For example, you take air travel. You know. Going to airports to catch a plane or two to get from somewhere to somewhere else quickly and in comfort – relative comfort – with drinks, and magazines, and restrooms and…on overseas travel…with little sock-like slippers that help keep your tootsies comfortably relaxed. And bags of peanuts, and choice of menu, including religious diets and vegetarian meals. And, oh yes, the movie and boutique…when they pass the cart around so you can buy tax-free luxuries.

Many disgruntled, and frankly unpatriotic Americans as well as even more suspicious foreign travelers…especially those with different complexions…argue that the new security regulations have changed air travel and that air travel is now a real pain in the tushie.

Well, I don’t want to seem pollyannaish or appear like some goodie-goodie seeking a pat on the head from our Attorney General, whom we are fortunate to have as our top law enforcer. I am law abiding, yes, but not necessarily law enjoying. And in egregious cases of abuse by unjust, mean or merely stupid laws, I have been known to express my displeasure…always respectfully, of course.

I lived in Germany for three years after W.W.II, and I remember some old timers there, native Germans, telling me that all that most people did during the sway of the Nazis was to obey the law. And that was a good thing. Conditions got bad enough in Nazi Germany without a bunch of anarchist radicals breaking the law right and left and making things even worse.

But, let us return to the contemporary scene at U.S. airports. Goodness knows that what I may or may not think about the current security regulations at our airports is of little enough importance. Law abiding citizens don’t boast about obeying the law anymore than honest people boast about not stealing. There’s no Nobel Prize for honesty, that’s for sure!

But, be that as it may, I have to confess modestly that I like…yes, like…the present airport scene.

Why?

It’s not too hard to explain. I am sure that the audience will understand why I like the way things are at…say…LaGuardia, Kennedy, Dulles or O’Hare.