Today's dialogue comes to you live from The Drink & Think, the frequent home of American Samizat and meetingplace of the Dash brothers. Located in the Rue Morgue Mall.

PHINEAS DASH: So, what's it all about, 9/11? What is there to say about it a year later?

CHRISTOPHER DASH: Last time I flew I had to remove my belt, jacket and shoes, and stand on a piece of carpet that had two footprints burned into it. I had to open my sealed bottle of water and take a sip in front of the security guard. Later, when I was entering a public building in Washington, D.C., an art museum in the Smithsonian, I was opening my backpack for the security guard to inspect. I took out my bottle of water and was about to take a sip---it was hot outside and I was thirsty---when the security guard told me I wasn't allowed to drink from a bottle inside the building.

THERON DASH: Exactly. Power plus fear plus bureaucracy equals intense absurdity. Of which this is a small example. Nothing like, say, attacking Iraq. But indicative.

CHRISTOPHER: Yes, but for the largest number of people this has been the biggest effect of 9/11 so far. It has made air travel, which was already deteriorating, an experience in madness.

PHINEAS: Air travel is on the brink of collapse. Think of what happens to the economy then.

CHRISTOPHER: I can remember when flying was pleasant. Or even when it was fun to go no-frills. People's Express. They had style when they started out. I was on a flight once, packed to the gills with people giddy over saving so much money, when the announcement came over the p.a. "Passengers on the right side of the aircraft can look to the left and see the passengers on the left side of the aircraft." Later when it got really big it wasn't so much fun. But they were always overbooked and I got so many free tickets by volunteering to be bumped on flights coming home that I saw half the continent for free. But for efficient and very comfortable flights, nothing beat Air Canada.

PHINEAS: Even Air Canada isn't so great now, but it suggests what really needs to be done. Air travel is so essential that the government is going to wind up bailing out some of these airlines, but that money isn't going to improve them, just keep them going. What we really need is a government funded airline.

THERON: Air America? Run by the CIA?

PHINEAS: No, run by TWA, the old TWA. Run by airline professionals, but run as a public utility. Government built the interstate highways, it subsidies rail travel, so supporting air travel is justifiable. And if the federal government paid for an airline with quality service and reasonable fares, maybe private airlines would find ways to improve their service and fares. A single national airline run like Air Canada used to be can coexist with private airlines just like Air Canada and other state-run airlines coexisted with commercial airlines. Plus a certain minimum amount of available air travel would be guaranteed. Somebody has to do something about the current chaos.

THERON: As much as I thrive on chaos, I'm inclined to agree. Did you read about that woman, the environmental activist, who was banned from flying because somebody didn't like her politics? And how she was abused with impunity by a single soldier, maybe not even regular army, but with more authority than anyone else at the airport? All the really loose accusations that carried really heavy penalties? That's chaos plus fear plus power, minus rights.

PHINEAS: We all realize what a serious trauma 9-11 was. But there hasn't been another airliner problem since then, and I'll go out on limb to say it's real unlikely there will be.

CHRISTOPHER: You went out on that limb on 9-12, as I recall. And of course it makes sense that they wouldn't expect to get away with using airliners again. Surprise was the essence of it.

PHINEAS: Heightened security is sensible. But it's gotten out of hand. Along with the rest of the Bushfellows agenda.

THERON: It's also taken a year to get federally employed security people as inspectors at airports. Yet some of them are saying that their training consisted of maybe fifteen minutes. That doesn't bode well for your national airline, Phin. Maybe we should just give the franchise to Air Canada.