Friday, November 16, 2007
Curious Priorities
On our most recent departure from Logan Airport in Boston, we were greeted in the security line by an agent who scrutinized our drivers’ licenses with the aid of a little blue light. It seemed that he was looking for special markings otherwise not visible as a means of screening for forgeries.
Indelicate impulse led me to comment “this thing gets more ridiculous by the day, doesn’t it?” Unperturbed, the agent replied “if it saves one life it may be worth it.”
It being a Thursday when this happened, it occurred to me that medical errors in Boston hospitals had probably killed at least a half-dozen people so far that week with few being the wiser. No doubt there were safety efforts going on in all of them, but nothing to compare with the US Transportation Security Agency and its long-shot effort to save lives by finding airline passengers with bogus driver’s licenses.
There is no accounting for priorities.
On our most recent departure from Logan Airport in Boston, we were greeted in the security line by an agent who scrutinized our drivers’ licenses with the aid of a little blue light. It seemed that he was looking for special markings otherwise not visible as a means of screening for forgeries.
Indelicate impulse led me to comment “this thing gets more ridiculous by the day, doesn’t it?” Unperturbed, the agent replied “if it saves one life it may be worth it.”
It being a Thursday when this happened, it occurred to me that medical errors in Boston hospitals had probably killed at least a half-dozen people so far that week with few being the wiser. No doubt there were safety efforts going on in all of them, but nothing to compare with the US Transportation Security Agency and its long-shot effort to save lives by finding airline passengers with bogus driver’s licenses.
There is no accounting for priorities.
