Dear Dirty America

Everything that is wrong with America plays out at the Los Angeles International Airport. It’s a tiny, out of control police state. Once you get on Century Boulevard and drive in, you’re subject to any kind of unlawful search and seizure of your property or your person. You become an inconvenience. A hassle to security, the LAX police, and the slouching TSA agents who have to wait for you to put your shoes back on.I was swooping in to pick up my Libra at the Southwest terminal.

Luckily, I’d found a spot in the loading zone, right beneath the last Southwest sign. Taxis, shuttles, and cars were streaming by. Just as I put the car into park, a heavyset, bald security guard in green army pants and a tan button up shirt waved at me.I waved back. Hell, I’m from North Dakota. People wave. It’s friendly.He kept waving. He took out a notepad and scribbled on it. I realized he was looking at my license plate. Behind me two cop cars with flashing lights were flipping on their sirens so those of us parked would move.

I stuck my head out the window.

“Keep it moving!” the guard said. “Come on. Move!” He swaggered toward me.

Would you complain?

For the thinking man, this is a dilemma. On one hand, I’m a good American. I follow the law. I respect the government’s officials, no matter how trivial or unreasonable their position. On the other hand, when I’m being mistreated, I have to decide if I want to raise my voice, or slink away in defeat. I considered the advice of William F Buckley Jr.

I also thought of George Washington. Would he put up with this baloney? Or would he politely remove his wooden teeth from his mouth, set them on the hood of his car, and then put a fist right into the LAX airport security officer’s mouth?

I rolled down my window and stuck my head out. “I just pulled up,” I shouted. Beside me cars and buses roared past. Squeaky brakes squealed. I shouted louder, “I’m here to pick up someone. She’s almost here.”

The security guard didn’t pay me any attention. His face grew sterner, and he waved me on more frantically. He told me to move again. I lowered my passenger side window and raised my hands. “She’s coming out, I need to pick her up,” I said. “I’ve been here for thirty-five seconds so far.”

Who hired that degenerate troll? Why do we put up with these people, and the exaggerated authority in this country?

He barked that I had to keep moving. “No waiting.”

Did he want my Libra to run beside my car with her suitcases, so we could coordinate a ‘moving pickup’? She could whip open one door, chuck her heavy luggage in, and then dive in after. We could have attempted this, except we weren’t prepared for it.

So what if I stopped for thirty-five seconds. What was the guard worried about? That I had Osama bin Laden stuffed in my trunk and I’d resurrect him if I had the chance? Would he want to check my underwear, too? Do a full cavity search? Do I look like a terrorist?

This was one of those rare times I actually wanted to see Kanye West spring out of a pink and green suitcase. The world famous asshole diving in, head and shoulders low, into the back of that security troll’s knees. Roll him right over. The bastard wouldn’t even know what hit him. That would be doing a service for humanity, a service Kanye badly owes us.

Leveling that airport officer would be a win-win for the general public. Kanye wouldn’t be charged with anything. And it’s not like the police can shoot at a world famous celebrity.

But that didn’t happen. Who knows where Kanye West was. Most likely not reading the kid’s version of Moby Dick to his boy, North. Instead, I had to drive around the congested airport circle like a ninny for twenty more minutes. Burning fuel. Blowing carbon into the air. Heating up the atmosphere. Melting the ice so the poor polar bears, who are normally excellent swimmers, can’t find a hunk of ice on which to rest. So they drown. So the ocean’s levels rise. So LAX eventually becomes official property of the Pacific Ocean.

I thought of that dwarf security guard. Hey buddy, don’t mind us. We’re just the taxpayers who pay your salary so you can playact importance over us while we’re trying to scoop up our loved ones from their terminal in a hectic, frantic airport.

We’re just the taxpayers who help the government subsidize their airports and airlines. We’re only the customers who pay hundreds of dollars to fly.

When our police and security officials belittle the very people they’re supposed to protect, and make life unnecessarily unpleasant without actually adding any security, it’s time to scale back the power we’ve entrusted to our state and local departments and organizations.

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