Checkpoints and Borders Policy Debate - Arthur Frommer loves the TSA

At the Frommers website, he wrote a passionate defense of the TSA. His stance is pretty much one of how can we forget the lessons of 9/11 and the TSA is keeping us from getting blown out of the sky.

http://www.frommers.com/community/blogs/blog.cfm/arthur-frommer-online/those-newspaper-columnists-internet-bloggers-ridicule-tsa-very-short-memories
"..I thank heaven for the zealousness of the TSA. Every time I am patted down, I am grateful for security agents who take their jobs seriously. I am conscious of the fact that their zealousness is deterring all sorts of would-be terrorists from attempting to carry weapons onto planes. And I am astonished at the shortsighted lack of memory on the part of various newspaper and internet commentators who enjoy the act of ridiculing the TSA.

Thank heaven we at last have a security agency that isn't affected by the profit motive. Thank heaven they are patting down even the most unlikely suspects, in the hope of deterring a terrorist from attempting to avoid their security barriers.
Thank heaven we have an agency that remembers 9/11. .."

Note to self - never trust Frommer's again............

I curse the zealousness of the TSA. Every time they pat down a child, an elderly person with a cane, a cancer survivor or war veteran with a prosthesis, they spit on the graves of the hundreds of thousands - or is it millions - of Americans who have sacrificed their lives over the last 200 years to defend American freedoms. And I am astonished at the shortsighted lack of memory on the part of various paranoid nincompoops who are willing to turn this country into a new version of Nazi Germany or the Communist Soviet Union out of cowardice and fear.

Thank heaven we have a few people in this country who still remember that we have a Constitution and why it was adopted. Thank heaven that at least a few people in this country still remember that it is freedom, not "safety" or "security", that made the United States the greatest country on Earth at one time, and can do so again.

Thank heaven there are still a few people who remember that 9/11 didn't change a damn thing - WE changed it, when we gave in, wholesale, to the fear that the perpetrators of 9/11 instilled in us as a nation.

But if we can find our spines in time, perhaps we can change it back.

Last time Frommer's sees a dime from me... or that I bother to read their blogs or travel info.

Note to self - never trust Frommer's again............

Isnt Frommer's target market a bit blue haired (scared of bad guys) and/or the type of person who would go to Europe with three money belts, and on an organized coach trip?

I think of their market as being a truly middle class traveler, perhaps taking the family to see the olde world.

Wait until a TSO grabs Frommer's junk and then let's see how he feels

Wait until a TSO grabs Frommer's junk and then let's see how he feels

He already answered you.

Every time I am patted down, I am grateful for security agents who take their jobs seriously.

I wonder if there is something going on behind the scenes at Frommers. Chris Elliott's trouble shooting column runs there. However, he has also written several pieces that are critical of the TSA which haven't been on Frommers. Coincidence or editorial control?

I don't have anything against Arthur Frommer. I think he is of the WWII vet generation that still basically trusts the government unconditionally.

Frankly, I don't care much for Frommer or his publications. Rarely have I seen anything in Frommer's that is unusual or out-of-the-mainstream. His/his publications pander to the inexperienced & in my opinion have contributed to the throngs of tourists at certain sites and the general bad behavior of tourists (American tourists in particular) at many of the major tourist destinations.

Instead of taking the badly-behaved tourists to task, the pandering continues. Likewise, he won't take the TSA to task because it might (negatively) impact his revenue stream. Frommer is IMHO a sheep that wants zero-risk, and encourages zero-risk for the travels of his readers.

Wait until a TSO grabs Frommer's junk and then let's see how he feelsHe already answered you.

Every time I am patted down, I am grateful for security agents who take their jobs seriously.

I said "grabs his junk" not simply getting patted down ;). I've been patted down and have had my junk grabbed* and there is a difference.


*and if it's a "good grab", I'll ask the TSO if he enjoyed it as much as I did ;)

Today Arthur frommer posted a blog about the TSA and the response he had from the previous blog piece. Mr. Frommer seems to be unaware that the weapons that the 9/11 hijackers used were not prohibited at the time and therefore the airport security was not negligent in letting those items pass.
http://www.frommers.com/community/blogs/blog.cfm/arthur-frommer-online/parting-response-readers-believe-tsa-should-disbanded-restricted

"...It was therefore with astonishment that I read the dozen-or-so negative comments that have been made in response to my recent blog post (scroll down for the comments) in which I discussed the campaign to discredit the TSA, or to replace them with the employees of private, profit-seeking companies, or to force them to discontinue certain security practices (like requiring passenger to take off their shoes and place them on the belt, or to permit passengers to carry large containers of liquid onto flights). See the comment to my blog that states we should "get rid of the body scanners, get rid of the shoe removal, get rid of the liquid restrictions." One wonders what world these strident sorts are living in. Have they never heard of Richard Reid, the "shoe bomber," who concealed explosives in his footwear that were capable of bringing down a plane? Have they never heard of the would-be terrorist who attempted to ignite explosive liquids that he brought onto a plane?..
Do the opponents of the TSA really claim that the calibre of TSA's work force is less impressive than the bored and bumbling types that used to maintain the security gates prior to 9/11 and who permitted the 19 hijackers to pass almost effortlessly onto the planes they later seized?.."

A commenter, IMHO, got it right: "I maintain that what has kept the terrorists from seizing planes in the last 10 years is not the security theater of the TSA (more on that in a second), but the mentality shift we as a society have undergone as a result of 9/11. When a pilot went berserk on a JetBlue plane yesterday, it was the other passengers who subdued him -- as it was the other passengers, not the TSA, who tackled the shoe bomber and prevented him from doing any harm..."

Frommer is an idiot.

Actually, Arthur, NO, I haven't ever heard of a passenger who got liquid explosives aboard a plane and "attempted to ignite them," because it has never happened. The so-called Liquids Bombers were busted long before they ever had their explosives concocted, and long before they ever got near a plane.

Which is lucky for them, since, as far as I can tell from my reading on the net, there is no liquid explosive that is powerful enough to take down a plane that is not also so unstable that it would blow the bomber to bits on the taxi ride to the airport.

Frommer's opinion is clearly based on three foundations:

1) That what TSA is doing is necessary
2) That what TSA is doing is effective
3) That security is more important than freedom

Some security is necessary. Very few people argue otherwise. However, rational people understand there is a point at which additional security is not necessary. The folks, like AF, that blindly chant the mantra "ANYTHING for security" are not rational. This dovetails nicely with the thinking that TSA alone is keeping us safe (when all the evidence suggests otherwise).

Rational people want security to be effective. AF doesn't even address the point. He takes TSA's marketing as gospel. See above.

The third item speaks for itself. Anyone that blindly sacrifices freedom for the illusion of safety is not only a coward, but is an ignorant and irrational one.

Add me to the list of former AF customers.

I curse the zealousness of the TSA. Every time they pat down a child, an elderly person with a cane, a cancer survivor or war veteran with a prosthesis, they spit on the graves of the hundreds of thousands - or is it millions - of Americans who have sacrificed their lives over the last 200 years to defend American freedoms. And I am astonished at the shortsighted lack of memory on the part of various paranoid nincompoops who are willing to turn this country into a new version of Nazi Germany or the Communist Soviet Union out of cowardice and fear.

Thank heaven we have a few people in this country who still remember that we have a Constitution and why it was adopted. Thank heaven that at least a few people in this country still remember that it is freedom, not "safety" or "security", that made the United States the greatest country on Earth at one time, and can do so again.

Thank heaven there are still a few people who remember that 9/11 didn't change a damn thing - WE changed it, when we gave in, wholesale, to the fear that the perpetrators of 9/11 instilled in us as a nation.

But if we can find our spines in time, perhaps we can change it back.

^ +$700 Billion (my estimate for the direct and indirect cost of TSA over the last decade)

That was my comment he referenced, about ending the shoe carnival, liquid bans and AIT.

I feel honored :)

That was my comment he referenced, about ending the shoe carnival, liquid bans and AIT.

I feel honored :)

Does that mean that Frommer's can now officially list you in their bibliographies as an informational source, Saul? :D

Does that mean that Frommer's can now officially list you in their bibliographies as an informational source, Saul? :D

Ha ha.

I trust that the overwhelming percentage of our readers are grateful for the conscientious performance of their work by the TSA.I'm sure they are, Arthur. Myopia is a common ailment.

My feelings are the same from a few years ago when we discussed Frommer... :rolleyes:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/practical-travel-safety-issues/1147265-arthur-frommer-likes-scanners.html

Frommers 'advice' is outdated and ineffective, and sometimes completely wrong. Placing a popular tourist destination 100km in the wrong spot is quite a serious error for a leisure travel company.

(Frommers also advocates dressing up to get an upgrade but many people listen to his advice/the advice of his website. And according to Frommers, I have been living 100km distance from where I should have been)

And as this thread shows, there are a lot of clueless people who believe his advice such as 'dress for an upgrade', including some FTers. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/travelbuzz/1243491-dress-up-upgrade-6.html

And then we have this thread, where the author of an article from Frommers uses outdated and misleading information. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/travel-news/1303619-according-frommers-best-worst-airports.html

Unfortunately, while Frommers is outdated/misinformed/inaccurate, there are many many people (lacking critical thinking skills) who believe what they produce, and take it to heart, just as they will believe and support what he writes about the scanners.

My feelings are the same from a few years ago when we discussed Frommer... :rolleyes:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/practical-travel-safety-issues/1147265-arthur-frommer-likes-scanners.html

I love how two years ago in that piece, he trumpeted AIT because his hip replacement always alarmed the WTMD and he had to be patted down.

And now, two years later, with the widespread deployment of AIT --

Because I have a hip replacement, and thus have metal in my body, I set off the alarm every time I pass through Security at an airport. I am thus patted down on every single visit to an airport, and in both directions. And because I travel by air much more frequently than most normal Americans, I have been patted down on nearly four hundred occasions over the past ten years.

Ah, but you sir are unusual.

You have critical thinking skills and were able to expose that contradictory message.

Many people (including FTers on those threads I linked) lack those skills, and think that just because he is a well-known name in the travel world, he must be right. Looking back at what I linked, I recognise at least one or two posters who support both Frommer and the scanners.

(And if Arthur is patted down on every single visit to an airport, then he isn't flying outside the US anymore)

Ah, but you sir are unusual.

You have critical thinking skills and were able to expose that contradictory message.

Many people (including FTers on those threads I linked) lack those skills, and think that just because he is a well-known name in the travel world, he must be right. Looking back at what I linked, I recognise at least one or two posters who support both Frommer and the scanners.

(And if Arthur is patted down on every single visit to an airport, then he isn't flying outside the US anymore)

Now that I think about it some more, would a metal hip implant trigger AIT? I thought AIT could not see inside the body.

My opinion of anyone goes down somewhat if I discover that they're in the AFS crowd. I try to be objective and tolerant, but when I hear someone advocating the erosion and violation of everyone else's Constitutional rights because they are scared of terr'ists, it just makes my blood boil.

I don't own any Frommers travel guides, but I had always thought of them as being reputable and accurate, within the limitations of a printed book, which can't keep up with recent changes as quickly as the web. Then I read this thread, and now I won't be recommending Frommers to anyone I know any time soon, partly because of the reports of inaccuracy, and partly because Arthur Frommer is an AFS advocate.

Now that I think about it some more, would a metal hip implant trigger AIT? I thought AIT could not see inside the body.

When I read that, I simply assumed that he was referring to the WTMD alarming, not AIT.

But you're right, at least about MMW. I have seen some test images from BSX systems on the net where the x-rays actually penetrate the thinner parts of the extremeties and show hand, arm, foot, and leg bones.

Interesting...
Christopher Elliott's piece about Corbett's end run around the scanner just posted on Frommers. As this article has already appeared in other places, I wonder if Frommer was trying to get control of the discussion before the Elliott article went up.
http://www.frommers.com/deals/airfare/article.cfm?dealID=AIRFARE&articleID=7649

Maybe, I'm just paranoid.

I don't own any Frommers travel guides, but I had always thought of them as being reputable and accurate, within the limitations of a printed book, which can't keep up with recent changes as quickly as the web. Then I read this thread, and now I won't be recommending Frommers to anyone I know any time soon, partly because of the reports of inaccuracy, and partly because Arthur Frommer is an AFS advocate.

When I am looking for a travel guide series, I look for the one specific to my home, and check what it says. That is generally a fairly good indicator of the accuracy and the focus of the series, even if individual books for different locations are written by different authors.

The threads which I linked to various threads here on FT reinforced my suspicions. Like you, I never had an issue with Frommers (but never used them). It was when he spoke up, and when I stumbled across the article with outdated information that I decided that I would never recommend them either.

Now that I think about it some more, would a metal hip implant trigger AIT? I thought AIT could not see inside the body.

It doesn't alarm on the implant. It alarms on pocket lint, sweat, pockets themselves, pleats, etc.

It doesn't alarm on the implant. It alarms on pocket lint, sweat, pockets themselves, pleats, etc.

It alarms on bad Karma too, but only about 50% of the time.

Frommer can kiss my a$$!

Do you think she is referring to the issues at JFK?
She may not be in TSA but she is more than just a kettle as she does travel writing for a living.

She writes:
The truth is: we have not had a successful terrorist attack on a plane since 9/11. To say that has only to do with the response of fellow passengers is naive. I've been at the airport twice in the past two months when the security line and ALL flights were paused, so that security incidents could be addressed. I'm a member of the public, not a TSA officer, so I don't know what those incidents consisted of. But I was impressed by the show of force and coordination these searches took (from what I could see). Its easy to diss the TSA. I say: look at their record of success instead.
4/2/2012 1:20 PM EDT

Do you think she is referring to the issues at JFK?
She may not be in TSA but she is more than just a kettle as she does travel writing for a living.

She writes:
The truth is: we have not had a successful terrorist attack on a plane since 9/11. To say that has only to do with the response of fellow passengers is naive. I've been at the airport twice in the past two months when the security line and ALL flights were paused, so that security incidents could be addressed. I'm a member of the public, not a TSA officer, so I don't know what those incidents consisted of. But I was impressed by the show of force and coordination these searches took (from what I could see). Its easy to diss the TSA. I say: look at their record of success instead.
4/2/2012 1:20 PM EDT

I was impressed by the coordination and show of force when I studied Nazi Germany in high school, but that doesn't mean I approve of what they DID with that coordination of force.

Do you think she is referring to the issues at JFK?
She may not be in TSA but she is more than just a kettle as she does travel writing for a living.

She writes:
The truth is: we have not had a successful terrorist attack on a plane since 9/11. To say that has only to do with the response of fellow passengers is naive. I've been at the airport twice in the past two months when the security line and ALL flights were paused, so that security incidents could be addressed. I'm a member of the public, not a TSA officer, so I don't know what those incidents consisted of. But I was impressed by the show of force and coordination these searches took (from what I could see). Its easy to diss the TSA. I say: look at their record of success instead.
4/2/2012 1:20 PM EDT

Funnily enough there have been no terrorist attacks in Australia since 9/11 either - and guess what? There's no TSA security theatre down under (not yet anyway). And Australia isn't unique in that regard.

I used to like Frommers and I used their books with great pleasure many, many years ago when I first ventured overseas. I think that it's a shame they haven't moved on, an organisation that I used to have a real fondness for now feels like an embarrassing old uncle that you'd prefer not to acknowledge.

Arthur is back, this time advocating even more extensive and frequent pat-downs by the TSA because of the latest version of the underwear bomber. He doesn't bother to mention that the perp was actually an agent of Saudi Intelligence working in concert with our CIA.


(...)

Now, with the news out of Yemen about an attempted Al Qaeda plot to pack explosives into underwear pouches, those sarcastic criticisms of the TSA's misplaced zealotry seem a bit weak, don't they? (...) And I for one will be grateful for the half-hour delays in boarding flights that are caused by TSA agents patting down the arms, legs, and torsos of passengers.

I wonder whether the authors of these caustic anecdotes about TSA extremism will lapse into silence in the days ahead. And though I fully expect them to persist in their smug arrogance about the foolishness of TSA procedures, or about claims that full-body scanners are an expensive waste, I hope that all of us will read their renewed criticism with the careful analysis that such diatribes should receive. Let's hope that in the days ahead, TSA uses pat-down procedures even more frequently and extensively than before. (bolding mine)

Link to his blog entry (http://www.frommers.com/community/blogs/blog.cfm/arthur-frommer-online/al-qaedas-underwear-bomb-plot-bring-down-passenger-airplane-objections-tsa-pat-downs-bit-ridiculous)

I posted a reply:

Arthur, let us examine your own piece with the careful analysis you mentioned.

Underwear bombs are sewn into UNDERWEAR. Patting down arms, legs, and torsos will NOT discover underwear bombs. Because the underwear bombs are not on arms, legs, or torsos.

The only way for a pat-down to discover an underwear bomb is if the pat-down includes hands on your privates. Yup - to find an underwear bomb, the pat-downs would require government agents to put their hands on your buttocks and crotches - because that's where the explosives are in those underwear bombs.

How many people are you hoping to see get THAT treatment in the days ahead? How many children?

Arthur is back, this time advocating even more extensive and frequent pat-downs by the TSA because of the latest version of the underwear bomber. He doesn't bother to mention that the perp was actually an agent of Saudi Intelligence working in concert with our CIA.



Link to his blog entry (http://www.frommers.com/community/blogs/blog.cfm/arthur-frommer-online/al-qaedas-underwear-bomb-plot-bring-down-passenger-airplane-objections-tsa-pat-downs-bit-ridiculous)

I'm not even going to give that kook the satisfaction of reading his column. Unfortunately, I know some folks that contribute to his publications and worship the ground he walks upon.... including some that are in favor of even bigger government.

I'm not even going to give that kook the satisfaction of reading his column. Unfortunately, I know some folks that contribute to his publications and worship the ground he walks upon.... including some that are in favor of even bigger government.

The sad (and alarming) reality is that he most likely has more of an impact on the infrequent travellers than the tinfoil hat crowd here on TS&S. :rolleyes:

Those of us who are 'smugly arrogant' still are not being heard by enough people. The vast majority of Americans do not fly very often at all, and they tend to listen to voices such as Frommers. (I won't bother to list again some of the reasons why I advise against his material, as I have listed it many times here before)

There are even FTers who travel infrequently, and who do listen to Frommer's advice.

His voice is more reassuring that our voices, which continue to point out the glaring holes in security. People who are afraid aren't always going to listen to reason; many times they will choose instead to listen those who will make them feel better.

He still seems to think that those of us who are against the scanners and patdowns are for no security at all. Perhaps he doesn't understand the lax security for airport workers, the slack inspection of cargo, and the easy bribing of TSA agents.

http://www.frommers.com/community/blogs/blog.cfm/arthur-frommer-online/would-wonderful-tsa-critics-proposals-preventing-terrorism-skies

"...Rather than respond to such outrage, I should like to suggest an experiment. I should like to ask the critics to do something positive, to suggest how they would replace the TSA and with what. Are they actually suggesting that we should simply board planes in the future without undergoing any security checks at all? (Who among us would feel easy about doing that?) They we should rely entirely on counter-intelligence personnel working away from airports? What about the suicide bombers that aren't apprehended by C.I.A. agents before they reach an airport? Are they suggesting that racial profiling would do the trick?.."

It may be time for Mr. Frommer to stop flying. He is terrified. Now he says that the patdowns have been proven necessary because of the suicide bomber in Yemen at the military parade. I think some FTers have already been leaving comments.

http://www.frommers.com/community/blogs/blog.cfm/arthur-frommer-online/this-weeks-attack-yemen-should-doubly-grateful-tsa-pat-downs

"...such an event serves to highlight the point -- as any fair-minded observer will, in my view, agree -- that it is no longer necessary for terrorists to break into the cockpit of a plane to bring it down, as they did on 9/11. And passengers aboard such a plane will no longer be able to subdue a terrorist who enters the lavatory of a plane to detonate the explosives he carries on his person, or who slips through intelligence efforts by the C.I.A. and others to discover such terrorists before they reach an airport. The only remaining line of defense is the TSA, examining passengers before they board the plane and often patting them down, in addition to using explosives-detecting swabs...

...So when you read these continuing efforts by writers we thought were serious, attempting to ridicule the TSA's work and make it into an un-American incursion on our liberties, ask yourself the question that I have repeated over and over: what do they suggest? Should we simply walk onto planes without undergoing security checks? Shall we really revert to pre-9/11 procedures that failed so miserably on the morning of 9/11? Or should we cooperate with the TSA and together work towards the defeat of terrorism."

The only thing missing is a guest appearance on Fox News during May Sweeps.

What a shame it is that Frommer, whose name and reputation carry so much weight in the travel industry, is so blinded by his fear that he cannot see the tremendous damage done to American civil liberties by the current TSA policies.

I've posted my response, not that I expect it to sway him in the least:

Once again, Arthur, you proceed from a false assumption that the pursuit of safety trumps the Constitutionally protected individual liberties and rights that so many Americans have given their lives to secure and defend for us over the last 200-odd years.

Those who signed the Declaration of Independence, listing the many intrusion on individual liberty perpetrated by the British government upon the American people as the reason for independence and war, did not feel that the pursuit of potential safety trumped the preservation of essential liberty.

Those who fought in places like Valley Forge, the Alamo, Iwo Jima, and Bastogne did not feel that the pursuit of safety trumped the preservation of essential liberty.

Those who marched with Martin Luther King, those who registered at the University of Alabama, those who engaged in the Montgomery Bus Boycott - none of them felt that the pursuit of safety trumped the preservation of essential liberty.

Those who take issue with the concept of government agents peering beneath our clothing, irradiating us with untested, untried x-ray devices, putting their hands upon our persons, sticking their fingers inside our pants and collars, or touching our genetalia, all without warrant, probable cause, or articulable suspicion, do not feel that the pursuit of safety trumps the preservation of essential liberty.

I certainly do not feel that the pursuit of safety trumps the preservation of essential liberty.

It is a shame that you, Arthur, have so lost sight of what it means to be an American, that you have allowed fear and xenophobia to lead you to believe that the freedoms upon which our country was founded are somehow less important than a vain pursuit of mythical safety from far-distant hostile people.

Our current situation if fleeting and transitory. But the damage done during this transitory crisis to the American dream of individual rights and liberties, will reverberate through history for decades, perhaps centuries, to come.

Wake up, Arthur. We're all frogs in the American melting pot - and the water is beginning to boil.

Great post WillCAD.

Someone also needs to remind Arthur that the failures of 9/11 were not airport security but rather a colossal failure of the "Intelligence" and security operations of the United States Government. That failure is the underlying reason for Congress' failure to hold TSA accountable for the abuses it inflicts daily on the flying public.

Recently written by Frommer:

"Aw, man, people over 75 have relaxed security rules? Man, I wish they had implemented that when I turned 75 in 1972."

Mike

Someone also needs to remind Arthur that the failures of 9/11 were not airport security but rather a colossal failure of the "Intelligence" and security operations of the United States Government.

I have to wonder if any Frommer's Guides have *ever* suggested that cooperating with a hijacker is the better way to survive.

I bet they have. And that would explain why Arthur Panty-Waisted-Chicken-Little Frommer is so desperate to divert attention to the actual security protocols of the time rather than an examination of the procedures advocated for flight crew and passengers.

My comment must have struck a nerve - it's been deleted.

I feel like a celebrity.

My comment must have struck a nerve - it's been deleted.

I feel like a celebrity.

It's still there --

http://www.frommers.com/community/blogs/blog.cfm/arthur-frommer-online/this-weeks-attack-yemen-should-doubly-grateful-tsa-pat-downs?plckFindCommentKey=CommentKey:c9e9fcfc-2d21-40fe-9860-df95d19a5a8c#CommentKey:c9e9fcfc-2d21-40fe-9860-df95d19a5a8c

My comment must have struck a nerve - it's been deleted.

I feel like a celebrity.

It's still there --

http://www.frommers.com/community/blogs/blog.cfm/arthur-frommer-online/this-weeks-attack-yemen-should-doubly-grateful-tsa-pat-downs?plckFindCommentKey=CommentKey:c9e9fcfc-2d21-40fe-9860-df95d19a5a8c#CommentKey:c9e9fcfc-2d21-40fe-9860-df95d19a5a8c

That's weird, when I looked earlier it wasn't showing up.

:Recently written by Frommer:

"Aw, man, people over 75 have relaxed security rules? Man, I wish they had implemented that when I turned 75 in 1972."

Mike

:D

My comment must have struck a nerve - it's been deleted.

I feel like a celebrity.
Your post is there....

Using his logic, all military personnel should be patted down and swabbed when they come into town. Why? A US serviceman was caught planning to blow up a restaurant and shoot the survivors. http://news.yahoo.com/awol-muslim-soldier-guilty-fort-hood-bomb-plot-205502556.html Don't mention it to Mr. Frommer. He might get ideas!

I never realized he was so desolate and lonely he craved human contact so much he had to rely on the TSA for it. Thank heaven I don't pay attention to Arthur Frommer.

At the Frommers website, he wrote a passionate defense of the TSA. His stance is pretty much one of how can we forget the lessons of 9/11 and the TSA is keeping us from getting blown out of the sky.

http://www.frommers.com/community/blogs/blog.cfm/arthur-frommer-online/those-newspaper-columnists-internet-bloggers-ridicule-tsa-very-short-memories
"..I thank heaven for the zealousness of the TSA. Every time I am patted down, I am grateful for security agents who take their jobs seriously. I am conscious of the fact that their zealousness is deterring all sorts of would-be terrorists from attempting to carry weapons onto planes. And I am astonished at the shortsighted lack of memory on the part of various newspaper and internet commentators who enjoy the act of ridiculing the TSA.

Thank heaven we at last have a security agency that isn't affected by the profit motive. Thank heaven they are patting down even the most unlikely suspects, in the hope of deterring a terrorist from attempting to avoid their security barriers.
Thank heaven we have an agency that remembers 9/11. .."

I never realized he was so desolate and lonely he craved human contact so much he had to rely on the TSA for it. Thank heaven I don't pay attention to Arthur Frommer.

He was great in "Eurotrip," though.

Mike

He was great in "Eurotrip," though.

That was Patrick Malahide playing "Arthur Frommer."

Chinatown DC: Arthur--

I loved your cameo in Eurotrip! What was it like to have your books prominently featured in a feature film--and to appear on-screen?

Arthur Frommer: It was weird to see myself portrayed in Eurotrip. I was originally asked to perform the cameo myself, but then learned it would require hanging around the movie location in Rome and elsewhere for nearly three weeks to simply utter two lines. The British actor who played me is far better looking. Best--Arthur Frommer

I love Eurotrip. It has so many terrific one-liners

* Currency colostomy bag
* Mi scuzi!
* You really are the worst twins ever
* This is definitely where I parked my car
* Mi scuzi!
* Allies. Mm-hm.
* We can walk from London to Berlin. - England's an island, Coop. - Okay, swim.
* Mi scuzi!
* Miami Wice!
* Mi scuzi!
* Fommer's tried to warn you, but you wouldn't listen
* You made out with your sister!
* Ha! Now I buy my OWN hotel!

I love Eurotrip. ...

* We can walk from London to Berlin. - England's an island, Coop. - Okay, swim.

:eek:

This reminds me of a current thread on FT where the OP apparently read Frommer's guides.

I don't believe that is a movie I will be adding to my playlist.

That was Patrick Malahide playing "Arthur Frommer."

;)

Yeah, I know, but I had to give him credit for something, even if he doesn't deserve it...

I love Eurotrip. It has so many terrific one-liners


* You really are the worst twins ever

* You made out with your sister!


These lines become less funny when you have boy-girl twins...

Mike