My flights to CPAC, or to BlogCon, are bookended with my silent recitation of the Lord’s Prayer.  The most dangerous points in your air travel are the takeoff and the landing.  From what I’ve read, more-so the landing.

But there’s also the threat of terrorism.  I’ve always allowed myself a bit of comfort in the premise that what is on the plane with me, both people and cargo, has had multiple sets of eyes on it, and the eyes belonged to people who were looking out for me.

I know, I know.  A comfortable fantasy, right?

Especially when the TSA inspectors can get an unknown package on JetBlue for a c-note:

On November 19, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) was at Charlotte Douglas Airport testing out JetBlue’s security. Their goal was to try and get an unaccompanied package onto a flight headed to Boston and unfortunately, they succeeded. An undercover TSA agent told a JetBlue ticket agent that he needed to get a package to Boston that day and would pay the agent $100.00 for helping. The agent took the $100, put it in his pocket and proceeded to follow the unknown person’s instructions. The ticket agent chose a passenger’s name at random, which just happened to be an unaccompanied minor, and the package went through the screening process with no problems. Although the package was harmless, the TSA pulled the package just before being loaded onto the aircraft.

Here’s the understatement of the year:

“That’s really alarming,” Anthony Amore, a former high-ranking TSA official at Logan Airport told a local Boston CBS station.

Gee, you think?

Now the question is, “How often does this happen?”

You never get caught your first time.  How many times a day do TSA agents put get packages on planes for a one time monetary donation to the undocumented TSA retirement fund simple bribe?

Meanwhile, keep strip searching those seven year olds and the Catholic nuns. Wouldn’t want anything to go unseen.

Hat Tip:  Instapundit

Cross posted at Right Wing News.

Update: When I wrote this, for some reason I thought it was the TSA testing the TSA.  The TSA was actually testing the JetBlue ticket agent.

From the article:

When the local station asked the TSA for a comment, they were told, “While we cannot comment on the specifics of an open investigation, TSA can assure travelers that, like checked baggage, every package tendered at the airline counter is screened for explosives.” JetBlue confirmed that they are “fully cooperating with the TSA’s investigation” and “the involved crew member is no longer employed at JetBlue.”

Commentor Good Ol Boy at Right Wing News adds:

Personally, and this is just me, I don’t care whether its a failure by JetBlue’s security or the TSA. The bottomline, to me anyway, is that for a measley $100 bride, a bomb could get slipped onto a plane. That is not just “alarming”, that is an epic fail.

Good point.