Under a new federal law, pyromaniacs, terrorists, and other ne’er-do-wells have to be given at least six weeks notice before regulations impeding their destructive plans take effect.

Call Richard Reid’s cobbler for details:

Airline passengers will have to ditch their lighters or lose them to airport security screeners when a new ban on lighters takes effect in April.

The ban reflects Congress’ fear that lighters could be used to ignite bombs on planes or otherwise damage or destroy them. The Transportation Security Administration until now had banned all but butane lighters and said each passenger could carry no more than two.

TSA’s new ruling extends the ban to all butane lighters, effective April 14.

Proponents of the ban, including Sen. Byron Dorgan (news, bio, voting record), D-N.D., cited the case of convicted “shoe bomber” Richard Reid, who tried but failed to light explosives in his shoes with matches. Had Reid been using a lighter, he might have brought down the plane, Dorgan said. Reid was sentenced to life in prison in 2003.

I feel safer already. Or I did until I read this.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 28th, 2005 at 6:35 pm and is filed under business, General, War. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.