Hi there Fans!

Sorry I’ve been flying under the radar in recent months, but I’m back! I was happy to meet some girlfriends in Las Vegas this past weekend and boy did I ever get lucky! And I’m not just talking about what happened in the casino (yes I bet the Jets and won big on the craps table). No folks – I had the good fortune of being selected for “additional screening” when departing from Phoenix Sky Harbor. Honestly, I didn’t realize what was happening until it was too late. As I’m scrambling to remove shoes and jewelry, keep track of my boarding pass and id, and walk through the metal detector – I get re-directed to another doorway. I’m thinking it’s just another metal detector – until I see the bold outline of two feet on the floor, and there are two blue screens on each side of me. Here was the exchange between the TSA agent and me:

TSA Guy: “Stand on the footprints, raise your hands above your head and place them on the screen.”

Barbie: (dumbfounded) “Oh, is everyone getting this?”

TSA Guy: (smiling smugly) “No.”

Meanwhile, my Michael Kors handbag is sailing through the x-ray machine with a potential weapon in it – a tail comb complete with a 4-inch metal point (think compass). Not only was my beloved comb not confiscated: It wasn’t even detected! And I’m getting body scanned? Just for the record, I’m a 5’5” 105-lb, rail-thin blonde. I was dressed in a pair of (very) skinny jeans, and a clingy t-shirt. Trust me, anything I could possibly try to hide would be visible! But at least we know the TSA is busy convincing Muslims that they’re not being profiled! No we’re not picking on Muslims – we’re scanning Barbie! I don’t know why, but for some reason I just didn’t feel any safer after being scanned.

During the return trip from Vegas, I was in for even more fun and games! This time, my radar was way up. As I’m being corralled into the body-scan machine:

Barbie: “Oh no, not this again. I decline.”

TSA Agent: (yelling) “FEMALE OPT-OUT! I NEED A FEMALE AGENT FOR PAT DOWN!”

I was then greeted by a large woman wearing rubber surgical gloves. She explained that she was going to search my back first, then the front. I was also informed that she needed to feel along the inside of my waistband. OK whatever.

TSA Agent: “We can do this here, or we can go into a private room.”

Barbie: “Will I be disrobing?”

TSA Agent: “No.”

Barbie: “OK, we’ll do it here then!”

It was the search of the front of my body which I found most pointless:

TSA Agent: “Now I am gonna have to search your breast area; I’m gonna use the back of my hands.”

Barbie: “OK.”

Now, just stay with me on this. She’s feeling under my breasts with the back of her hands, which are gloved, and I’m wearing an underwire bra. What was she going to discover? That I prefer underwire to wireless???? Just for the record, I had decided to pack my tail comb in my checked luggage. I figured why press my luck. Then the strangest thing happened: This old TSA guy then swabbed the Gloved One’s hands, then placed the swabs into a machine.

Female TSA: “ If this comes back clean, you’re free to go.”

Barbie: “OK, thanks.”

TSA Old Guy walked over to me about 2 minutes later, and released me.

OK, so what can we conclude from my experience? Obviously the TSA is more concerned with appeasing Muslims than actually injecting some common sense into the whole process. While the loser TSA guys in Phoenix were busy yucking it up, obviously so distracted with my body scan -- my “weapon” went undetected. Did the fact that I boarded the plane with a potentially lethal weapon matter? No, of course not. Because I’m not a terrorist. We need to start looking for people, not objects.

Instead of randomly molesting Barbie in order to show Muslims that we don’t want to pick on them, we need to selectively (not randomly) screen those who exhibit suspicious behavior regardless of gender, age, race, religion. Or those that haven’t bathed in over a month (that’s my “get even” with the TSA!). Umm, having a passport that’s stamped “Pakistan” 6 times in the last three months – can we scream “additional screening!”

You be the judge.