If This Organization Was A Person, Courts Would Have Appointed A Guardian By Now

by Kevin R.C. "Hognose" O'Brien

If you've ever had an alcoholic in the family, you know about "rock bottom." Just when you think that the last boneheaded incident must surely indicate that the problem child has struck rock bottom, the alky does something even dumber, proving that rock bottom is deeper than you ever imagined.

The Transportation Security Administration is a lot like an alky, only we never knew what it was like before it started drinking, so we're less likely to give it undeserved slack.

We thought nothing they could do would shock us any more, but there seems to be no bottom to virtual Marianas Trench of dunderheadedness in which the various welfare refugees, strutting mall cops, retired-military double-dippers and just plain imbeciles of the TSA are sinking. Sinking, hell... diving. SOUNDING like Captain Ahab's whale, and God Himself has never made the harpoon that will reel this agency in and bring it back to the bright sunlight of common sense. It dwells for all time in the depths of Poseidon.

Meet Ciaran Ferry. Mr. Ferry may be kind to dogs and small children, but he's also a dyed-in-the-wool terrorist, a member of the Irish Republican Army, an organization whose name is two-thirds lie (it has always been Socialist or Communist politically, not republican if you understand that to mean supporting a republic of laws; and you can't call an outfit that thrills to murder kids and rob Brinks trucks an Army). So the DHS put his name on the no-fly list. The list that the TSA uses to determine who can't fly.

But turns out there was no need to worry about Mr. Ferry getting loose in the States and knocking over a Brinks truck -- because he wasn't loose, when our story begins, but in the clutches of the law --specifically, in the clutches of the federal Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). And he was on his way to spend Christmas at home, or at least in some other country. He was being deported, on December 21st, with two federal agents stuck to him like glue to ensure that he got where he was going. And didn't come back. Kind of like live-trapping a rabbit in your garden and then releasing it in your brother's, but there was no legal justification for holding Ferry in an American jail.

Enter the TSA, whose mouth-breathing mall cops announced that Ferry could not fly. The entreaties of the ICE men cut no ice with the Turkeys Slouching Around. Could they call a supervisor? I mean, one with an IQ in the positive integers and enough juice to make a decision? You gotta be kidding -- four days before Christmas? You might as well ask for peace in the Middle East. Or an affordable fuel gage for a Beechcraft. Ain't gonna happen.

So, minutes before the plane was to leave, the TSA brain trust hauled Ferry and his keepers off the plane (well, the TSA was perfectly OK with the terrorist going loose in the USA, while the ICE agents flew without him. The ICE agents thought it was a better idea to keep the terrorist under lock and key. Explains why they are not working at TSA -- too much common sense). The plane departed on time, with a bunch of passengers wondering what the heck all the drama was about.

So -- again, four days before Christmas -- the agents had to find overnight accommodations for themselves, and for Mr. Ferry. (Ferry was the easy one. They locked him in the Hudson County, NJ, jail). Then they had to go through channels to try to find someone that would allow them to put a terrorist on an airplane.

An airplane out of the country. Sandwiched between Federal agents.

Both TSA and ICE report nowadays to the Department of Homeland Security, so you'd think they would talk to each other. You would think that the TSA would employ someone at Newark, or at least someone that the mouth-breathers could call on the phone, with a scintilla of common sense. But that would be expecting TSA management to be as alert as... hmmm... not Wal-Mart management; that's asking too much. Not McDonald's management. Maybe, as alert as legacy airline management.

And they're not.

Of course, when DHS higher-ups found out about this, some heads rolled, right?

Nope. In the mixed-up, tossed-up, never-come-down world of the payroll patriots of TSA, this counts as GOOD police work. DHS backs them on this. "It's a system that works," a DHS spokesman told Ray O'Hanlon of the Irish Echo newspaper.

If this is a system that works, I'd hate to see a system that was all messed up like a screen door on a submarine. The mind boggles.

Yep, the Transportation Security Administration is a lot like an alcoholic. But real-life alcoholics can sometimes trade on a certain boozy charm to deflect people's irritation with them; if that failed, they could fall back on the mercy of old memories.

But the TSA has no such luxury (about the only luxury that founding director Magaw forgot to have installed in his office). We never knew what it was like before it started its dive to the bottom, because it started that dive on Day One, and it still hasn't hit. Rock bottom? Heck, it hasn't even hit terminal velocity: as the Ferry incident shows, it's still accelerating. Downward.

And rock bottom is turning out to be an elusive goal. But if any human organization can hit it, it'll be the TSA.

Look out below!

FMI: www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/mwdictsn?va=imbecile