‘Tis the season for travel. I’m not going to be flying, and I don’t want to. (If you hire me to speak at your convention, real cash money plus travel expense, I’ll fly. Otherwise? Fuhgeddaboudit.) I don’t fly much, but when I do I’m appalled at the process of getting on a plane to go somewhere. Twenty years ago we showed up a half hour in advance and hardly noticed there was security. The last time I took a trip I had to take my shoes off three times in two airports. I seriously doubt that this is making me even slightly safer. (The current term for this, coined by security maven Bruce Schneier, is “Security Theater”.)

What is making us safer in the air is the knowledge that hijacking is no longer safe. Until 2001, the overwhelming majority of passengers made it safely home, although they may have had a couple of uncomfortable days in Cuba or Algeria before the plane was returned to its owner. After 9/11, now that we know there are more dangerous possibilities, passengers aren’t going to be docile and put up with a takeover. I know how we could make it even less likely.

In most states, law-abiding citizens who can demonstrate a certain measure of responsibility can get a Concealed Carry Permit, allowing them to carry a sidearm under their clothing. This is a group of people who statistically commit no crime at all. It includes a large number of retired military personnel as well as retired and off-duty law enforcement personnel. I want them armed and sitting next to me on my next flight.

I suspect everyone has seen a movie in which a bullet fired on an airplane goes through the fuselage or through a window and the side of the plane blows out. Well, it doesn’t really work that way. Planes are pressurized, but there would have to be tens of thousands of times more air inside the cabin than there actually is to cause the destruction they show in the movies. There are also bullets available that will cause even less damage.

So here’s my plan: If anyone presents himself (or herself, it would be better if this weren’t limited to middle-aged men with really short hair) at the boarding counter with his sidearm and permit, the airline would provide appropriate low-penetration cartridges as needed and issue an extra 5,000 frequent flyer miles. Given a few months to get the program off the ground, as it were, any hijacker would have to expect that two to ten passengers, maybe more, on every flight would be armed and prepared to promptly stop any action that would threaten the plane or the passengers.

This doesn’t address the risks of sabotage, of course, but those risks don’t come from the passengers as a rule, but through baggage or maintenance. We could eliminate this absurd requirement that we show up at the airport two or three hours in advance. We could eliminate thousands of pointless guards. Flying would be easier, faster, and cheaper. If I Were King, the program would start tomorrow, although God alone knows what would become of the thousands of lackwits currently wearing TSA badges in our nation’s airports.