George,

Feb 25 I checked my suit case with Jet Blue at Richmond Airport. The TSA asks us to trust them with our checked luggage because all luggage locks are removed or cut off. My bag was whisked out of my sight to be inspected by TSA before loading. When I opened my bag several hours later at my destination I found an empty camera case. It was missing a Canon camera, instruction book, Garmin GPS navigation system, and power cord. This suggests a leisurely theft. I suspect the TSA are the culprits. The TSA X-rays and or searches all passenger baggage behind closed doors out of sight of the public. Who watches them? Who's to stop them if they swipe a few goodies here and there?

Baggage loaders don't have time to open each and every bag looking for potential loot. If one of them got lucky and opened my bag, they would have grabbed the entire camera case and quickly stashed it instead of removing one by one the above mentioned items.

Or maybe the TSA and the baggage loaders are in cahoots. Maybe my bag was cased and marked by a TSA worker, for looting in a less conspicuous location.

However it happened, my trust in the TSA has been totally violated. It burns me that tax-paying law-abiding US citizens are presumed to be and treated like potential terrorists. We are humiliated by removing our shoes, belts, patted and searched. Some say they don't mind this because it is the price of freedom. Ha.

What about this scenario?

More people are killed every year by drunk drivers than were killed on 9/11/01.

If the same line of reasoning is followed, shouldn't every vehicle on the road be stopped and searched, and the driver given a breath test? Wouldn't it be worth giving up our freedoms to save thousands of lives? What's the difference between the two?

We've been slowly and steadily conditioned into accepting the erosion of our civil rights. It might come to this.

What's the solution? Demand to watch your bags being search by the TSA. Don't pack anything of value in your checked luggage. Quit flying. Don't drink and drive.

Joan Schatzman (Electronic mail, April 3, 2008)