pilots refuse to fly with gun loons onboard

On Tue, 30 Dec 2003 at 22:46:28 in message
, Thomas Heide
wrote:

I am British and live in the UK but I have spent time in the USA.

I can´t believe what I just read.
Didn´t you Americans learn anything from recent history (some school-events
just popped into my mind)?

Irrelevant and objectionable.

It just does not work to make even more people carry guns in order to
protect them from potential terrorists.

On what evidence do you base that statement? The Israeli's have been
doing this for years. Seems to me a terrorist might well think twice if
he thought there was a high chance of unknown numbers of armed law
enforcement agents on board. Are all the armed police in UK major
airports a waste of time then?

What kind of logic is that?

A reasonable hypothesis I would say.

You won´t stop terrorists from trying to hijack planes by simply having
armed sky marshalls on the aircraft.

Again on what do you base that wild statement?

You should increase airport security first and then try to figure out how an
unexperienced pilot can fly all over New York and make a sightseeing tour
around the Statue of Liberty without beeing noticed at all before you think
about arming sky marshalls.

Nothing wrong with good security as a first line defence, but the rest
of the above is just nonsense.

And how impertinent are you to simply postulate a "law" like the above?
I really pay my tribute to the pilots making a statement like that.

I can understand they might have reservations about the powers of
marshals over their own authority, but if we have them I don't want them
to have to ask the captain before they act! However I do want them to be
trained and to understand the risks.

It plays in the same league like the major of London who explicitly allowed
demonstrations against Bush in the vicinity of his whereabouts.

Nothing what ever to do with it as far as I can see. The right to
protest is not connected to the rights of terrorists to kill people.

Without making the attacks less horrible, but America gets more and more
paranoic.

A few people in America may be paranoid about being criticised for not
doing something but your generalisation is not justified by the
American's I know that I respect and count as my friends.

--
David CL Francis