http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/12/10/21849757-tsa-confiscates-sock-monkeys-toy-gun?lite
 

Good job TSA!  I feel safer already.
 
It's a good thing they haven't seen the monkeys we have around here!

But they let her take the sewing supplies on board. Tiny toy gun or pins and knitting needles, what's more dangerous.

I'll never forget the story a friend of mine told.  He worked for Horizon Air here at Portland International Airport (a sister company of Alaska Airlines).  One day he was going through the security lines when the guy stopped him because he had forgotton to leave his little Swiss Army knife at home.  It's one of those tiny ones with the scissors and the toothpick.  The security guy said he couldn't go on the plane with it and my friend asked why.  "Because it could be used to commandeer the plane," the guy replied.  To which my friend quipped "I'm the pilot you idiot, I'm supposed to commandeer the plane!"
 
Cracks me up everytime I recall it!

Many moons ago I was on a flight to a remote desert airstrip in a Middle East country. Security at the city airport terminal took my colleagues Swiss Army Knife and gave it to the steward for safe keeping. The plane was an utilitarian F27, half passenger, half cargo.
 
Once on the flight my colleague asked if he could have his knife back. "Not until we land, its for security, you might hijack the plane", his response. "If I needed a weapon to hijack the plane do you think I would use that knife, or take that fire axe off the bulkhead?"

TSA is worthless.... actually, less than worthless. They have stopped not one single terrorist. The terrorists have gotten through and were stopped by the passengers on the planes.
 
All they have done is harass the good citizens while strip searching grannies and little kids and confiscating water bottles and embroidered guns. It's time to close that agency down. (among several others as well)
 
Common sense has left this country.

The best part of the story is this conversation regarding the 2 inch "gun":
 
 
 
“She said ‘This is a gun,’” May told King 5. “I said 'No, it’s not a gun, it’s a prop for my monkey.'”
 
“She said ‘If I held it up to your neck, you wouldn’t know if it was real or not,’ and I said ‘Really?’” May said. 

 
 
 
Ya.....common sense has been deleted.

After spending several months being harassed and verbally abused on a weekly basis by TSA personnel, I am convinced that their behavior is due to a systemic problem rather than an individual one.  TSA agents are rude and nonsensical because they are trained to be.  They're doing what their management wants them to do.  Remember the "behavioral profiling" program that cost almost $1B that was proven to be completely ineffective?  Part of this technique included (based upon my personal observations and opinions) screaming at passengers, the agent's insistence on following inane policies in the most iditiotic manner possible, shrieking nonsensical commands in a threatening manner, and suddenly ganging up on an unsuspecting passenger with little or no provocation.  I've had agents in my face for no intelligent reason, screaming at the top of their lungs, and invading my personal space merely to demonstrate and confirm their dominance over me.  Week after week after week, I have endured their constant, never-ending abuse.  It Never Ends.  It never gets better.
 
There is only one reason for it.  Our "superiors" want us cowering at their feet.  This is about power and nothing else.  Those with the power will never, under any circumstance, voluntarily give it up.  It doesn't matter how stupid the situation may be.  It doesn't matter how ridiculous their demands are.  It doesn't matter whether or not their abuse of the citizenry is legal.  They are putting us in our place and that's the end game.  We can choose how we respond, but there is a cost to defiance.  In most cases, we submit to it, bowing before our masters, gratefully accepting whatever treatment we are given because we are not willing to accept the cost of standing up to them.
 
This isn't about politics.  It's about power.  They have it and we don't.
 
Long live the sock monkeys!
 
(Can you tell I've had my fill of dealing with air travel?)

I wonder what would happen if The Forum Monkeys tried to board dee-plane?

bapu
I wonder what would happen if The Forum Monkeys tried to board dee-plane?

They might bring Law & Order to these power hungry TSP imbeciles whom are just incapable of Breaking Bad?