough-guy Phoenix Sheriff Joe Arpaio, you're calling the javelinas ugly?

On behalf of javelinas, I demand an apology. The gnarliest javelina is better looking than Sheriff Joe.

Smells better, too.

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A Visit to the 9/11 Memorial in New York Where Silly Security Shows That the Terrorists Did In Fact Win

"Remove your belt!"

I'm passing through the crowded security checkpoint at the new 9/11 Memorial on the site of the World Trade Center ruins in lower Manhattan and I realize this goon in a blue shirt that says "SECURITY" is yelling at me.

He is also poking some kind of a wand into the tray holding my camera and cellphone, knocking them around a bit before they pass through the magnetometer.

"Be careful with that stick you're banging my camera with," I tell him.

"Remove your belt," he repeats loudly, in a tone that not even the rudest TSA screener would dare to use at an airport. He glares at me in a way that says, "If this was Guatemala, you'd be on the ground right now, pal."

Welcome to the 9/11 Memorial where, given the absurd degree of pointless security that abounds, the terrorists have clearly won.

There is not a sign, and barely a reminder, of the courage and fortitude shown by New Yorkers on that terrible day as those huge buildings crumbled and all of those people died at the hands of religious-fanatic murderers who were determined to bring this great city to its knees.

No, there is just the security, the fear that is so obviously on display, now that the actual threat is gone.

You need to go online and arrange a pass and a time to visit the memorial site, which is dominated by two giant sunken pools with waterfalls cascading into the pits where the Twin Towers each once stood.

I know that ground well, because I worked for years at the Wall Street Journal, pre-Murdoch, when Dow Jones was based at the World Financial Center across the street from the World Trade Center. When I go there today, I see not those holes in the ground, so tastefully designed to eradicate all memory of the offense of the horror, but the vast and unspeakable emptiness in the air. All of that mass, gone, and yet I still feel it there.

The security, I am deeply saddened to say, spoils any sense of reflection or reverence at the site. Instead, the fear is everywhere, in the humorless faces of all those rent-a-cops, all those real cops, all on guard. All that law-enforcement presence, and for what?

Against what?

I wanted to tell the hump who ordered me around at the metal detector, Listen, Skippy, you are aware, are you not, that this place has already been blown up? That there is nothing left to destroy? That the threat to American freedoms is from the likes of you in your quasi-military blue uniform and your Guatemala militia manners? The terrorists have moved on. There is no opportunity at this place now.

The New York City police commissioner, Ray Kelly, has given interviews about the security at this site and come up with little more than an expressed concern that some people might be so overwhelmed with grief that they might feel the impulse to jump into one of those reflecting pools. I am not kidding.

"People might commit suicide," Kelly said in one interview. "We're concerned about the possibility of somebody jumping in. This is what we're paid to think about."

It does not matter, because common sense has died, that anyone with a desire to end it all can merely cross the street, stroll a block west, and hop a low railing right into the churning Hudson River.

No, we have a memorial at the World Trade Center site, the site of such courage and resolve when the enemy was real, and the memorial is to fear. And to the growing security state. And in a very sad way, it is a pathetic tribute to the murderers who sought on 9/11 to make that hideous statement about the vulnerability of America.

I'd post a photo or two of the site that I took yesterday but I cannot. As I left the security area, I turned around to snap a picture, and one of the glowering rent-a-cops blocked my exit.

"You can't take a picture. You have to delete it," he ordered me.

I insisted that he call an actual police officer, and two responded. Yes, they agreed, I would have to delete the picture.

I wasn't sure how to do that, so the rent-a-cop took my camera and did it for me. Deleted all. And then dropped the camera, which no longer functioned properly.

This, of course, would be an illegal act in America. But not here, I guess. Not at this tasteful memorial to fear, where the security state rules.

###

Bombs Away

The Sunday Times of London has a story today, though it's thinly and perhaps questionably sourced, saying that "Western intelligence agencies believe doctors working with Al-Qaeda in Yemen have been trained to plant explosives inside the bodies of suicide bombers."

Bombs can be implanted in the abdomens and breasts of suicide bombers, the story says. That would evade the vaunted "whole body scanners" in use at airports, which supposedly detect anomalous forms or mass on the body or in the clothing.

It's questionable whether the body imagers actually work, in the first place. If the London Times story is correct, it's irrelevant.

The London Times is owned by the odious Rupert Murdoch, but like the Wall Street Journal, another Murdoch property, it still does have a reputation for accuracy, though you can't depend on it.

From the Times account: "Experts say explosive compounds such as PETN (pentaerythritol tetranitrate) could be implanted into a would-be suicide bomber and the wounds allowed to heal." The device "can be detonated by injection," says the paper.

Note the conditionals, could and can.

And note the lack of attribution, which follows standards more like those of the Daily Mail or the New York Post than of the pre-Murdoch Times of London.

Still, it seems plausible. That doesn't make it true, and stories anchored by mere plausibility are among the lowest forms of journalism (right after lottery-fever stories and all articles by anything called the White House press corps, that is).

Still ...

###

That New Underwear Bomb: III

This is from Schneier.com, by the security technology expert Bruce Schneier, on the media hyperbole about that latest supposed underwear-bomber/double agent:

"We don't know much, but here are my predictions:

1. There's a lot more hyperbole to this story than reality.
2. The explosive would have either 1) been caught by pre-9/11 security, or 2) not been caught by post-9/11 security.
3. Nonetheless, it will be used to justify more invasive airport security."

###

The Birds and the Bees

Ok, ok, for all of you who were horrified by my rant last week against Africanized killer bees in the Sonoran desert, Saguaro National Park Ranger Michelle Uhr forwards this stunningly beautiful video called "The Beauty of Pollination."

I still hate Africanized killer bees, but I'll drop that awful idea of getting a flamethrower.

Here's the video link (From YouTube):


www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/xHkq1edcbk4?rel=0




###

New Underwear Terrorist Bomb II -- What About Those Body Scanners?

In further proof, as if we needed it, of Bill Moyer's axiom that "Reporters are people who are paid to explain things they don't understand," we have the following brilliant assertion in the Wall Street Journal today about the much-typed "new type" of non-metallic terrorist body-bomb that can be concealed in the underwear:

"Investigators are closely scrutinizing the construction of the bomb for clues that would lead to its makers and would also help aviation security experts improve and adjust airport detection systems. Investigators say the bomb contained no metal, meaning would have likely evaded detection by airport screeners."

Hang on there just a minute, Scoop! Ignore how that passage demonstrates the Journal's appalling decline in copy-editing standards under the regime of the odious Rupert Murdoch (you need an "it" after "meaning" in that sentence). Instead, consider: The TSA has spent hundreds of millions of dollars to install these new-fangled "strip search" machines to replace metal-detecting magnetometers at airport checkpoints. You know, the machines the TSA initially called "whole-body imagers," but then changed the name to "advanced imaging technology" when it became apparent that "whole-body" was an infelicitous, if nevertheless accurate, description of what the machines focus on.

The point of these machines, as the Wall Street Journal seems not to recall, is to remove dependence on metal detectors in favor of machines that see through clothing and, supposedly, detect any anomalous item on the body. The old metal detectors, of course, would not detect any non-metallic underwear bomb, which would likely be noticed only by an alert screener wondering why that terrorist-looking person has droopy pants like some baby with a load in its diaper.

So why, exactly, would these invasive whole-body imaging machines not detect whatever mass this latest model of the underwear bomb presented?

By the way, in the New York Post newspaper today there's a breathless headline over an even more half-assed story in which the reporter seems to think that the body-imagers would be thwarted because the they can't detect the chemical properties of a possible explosive. But that has never been the point of the body-imagers, whose sole function is to detect foreign objects on the body or in the clothes, which are shown as mass. The mass could be a stick of chewing gum or a wad of plastic explosives, the machine only knows shape, not chemical makeup.

That story also makes the ludicrous assertion that the only way to insure real security against chemical bombs is to use "bomb sniffing dogs." Absolutely no security expert in the world would depend on bomb-sniffing dogs -- which can be diverted by a ham sandwich (hey, they're dogs!) -- for anything other than an extra backup check on security. They are not a first-line of defense. The New York Post, of course, is another newspaper owned by the odious Mr. Murdoch.

Meanwhile, a little less fluttering around about the "double-agent" aspect of this strange story is required of all news media covering the story. How about a little more focus on the threat and the evident holes in the system posed by "whole body imaging" strip-search machines that seem not to be able to do what their well-paid manufacturers claim they can do?

###.

New Terrorist Underwear Threat: Here We Go Again?

Uh,oh. Watch for the trusty security state to ramp up theatrical operations at the airport checkpoints, now that another underwear plot has been uncovered, so to speak.

I'm always wary of stories that claim the news is "worthy of Hollywood," and yup, here we are in the L.A. Times: "WASHINGTON -- The successful blocking of an ambitious Al Qaeda plot to bomb a U.S.-bound airliner was an international sting operation worthy of Hollywood, with spies tricking terrorists into showing their cards."

According to the news accounts today, Saudi Arabia’s intelligence agency, working closely the CIA, used an informant to pose as a would-be suicide bomber from the Al Qaeda franchise in Yemen. The scam was for him to get the Yemen terrorist branch to provide him with what is described as "a new kind of non-metallic bomb that the militants were designing to easily pass through airport security."

A couple of flags get hoisted in my head right off the bat.

One: Saudi Arabia. Uhhh.

Two: This the guy was an "informant." Uh-oh. We know how well these "informant" and other double-agent stings have been working out ... don't we, Mr. Holder?

Three: "... New kind of non-metallic explosive." Wait a minute: I thought these hundreds of strip-search machines -- the whole body imagers --- that the TSA has been busily installing in airports to replace the metal-detecting magnetometers had one main purpose. That is, to detect non-metallic explosives on bodies, including those tucked into someone's skivvies. The whole-body imagers are designed to detect mass on the body, not metal.

But the "new kind" of non-metal bomb foils the machines? Huh? How's that?

It'll take the credulous media a while to get around to asking, while they swoon like bobbysoxers over the story right out of Hollywood involving a double agent.

Meanwhile, get ready for more groping at the airport checkpoints as hysteria reigns, as it always does.

And incidentally, every security expert I know discounts the "one-off," that is the threat of a single terrorist managing to blow up a single airplane. Not enough impact, though there is great concern about multiple, simultaneous explosions.

Whatever. Let's get some answers while we grab all the grannies at the checkpoints once again.

What exactly are those invasive whole-body scanners supposed to do? I mean, exactly. And how, exactly, was this "new kind" of explosive, concealed on a body, supposed to get around that?

Could it be, as critics have said for years, that the whole-body imagers, designed to detect non-metallic explosives on any body, are in fact an expensive joke?

###

'Packing' for the Airport

The chart is the latest from the TSA -- guns found in passengers' carry-on bags at checkpoints, for the week ended May 3.

That's 23 guns, 22 of them loaded.

The TSA is a little too wary, it seems to me, of making much of an issue about the fact that people routinely try to board airplanes carrying loaded guns.

Undoubtedly, few if any of these people have terrorist intent, but it seems to me that a good number of them have to be aware that they're packing. I simply don't buy the reasoning that somebody just plumb forgot he had a loaded Glock with a round in the chamber tucked next to his skivvies in his carry-on.

The TSA is wary about making much of an issue of this, I believe, because of the strong political influence being exerted on the federal government by the vocal "right to carry" segment of the gun lobby.

Instead, the TSA blog that publishes the weekly roundup of the sorts of prohibited items that are being routinely found in carry-on bags this week makes a somewhat big deal of the fact that a speargun was found in one passenger's bag.

From the TSA's Blogger Bob:

"Spearguns are Prohibited – I remember when I used to train TSOs. Theywould laugh when I mentioned Spearguns while going over prohibited items. Theycouldn’t believe that anybody would actually try to bring one on a plane.Well…in addition to all of the other ones we’ve found, the latest wasdiscovered at Raleigh-Durham (RDU)."

Well, Blogger Bob, I would guess that someone actually might well bring a speargun, inadvertently and perhaps stupidly, because they had a legitimate sports use for it on a vacation. Like for a diving vacation.

I'm a whole lot less amazed about a speargun (maybe you can hijack a pane with a speargun, but I doubt the rest of the passengers would let you) than I am about those loaded pistols you find every single day, and do not make much of an issue of.

###

Phoenix-Area Massacre by Border Militia Nut: Could It Be ... Satan?

 Photos: Top: J.T. Ready, Patriot. Left: Dana Carvey's Church Lady knows what Satan has been up to ...


One of those border-patrol militia nuts who help make Arizona into a laughing stock is dead today after a shooting rampage in the Phoenix suburbs in which he massacred four people, including a 15-month-old baby. He then shot himself to death, thank God.

Here's that story from the Arizona Republic newspaper in Phoenix, which always has to walk a fine line between dealing with reality as well as the paranoid delusions of a significant percentage of its readership.

Meanwhile, Russell Pearce, the ousted former state senate president and author of Arizona's notorious SB 1070 anti-immigrant law, is blaming Satan for the massacre. (See below) 

Also, the lunatics who support this odious border militia movement in Arizona are floating a story that the militiaman who did the killings, a well-known neo-Nazi slob and borderline personality named J.T. Ready, was actually innocent of the crimes. Instead, the lunatics are claiming, ol' J.T. and the other dead, who were members of his extended family, were victims of some mysterious foreign drug kingpins seeking retribution for ol' J.T's patriotic stance against evil illegal immigrants.

For example, the following is posted today on the Facebook page for ol' J.T.'s candidacy for sheriff of Pinal County:

"Reports are unconfirmed that a cartel assassination squad murdered JT Ready and several of his friends and family this afternoon in Gilbert, Arizona. This page's admin will keep you updated of the situation as soon as possible."

Here's some background on ol J.T., white supremest, neo-Nazi, friend of right-wing pols in Phoenix, protector of our freedom and, I would guess, our precious bodily fluids.

Yes, J.T. Ready was running for sheriff in adjoining Pinal County, which is by the way a major drug smuggling and money-laundering route into Phoenix. The current Pinal County sheriff, one Paul Babeu, recently got into some difficulties when he turned up on gay Web sites in compromising photos trolling for sex. Babeu is also under federal investigation for corruption. Babeu remains on the ballot, of course.

Clinical insanity, which appears to have reached epidemic and psychotic proportions in recent years in the Phoenix area, also manifested itself in connection with this tragedy in the form of the disgraced former state senate president Russell Pearce, a supporter of the militia vigilante movement and a former friend of the killer's.

Here's a piece with a lot of damning detail about the close relationship between Pearce and ol' T.J. Ready.


Pearce, trying to regain his senate seat in the next election after having been tossed out in a recall election last November, insists in a statement he issued today that the murderer was not responsible for any crimes he might or might not be technically guilty of.
.
"Today, the Devil won," Pearce said. The Devil, alas, could not be reached for comment.

 No wonder Arizona is having a harder time attracting visitors, despite its magnificent landscapes and spectacular weather. Satan seems to be running the show -- although that might actually be a better proposition than the idiots and right-wing crackpots who are actually running it in Phoenix.

###

Heads Up in Southwest: Killer Bees

There appear to be more reports in the Southwest this spring of swarming "Africanized bees," also known as killer bees. But the bee and honey industry would just as soon you not think about that.

Because the noble honey bee, you see, is Our Friend.  No argument there.

Nevertheless, beware when traveling outdoors in places where populations of not-so-noble killer bee are growing. They're becoming more of an issue with climate change.

The nasty, dangerous pests are extremely aggressive, and attack without warning. People are encountering them more often these days on desert and mountain trails.  The bees are very similar to honeybees except that they are monstrously aggressive and attack in  big swarms, sometimes numbering in the thousands. Once they attack, they tend not to relent. Also, in parts of the country, the common European honeybee is disappearing and being replaced by the Africanized killer bee.

An unfortunate encounter with a swarm -- and they'll chase a person for a half mile -- can lead to the hospital or .... bzzzzzzz .. the morgue.

They came to our Southwest originally thanks to some nitwits who imported them from Africa and bred them in Brazil (no further comment, vide), and then the pests made their way up through South America and Central American, through Mexico, and then into Texas. In parts of the south and Southwest, they've decimated native populations of docile European honeybees, mostly through mating with them.

Best advice to avoid Africanized bees: Ask the locals (or Park Rangers, if appropriate) where the known hives and nests are. Trust me, they'll know.

I love this advice on About.com on what to do if you encounter a swarm:

"-- Do not jump into the pool. The bees will wait until you surface for air to attack

--If you are attacked by bees, run away. Don't play dead or swat at the bees. Most people can outrun the bees, but you might have to run a few blocks...."

Even more amusing is this advice on WikiHow (epmhasis mine):

"...Hollywood hype came up with the `killer bee' term, owing to the ferocity of the bees when riled. While Africanized honey bees are very defensive and easily provoked,   they are generally not a threat to humans provided they are not riled. ..."


Oh, swell. Do not rile the "easily provoked" bees! It's well known that killer bees define provocation in somewhat extreme terms, such as someone accidentally wandering within 100 yards or so of what they regard as their turf. These bees would not make good urban citizens.

ABC News, which often exhibits the amazing ability to be both unreliably alarmist and unreliably reassuring at the same time, quotes a bee expert here in a story about the threat of killer bees. The bee expert calls being swarmed and stung a "bee encounter," rather than an attack, and dismisses the danger, saying that only about 40 people a year die from bee stings.  (The survivors, I assume, merely suffer miserably, but without creating inconveniently high mortality statistics for the bee lobby).

One note to consider on ABC's "bee expert," an etymologist at  the University of Illinois named May Berenbaum. ABC and others who quote Dr. Berenbaum being so reassuring about bees and the people they kill never note that she is also the author of a book extolling the virtues of honey, "Honey, I'm Homemade! Sweet Treats from the Beehive Across the Centuries and Around the World."

The publisher's blurb says: "More than a cookbook, Honey, I'm Homemade is a tribute to the remarkable work of Apis mellifera, the humble honey bee whose pollination services allow three-quarters of all flowering plant species to reproduce and flourish. ..."

The bee world manifestly has an interest in extolling the virtues of European honey bees, and does not like to discuss killer bees and how to guard against them, though. Instead, the bee lobby has a tendency to ridicule concerns about Africanized bees.


This is an issue, because the problem of eradicating them, or at least minimizing their danger in various places, thus does not get addressed openly and honestly. 


Here, by the way, is some actually well-informed and useful advice from Saguaro National Park in Tucson about killer bee attacks: Basically, if swarmed and attacked with multiple stings, run away, don't flail arms, cover head, seek medical attention, and report the attack and location to park rangers.

By the way, homeowners who encounter them on their property and try to find remedies in the stores will run into a dilemma. The beekeeper world, it appears, has a lobby that discourages stores from selling insecticide that might deal with bees. Instead, what you'll find is a nice selection of wasp, horney and yellowjacket killing agents, but none labeled for killing bees. Most of the products -- bien pensant -- advise you that honeybees are beneficial.

The bee-keepers lobby advises us, citing no evidence at all, that "deaths by bee sting are extremely rare." Note the bee expert's figure of 40 deaths a year from bee stings, but the lack of sourcing for same. Still. imagine if there were 40 deaths a year from killer wolves. We'd sure be talking about how to handle that problem!

Actually, hospitalizations and even  deaths from swarming killer-bee stings are not so rare these days  -- and docile European honey-bee populations are disappearing as the killer bees take over in the Southwest and parts of the South.

Killer bees are basically the same as European honey bees, except for their murderous Einsatzgruppen behavioral patterns of attacking relentlessly, en masse.  

Evidently, the bee lobby, which is closely tied to the artisnal honey business, thinks we all can live with Africanized killer bees. Even in places like deserts where large populations of bees don't really belong.

Me, I can more easily live without honey, thank you very much.

Which is why I'm in the market for a flamethrower.

###

Does this Poll Include Responses From People Who Have Actually Been Anywhere?

No, I didn't think so.

Here's another of those "most popular" travel polls, this one purportedly a ranking of the 25 most popular U.S. cities, in the Huffington Post, that would leave you smacking your forehead. That is, if you didn't realize that these things are served up half-baked in various media by 24-year-olds who have never actually been anywhere -- but sure do know their urban stereotypes because, you know, they're intense watchers of television.

And by "polling" outfits that don't disclose their shaky, vague "methodology," if any.

Los Angeles almost dead-last at No. 22, far below Baltimore (13)? Philadelphia (11) over San Francisco (12)?!! New York (7), demonstrably the most popular travel city in terms of, uh, numbers of people who flock there, bested by Dallas (6) and Atlanta (4)?

Dallas and Atlanta?

###

With US Air in Pursuit, American Airlines Posts $1.7 Billion Loss for 1st Quarter

Wonder just how eager American Airlines is to find someone to buy the joint? Not clear, especially with such decisions now in the hands of bankruptcy court, but US Airways is in pursuit anyway.

Meanwhile, AMR, the airline's parent company, says it lost $1.7 billion in the first quarter of this year -- though it says most of that was due to costs of its bankruptcy filing and reorganization and various "special items."

Otherwise the net loss would have been $248 million. In last year's first quarter American had a loss of $405 million.

Revenue in the most recent quarter was up 9.1 percent to about $6 billion, and yields (read: fares) were up 7.3 percent, which are good signs to a potential buyer like US Airways.  On the other hand, operating expenses were up 6.6 percent. That's the first place a buyer will be looking to cut, along with capacity, which was up slightly, with a relatively low (by industry standards these days) load factor of 79 percent.

US Air, while not yet announcing any official move to buy American, said today that it has in its pocket an agreement from American's pilots, flight attendants and mechanics unions that greenlights a merger with American.

But I also would point to an e-mail alert that Joe Brancatelli sent this afternoon to his members at Joesentme.com.  "American management has approximately ZERO interest in doing business with US Airways, just as US Airways management was rebuffed when it tried to do a deal with both Delta and United," he said, noting also that the bankruptcy court has exclusive jurisdiction over AA matters and that the unions' agreement appears to be a tactical move as the bankruptcy court takes up American's petition to void its union contracts.

"Today's news does not mean that we have agreed to merge with American Airlines,"  Doug Parker, the US Air CEO, said in a letter today to US Air employees.  "It only means that we have reached agreements with these three unions on what their collective bargaining agreements would look like after a merger, and that they would like to work with us to make a merger a reality."

A merger, of course, would need the approval of the bankruptcy court.

In a statement today, Laura Glading, the president of the Association of Professional Flight Attendants, which represents American's flight attendants, said: "I was approached by members of the US Airways management team who were interested in discussing a potential merger." Along with the other two major unions, "each of us individually came to the conclusion that a merger would be the best plan for our membership and the most successful reorganization of our company."

###

For Those in Peril On the Sea ...

Interesting that on the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, a tragedy that was marked by a profound disregard for the plight of the poor on board while the first-class passengers had a much greater chance of scrambling to safety in lifeboats [*see below], we have an allegation that a Carnival Cruise ship ignored a fishing boat and its crew in distress last month.

This is the case of Adrian Vasquez, an 18-year-old fisherman from Panama, who was found alive after being lost at sea near the Galapagos Islands for 26 days, according to this account in Eturbonews. The two other men in the fishing boat died of dehydration and heat stroke.

Passengers on the Star Princess, a Carnival luxury ship sailing from Ecuador to Costa Rica, claim they alerted crewmembers after seeing three men in distress in the fishing boat. The cruise ship ignored the plight of the fishermen, the passengers say. International law, in this case known as the law of the sea, requires that a ship stop to assist any vessel in distress on the high seas.

The captain of the Star Princess is reported to be saying that he never got the word about the distressed vessel.  Here's the account in the Guardian newspaper.

Here's Carnival's statement on the incident:

"Princess Cruises deeply regrets that two Panamanian men perished at sea after their boat became disabled in early March. Since we became aware of this incident, we have been investigating circumstances surrounding the claim that Star Princess failed to come to the aid of the disabled boat, after a crew member was alerted by passengers.

The preliminary results of our investigation have shown that there appeared to be a breakdown in communication in relaying the passenger's concern. Neither Captain Edward Perrin nor the officer of the watch were notified. Understandably, Captain Perrin is devastated that he is being accused of knowingly turning his back on people in distress. Had the Captain received this information, he would have had the opportunity to respond. 

We all understand that it is our responsibility and also the law of the sea to provide assistance to any vessel in distress, and it is not an uncommon occurrence for our ships to be involved in a rescue at sea. In fact, we have done so more than 30 times in the last ten years. We deeply regret this incident and are continuing our investigation to fully understand the circumstances." 


*Of the 2,224 on board the Titanic, more than 1,500 perished. Of those saved, 62.2 percent were in first class (including 97.2 percent of the first-class female passengers), 58.6 percent were in second class and a mere 25.2 percent of those who survived were in third class (steerage).

The official list of those who perished issued by the White Star Line, owner of the Titanic, includes the New York tycoon John Jacob Astor, who died while his wife was saved.

Here's how he's listed:

"ASTOR, Colonel J.J., and Manservant."

The actual name of the "manservant" never appeared.



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Dallas Flights Being Canceled, Diverted Because of Tornadoes

Heads-up for anyone traveling to, from or anywhere near North Texas today.

A wicked string of tornadoes is seriously disrupting flights (not to mention normal life on the ground) at Dallas-Fort Worth airport this afternoon.

Delays are running two to four hours. Lots of arriving flights are being diverted to other airports. Cancellations are mounting. As of early afternoon, all inbound flights to DFW were being held at their originating airports till 4.30 p.m. Central time. [UPDATE: By early evening, more than 1,000 flights had been canceled at DFW, most of them on American Airlines and American Eagle.]

[UPDATE: American Airlines has scrubbed all flights to and from DFW for the rest of the day -- which means that it will take days for American to get its schedules back to normal. Meanwhile, the Dallas News is reporting that Love Field, the Southwest Airlines hub, has been evacuated. I'm not totally confident in that report, though, because Love Field was evacuated yesterday on false reports of a bomb, and the Dallas News Web site is not useful on breaking news. I won't even link to the Dallas News site because it's a jumble of unconnected text links, disjointed tweets and video snippets, with no cogent overview. Come on, folks, this is what editors and words are for!]

This is a lot more than normal early spring weather disruption. Tornadoes are touching down in various places, with significant destruction on the ground.

For fliers, it's an unholy mess -- so do check with your airline if you're flying west of the Mississippi today and tomorrow. Given the fact that the airlines have no slack built into their schedules these days, it may take a while to get flight operations back to normal -- not just at Dallas but elsewhere in any system in which Dallas is a hub.

By the way, as of right now (mid-afternoon Dallas time), the Web site of Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport is ridiculously devoid of any information whatsoever on this major disruption. Why even have a Web site if you treat it like a brochure?

The American Airlines web site, also, is doing a disgraceful job. There is no notice of the disruptions at DFW, and if you click on the AA "weather conditions" for DFW, you get only this profoundly useless information: "Mostly Cloudy."

Gives you some idea of why some pilots deride operations at DFW as "Different F------ World."

Incidentally, I never cease to be amazed at how inept reporters are in reporting air-travel disruptions. One local report in Fort Worth quotes the DFW airport flack as saying that flights "may be delayed or diverted" -- long after a very large number of flights were in fact diverted.

When will they learn that the guy on their Rolodex under "airport" who they've been calling since like 1997 doesn't know jack? You get real-time flight information from FlightStats.com or FlightAware.com.

Really, you could look it up. FlightAware.com, for example, has the number of American Airlines and American Eagle flight cancelled today: 794.

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With Pinnacle Airlines Filing for Bankruptcy, New Questions About Declining Air Service in Small and Mid-Size Markets

Pinnacle Airlines filed for bankruptcy Sunday night, raising new questions about the viability of regional-airline service to many small and mid-sized markets.

Pinnacle, with its subsidiary Colgan Air, flies regional jets and turbo-props as a contractor for major airlines, including Delta Connection flights and other flights operating as United Express and U.S. Airways Express.

About a month ago, United PR reps insisted to me that the United Express flights operated by Colgan from Washington Dulles International were viable, blaming ongoing serious disruptions on weather -- even as it was clear to anyone outside the PR loop that other problems besides weather were at work in flight cancellations and disruptions to the southern tier and central regions of New York state and upstate Pennsylvania in particular.

Regional airlines like Pinnacle account for more than 50 percent of the daily flights in the U.S., operating as subcontractors on major airline routes and flying under those major airlines' colors.

In a statement today, Pinnacle said it hopes to "restructure" its most important contract, with Delta. It said it is "winding down its operations with United Airlines [and] completing the wind-down of its Essential Air Service (EAS) flying with US Airways." And it said it would further increase efforts in "achieving cost-savings from its workforce."

Pinnacle and Colgan fly 199 regional jets and 62 turbo-props on more than 1,540 daily flights to 188 cities and towns. The turbo-prop [Note: correcting typo, originally said turbo-jet] planes had already been scheduled for imminent retirement.

Look for disruptions ahead in the already badly disrupted air-travel service system in small and mid-sized cities that are totally dependent on regional airline flights operated for the major carriers.

By the way, aviation reporters always misunderstand what "regional airline" means. Basically, a regional airline is not really an airline, but rather a subcontractor that operates regional jets and turbo-prop planes, at lower cost and service levels, to supply "lift" to and from major hubs for the major carriers.

In keeping with that grand airline-company tradition of stiffing the workers while dumping cash into the pockets of the executives, Pinnacle disclosed in an SEC filing just last week that it had rewarded two of its top executives with hefty salary increased. The top guy, Sean Menke, got a 60 percent raise from $425,000 to $675,000, according to the Memphis Business Journal.

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