The federal government maintains a Watch List for airline passengers. It’s inevitable that some people are going to share a name with an actual “person of interest.” And it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy than the whiny, self-absorbed, deceitful putz who wrote this op-ed in today’s L.A. Times.
The op-ed is by a guy named John Johnson (aka Fenton Johnson). Why is he on the Watch List? I have no idea. Is there an actual potential terrorist named John Johnson? Or does the federal government just think that some moron foreign terrorist is likely to use a generic name like that? Mr. Johnson has a darker theory:
Why am I on the TSA list? Because I have a common first and last name? Because I snapped at a security screener who confiscated my nail clippers? Because I write critically of the administration? Because I vote Democratic?
News flash, John Johnson aka Fenton Johnson: you’re not that important. I never heard of you and I bet President Bush hasn’t either. And no, there are not 55 million people on the Watch List.
What terrible indignities has our hero had to face as a result of his sharing a name with a person of interest? Get out your hankies, because this is a tragic tale:
In the months since I learned I am on the list I have flown several times, and — so far — my greatest inconvenience consists of being denied use of the machines that dispense automatic boarding passes. Instead, I must wait in line for a clerk.
Comparing this inconvenience to the inconvenience of people flying airliners into skyscrapers, my conclusion is that John aka Fenton Johnson should shut the hell up.
Read on — if you can stand to:
By now I anticipate the situation, obediently line up, and watch for the clerk to react as I’m fingered by the list. After an ID check, I’ve been allowed to proceed, although some make clear their feeling that if the law has turned its spotlight on me then I must have done something wrong, and the sooner I’m sent to Guantanamo Bay the better.
It’s not long before our boy shifts from Whiny Mode to Deceptive Mode, with this dishonest paragraph:
I have visited the TSA website, where I was informed that on submission of notarized copies of my birth certificate, my passport and my driver’s license, I might find it easier to proceed through airport security — but that I will not be removed from the list.
I have to admit that when I read the article, that was the one part that bothered me. If this fellow can prove that he doesn’t belong on the list, then (whiny as he may be) they should take him off. But a little voice in my head said: “Don’t trust him. Check it out.” So I did.
Here is what the TSA’s web site actually says about removing yourself from the Watch List:
Please understand that the TSA clearance process will not remove a name from the Watch Lists. Instead this process distinguishes passengers from persons who are in fact on the Watch Lists by placing their names and identifying information in a cleared portion of the Lists. Airline personnel can then more quickly determine when implementing TSA-required identity verification procedures that these passengers are not the person of interest whose name is actually on the Watch Lists.
Clearance by TSA may not eliminate the need to go to the ticket counter in order to check-in. While TSA cannot ensure that this procedure will relieve all delays, we hope it will facilitate a more efficient check-in process for you.
In other words, if there is a person of interest whose name is contained on the Watch List, the government isn’t going to just take it off just because the person of interest happens to share a common name with a non-suspicious citizen. Instead, the government is going to do the only thing we could reasonably expect it to — take the Clean Citizen’s information so that they can be quickly distinguished from the actual person of interest.
That is not what I thought ol’ John aka Fenton meant when he said “I will not be removed from the list.”
I have no doubt that the Watch List is bureaucratic and nowhere near as effective as it could be. I wish I could read a good op-ed about those deficiencies, which identifies the real issues and suggests viable solutions. Instead, the editors give us this whiny, Bush-bashing, deceptive claptrap.
I’ve said this before about L.A. Times editors and it applies today: I am not surprised, but I am disappointed.