The Airlines
Flying has become worse than a root canal or prostate exam.
Some one hasn’t quite explained why the airlines are not subject to the full rules of capitalism, in that the way they seem to treat customers terribly, charge about the same prices, and now give wretched service?
Is it the intrinsic nature of air travel? You go out to a distant airport and once there are stuck with no other choices—with very little recourse to trains or cars? Or do they do a pretty good job getting us in one piece across treacherous skies, late but alive? Millions of miles each year without an accident are impressive, after all.
Or do they charge too little, and therefore are overcrowded with too small a profit margin? (Note those stewardesses sometimes counting the pretzel bags at the end of service).
Or is it our fault? Count the ways. In security lines, some use up to 4-5 pans with everything imaginable, from laptops to all sorts of gadgetry and cosmetics to an entire metal shop in their pockets. And many hold up things by dragging along too much carry-on luggage. They don’t listen when asked to sit down quickly when boarding. One person on a cell phone struggling with an oversized carry-on that won’t fit in the overhead space can stop 50 behind him as he blocks the entire aisle for 5 minutes.
When called by successive zones to board, many elbow ahead anyway. And at the desk—I testify to this after this week’s nightmare connections in NY and Pittsburg due to weather and the PGA tournament—travelers become almost homicidal in demanding instant redirects, in turn, causing the service reps to become coarse and cynical.
Solutions? Try to take the pressure off through regional travel by better trains and freeways? The use of more satellite terminals like Oakland or Orange County? More smaller or is it fewer larger planes? More honesty from government and the airlines on frequencies of delays and percentage on-time arrivals?
When flying across the country now with a connection, I think that most assume they will miss a connection, be late, or have some sort of unexpected catastrophe. For now, 2-3 beers is about the only antidote.
Just another day
More suicide mayhem in Afghanistan. Another democratic reformer blown up in Lebanon. Iraq of course. And then the non-civil war in Gaza. No pattern here apparently other than ubiquitous radical Islam, probably Chinese and Russian weapon sales, the stealthy role of Syria and Iran to subsidize the mayhem, and Western furor that George Bush is the root of it all.
Bakerism
The solution we adopted for Gaza? Pressure Israel to make “concessions” to give Fatah symbolic stature to allow it some legitimacy to outscore Hamas. But Fatah has no stature because it was always a whiny plutocracy (cf. those hilltop mansions on the West Bank, thanks to Western bribes and “aid”). We were told that Fatah, a corrupt has-been of aging terrorists, was preferable to younger, purer, Islamic jihadists like Hamas—never realizing that because it was marginally “better” did not make it anything near “good”, in the sense that Mussolini’s fascism was not as bad as Hitler’s Nazism. Note again that none of the Iraqi war critics will apply their own nomenclature to this mess—like “civil war” or “hopeless.”
Can’t be True.
Hamas has a “military wing,” the Izz el-Din al-Qassam Brigades? I thought Hamas itself was the militant wing of the Palestinians? Can a militant wing have a militant wing? Apparently in the way a terrorist clique like Fatah can be threatened by a terrorist clique like Hamas to the point of now becoming “moderate”.
As they loot and kill in Gaza, someone no doubt will (a) now at least assure us this is a civil war, (b) that it took place because someone disbanded the … what? Palestinian authority?
Hamas apparently has inherited quite a stockpile of American weapons from a now defunct Fatah (cf. the most recent $60 million given by us for “security”)? Apparently we thought that if we poured diesel, rather than gasoline, into the conflagration it would not fuel the flames.
Our policy?
The Palestinians have bisected their country for us. The overcrowded, filthy and desolate Gaza is to be the Islamic republic of Hamas, while the larger, less miserable West Bank goes to what’s left of Fatah. We will apparently deal with Fatah West Bank and isolate Hamas Gaza, and this will no doubt by analogy give impetus to those who wish to trisect Iraq. But watch Gaza—it will soon become Afghanistan light, as Iranian and Syrian money pour into it, and Egypt keeps clear and smiles at the ensuing blood sport with Israel.
And why should Hamas be content with miserable Gaza when the losers may keep losing?
Remember Hamas’s birth: the swindled Palestinians thought they would send a message to the corrupt Fatah by electing Islamists, some perhaps not quite thinking anyone would allow them to be really governed by such killers. But democracy, even in its reptilian form in Palestine, is unforgiving, and you live with what you vote for.
Anti-Americanism British Style
“Why we must break with the American crazies” or so writes London Times columnist Anatole Kaletsky, who goes on to cry about the old bogeyman of a neo-con conspiracy et al. that has ruined the world in Lebanon, the Middle East, Iran, and Iraq (always wise to blame the US rather than the jihadists who are doing the killing).
But I tend to agree with Kaletsky that some sort of polite distancing is necessary between us and his kindred in the post-Blair era. As we speak, British academics and journalists are boycotting Israel. Apparently such British elites see a culture of murdering and racism preferable to the democracy in Israel.
Note too that a Hamas leader Ghazi Hamad was recently feted in London as the guest of the Guardian and was courted by British elites. That London has entire apartheid communities of angry young Islamists and many of them eligible as British subjects to piggy-back on bilateral transportation agreements to travel into the US, likewise make Kaletsky’s ideas of polite distancing somewhat palatable. Whatever the UK is doing in terms of immigration and integration in London, the US should do exactly the opposite. So who exactly are the real “crazies”?
In my limited experience, most of the animus in the partnership comes from the UK and is a mish-mash of aristocratic disdain for our rabble culture, left-wing anger at our “cutthroat” society, general British angst about loss of empire and envy of the US, and special furor with the Texan, bible-quoting George ‘smoke-em out’ Bush. Whether Mr. Kaletsky likes it or not, a new neo-isolation is coming, and the next time the UK and Europe have a crisis—remember the litany from the Falklands to Soviet nuclear tipped tactical missiles to Milosevic killing thousands a few hours from European capitals—I doubt there will be any American public support for much of any US intervention.
And we know now the default British position when pressed: cf. the EU3 collapse in talks with Iran; or the British response to the Iranian piratical attack on its gunboat; or the ongoing withdrawal from Iraq. No need for any anger on either side about any of this, just a fact that trashing the US is so commonplace that it has finally hit home with most of us.
I once had dinner with a British officer, and after a pleasant conversation of about 2 hours, I remarked “This is the first time I’ve dined with a Tory and not heard something about “those Jews”. He laughed and said, “The night is still young.”
The Samson Complex
Democrats may well take the Presidency next time. And with both houses of Congress they’ll change course. But what good will all that do if they pull down the house in the process? If Nancy Pelosi triangulates by going to Syria, that does not mean that the Democrats won’t have to deal with a murderous regime in Damascus that interprets such fawning, as we just saw with the latest bombing, as a blank check for more serial murdering in Lebanon?
And when Harry Reid calls commanders in the field “incompetent” (cf. his remarks about Gens. Pace and Petraeus) and the surge a failure before it has fully unfolded, what will that mean when a Democratic Commander-in-Chief might well have to work with that same military to keep us safe? What will they do on the morning after a 9/11 event? Blame whom? The military that will be called on to save us? The CIA and FBI and other intelligence agencies that they claim trampled our freedoms?
Imagine
I often think had Scooter Libby, like Richard Armitage (who really did disclose the non-covert status of Valerie Plame) just been a Hamlet-like figure—voicing tortuous doubts about the war, and upon leaving the administration, castigating those who did not listen to his wisdom—he would have been free of his relentless Inspector Javert.
And had Paul Wolfowitz likewise had a change of heart and “deplored” the war, would the Euros on the World Bank really have gone after him for supposedly icing a good deal for a girlfriend?
In contrast, had pro-war Joe Wilson come back from Niger claiming that Saddam really was interested in yellow-cake (and he, in fact, was), and then lied on the pages of the NY Times, while his newly converted neocon wife claimed she was outed by a war critic, would either be current popular victims?
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15 Comments
1. Mark William Paules:Re: Hamas in Gaza. Irrational hatred and lunatic nihilism have but one end. If Gaza doesn’t consume itself in a fit of self-immolation, there will come a time when this tiny enclave of radicalism will become too dangerous for the Israelis to tolerate. When the war comes, as it surely will, Israel will be forced to destroy Palestinian Gaza for good. The only exit point for refugees will be into the Sinai, where the welcome by the Egyptian government will be less than cordial. The pathetic squalor of Gaza today will be nothing compared to the fetid refugee camps to come. This will be Arafat’s final legacy to his people. The loss of everything. But could such madness have any other outcome?
Jun 16, 2007 - 2:43 pm 2. Allison Aller:It all makes you want to take to the woods, doesn’t it?
Jun 16, 2007 - 4:30 pm 3. JA Lineberry:You do lay things out very clearly, as always. Thanks.
I wonder whether there is even a good and bad anymore, with these parties of ours.
Jun 16, 2007 - 6:24 pm 4. Largecanine:The analogy I would use would liken Fatah to the SA and Hamas to the SS. Nothing to chose between them. The US gov’t is foolish to give them anything. Instead we neglect valuable and trustworthy allies like Poland and Bulgaria, and waste time and wealth on our declared enemies.
Jun 17, 2007 - 12:57 am 5. Dave Begley:Could someone explain to me why the United States of America gives foreign aid money to Hamas or Fatah or the PLO or any of these murdering thugs in Palestine?
Jun 17, 2007 - 6:52 am 6. Brian J.:Let’s see here now…
You fantasize about turning the United States against *Great Britain*. Good luck, buddy. Have some Freedom Muffins for breakfast, use Freedom Leather aftershave, and when playing pool, put some Freedom on the ball. Maybe we’ll read about the success of your boycott in the London Business Review. (snicker)
You want better airline service? Re-regulate the airlines so that they compete on amenities and have a price structure we can understand. It honestly surprises me that so many right-wingers don’t recognize the profit motive behind the diminution of service, amenities, and maintenance.
I notice that not a single message met your muster for your last comment. But then, conservatism has increasingly become a philosophy of talking to oneself.
Jun 17, 2007 - 10:54 am 7. Jimmy J.:The airline fiasco. Yes, the airlines were deregulated……..partially. The government still oversees the safety standards, regulates the training, regulates the maintenance, controls the airways where they fly, controls the airports where they land, sets rules for dealing with passengers, and controls the security measures in the terminals. What can the airlines do without government looking over their shoulder? Decide where they will fly (except for big airports like O’Hare, Atlanta, Kennedy, etc.), when they will fly, and how much they will charge for a ticket. Meanwhile, start up airlines can enter the field with low cost employee structures and all leased equipment and keep driving the fares down until no one can make a profit. Not exactly a business that anyone not blinded by the glamour of aviation would want to enter.
Jun 17, 2007 - 8:14 pm 8. ivanhoe:How in the world do you manage to fly internationally on only 2 or 3 beers? I quit drinking years ago, but am regularly tempted to throw sobriety to the wind due to the aforementioned behaviors even on short regional flights. The market will have its way and respond to these frustrations. We will see more expensive flights available to those that want to avoid the rainbow coalition of trash that populates most flights these days. If I were you, I would just add a few bucks to each book or speech and see if you can make other aerial arrangements. The rest of us will sit quietly in our seats next to the screaming kid seated in the fat lady’s lap, in front of the teenager kicking our seat in time with his blaring rap music, behind the guy who thought he could set up his office on the plane and wonder just how much time we would actually have to do in federal prison if we just gave all a sound in-air thrashing with a thick book on manners.
Jun 18, 2007 - 4:36 am 9. Kevin Merkelz:You are correct in sensing a new isolationism in the wind. Many of us are looking for a less interventionist foreign policy, not because we don’t believe in the American republic and western ideals but because we frankly don’t see that the rest of the world is worth the blood and treasure. If we are to be militarily engaged in a country that is truly a “clear and present danger” we would have a quarter-million troops trying to bring democracy to Mexico. As Mexico’s oil fields begin to decline in output, which is rumored to be already the case, and income that props up one of the more corrupt governments in the hemisphere evaporates, the stream of north-bound refugees will become a flood. The income stream “safety valve” provided by illegals in this country will not keep the lid on and Mexico will implode. Crazy? Perhaps. But no crazier than trying to bring western thinking to middle-eastern peoples that have no history, experience or desire for those values and are quite content slaughtering one another settling generations-old scores based on which fairy tale each group believes in.
Israel will endure, as we have wisely supported them over the years because they had the raw materials for a democracy. We have given them the nuclear equivalent of the Colt Peacemaker, ensuring them equal stature with the 350 million surrounding Arabs who would see them destroyed.
Finally, let’s be honest about what our strategic interests are in the miserable Middle East. If three-fifths of the worlds remaining oil reserves were not under the Arabs feet, we would leave it the donkey-powered dust bowl that it was before the French and British developed those resources. Worry not. As much as they hate us, the Arabs will sell us whatever oil remains. They have little else to offer the world.
This will not be the most intellectual of responses, Mr. Hanson but I just wanted to let you know that sometimes I most enjoy reading the sections of your blog that deal with your everyday life. There’s something about reading your grumpy complaints concerning airport security that makes you seem more… Down to earth. More “accessible”, if that’s the right term. I truly enjoy it whenever you mention your farm, your kids, or what you’ve been off doing for the past week. Feel free to step off the academic and political lecturn to fill us in on little things that are happening in your life. I, for one, am always interested!
Also, I thought you might like to know that I made another addition to my growing library of Victor Davis Hanson books last weekend: I picked up “Mexifornia” at a big used book sale here in suburban Chicago. Considering the times, and the bill attempting to be put through Congress, your book’s subject matter is more potent than ever. I am excited to dive into it!
Kevin Merkelz
Jun 18, 2007 - 9:25 pm 10. Gaius:Monkey2ewok@comcast.net
I like the new Blog Dr. Hanson. I will spread the word.
I know this is not on your blog topics, but when is your novel coming out? You mentioned it on Booktv a couple of years ago.
Thanks
Jun 19, 2007 - 3:54 am 11. Mike O'Connor:SPEAKING OF A CRAZY WORLD…
I just read Mr. Hanson’s very good article “Hypocrisy That Undermines Civilization”. I’m trying to get someone who is influential, such as him, to draw attention to a certain reality pertaining to the war and… New Orleans (the city of my birth). Just bear with me for a moment or two and you’ll see the point.
If you GoogleNews the string “tulane 96 murder new orleans” you’ll find several articles that all say the same thing: that the murder rate in New Orleans is 96 per 100,000 per year.
Applying that rate to 26,783,383 Iraqis (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/iz.html), that would be 25,712 per year. Dividing by 365 days per year gives us an estimate of now many Iraqis would be dying per day of homicide if they were in New Orleans: 70 per day.
Currently CNN at http://edition.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/03/31/iraq.main/ says that “More than 1,800 Iraqi civilians died in sectarian and insurgent violence in Iraq in March”, according to the Interior Ministry. Dividing 1,800 by 31 days gives us 58 per day.
The point isn’t that the murder rate in Iraq is slightly less than the rate in New Orleans. No. The point is that the rates are, or I should say `have been’, roughly the same. So to me the situation is insane. How is it that the Left is allowed to declare that all is lost in Iraq, when in fact New Orleanians are quietly coasting along with a higher murder rate? For heaven’s sake, they just had a successful tourist-ridden Mardi Gras there! We have National Guardsmen there too, you know. How do journalists get away with their nonsense?
Jun 19, 2007 - 11:23 am 12. Paul:You want better airline service? Re-regulate the airlines so that they compete on amenities and have a price structure we can understand. It honestly surprises me that so many right-wingers don’t recognize the profit motive behind the diminution of service, amenities, and maintenance.
Whoever you are, please don’t ever vote. But if you must, do not ever run for office. Thank you.
The De-regulation of the airline industry is one of the only good things to come out of the Carter Administration. Instead of having just 10% of the people do 90% of the flying (which is what we had in the early 70s) now you have 50% of the people in this country doign 90% of the flying. The only reason why they fly is because they can afford it. They only reason why they can afford it is because it was De-regulated. To RE-regulate it would be the worst thing you could do (but the best thing you could do for the airlines as they are free to secure any profit that they want.)
The Free Market has dictated that airline travel is NOT a brand. It is now a commodity. That is what it is, like it or not. People in this country put up with long security lines, terrible serivce, tremendous restrictions, and being treated like cattle being herded into the slaughterhouse because they like the price. The price is right. They will pay no more than that. To regulate it means to RAISE the price. You have just DENIED air travel to millions and millions of would be air passengers.
You don’t get to do that. Shame on you for even suggesting it.
Victor Hanson can put up with the lousy service at the airport if it means that more people are afforded the privledge of flying. We just need to stop looking at it as anything special. Taking the plane for Domestic travel in these United States, is nothing more than taking a really fast commuter bus that travels through the air. That is all that it is, and that is all that the market demands it to be.
Jun 20, 2007 - 10:05 am 13. narciso:Of course, you were referring to Londinistan and their left wing
Jun 21, 2007 - 6:59 am 14. Blake:associates like Kaletsky, Pilger,
Fisk, hell the whole Guardian &
Independent/Observer Group
Brian J., thank you very much. Although relatively few who read this blog need to be convinced of the immature thought process held by many liberals, your flippant response to Mr. Hanson (which completely missed much of what he was trying to say) is a text book example.
Jun 21, 2007 - 10:51 am 15. Mark William Paules:Brian,
The good professor has posted your comments, I would assume verbatim ac litteratim. If I’m wrong, please correct me. He won’t answer your diatribe, but I will. And you can post my response wherever you like. Freedom is not a concept to be sneered at. Free thought, freedom of inquiry, and free expression provide the foundation for Western Civilization. The process tends to be contentious, but the results are remarkable. Modernity and progress are the children of debate.
If you think conservatives are philosophically monolithic, then you know nothing about your political opposition. We debate policy each and every day. The conservative movement is generally more divided than it is unified by a common ideology. We contend within our own group for the best ideas and the best policy, ongoing and everyday.
See you to the same, brother. Give us a mote of respect in the debate and we’ll reciprocate. Civil discourse is always welcome, especially by the opposition, but snide remarks will get you nowhere. Are you up to the task? If so, prove it.
Jun 21, 2007 - 7:09 pm