INFINITY Welcomes Careful Drivers

I've got several things going for me with this gem from the BBC. First, I suffer from a fairly healthy dose of paranoia when it comes to checking baggage for a flight. I don't like the idea that my bags are ever out of my sight, though I understand there is now way the airlines or their lawyers would ever consent to allowing me to load my own luggage (other than carry-ons, of course) onto an aircraft. But I also don't like the idea that people can just rifle through my personal effects. Things get stolen that way.

Second, I am wary of the overzealous ways that people all over the world view drugs. Certainly, I am no proponent of heavy drugs like Ecstasy, crystal meth, cocaine, crack, heroin and so forth, but pot is a different story. I don't smoke pot, but I've known people throughout my life who have, and without a single exception, those people have never: killed someone while stoned, robbed someone while stoned, crashed a car while stoned, burned down a house while stoned, killed themselves while stoned, beaten their wives or children while stoned or anything else that people have, for centruries done under the influence of alcohol and the heavier drugs.

Back on the paranoia front, I am also mistrustful of people stuffing things into my bags that don't belong to me, which goes along with my distaste for not keeping my bags with me at all times. I've read too many stories where drug transporters will dump their stash into an innocent persons pocket, or purse, or whatever to get through security and customs, only to have the innocent person caught with a load of drugs that was not theirs in the first place.

This brings us to Japan. Rightfully, they have a system in place to test their security measures and drug detection techniques to stem the flow of illegal drugs into Japan. However recently, the person conducting the test did so not by using a marked test suitcase, but by placing 1.6 grams of marijuana into the baggage of an actual passenger.

Of course, their security and the drug dogs failed to locate the pot, and whoever that passenger is got out of Narita airport with all that weed. Free, tax free weed. Glorious government provided weed. However, while I may get giggly at the thought that someone would give me a free stash of weed, which I'd never smoke, but the though is still amusing, I am even more terrified at the thought of the what if...

What if that person made it through the airport, then got pulled over later on and searched? What cop in their right mind is going to believe a story like that? What if they got stopped at the airport AFTER picking up the bags and were detained/arrested then? What if they never even noticed it, and the bag actually ended up on a connecting flight elsewhere, and that person got busted with pot that wasn't theirs in someplace like Viet Nam, or Turkey, Egypt of any of the host of other countries where even moderate amounts of marijuana will get you a death sentence or at best, life in a third world shithole prison?

Who will take responsibility then?

It terrifies me to think that the very people charged with enforcing the law, and for busting people who carry drugs, would be so stupid as to actually place drugs in an innocent person's baggage. Would they do the same if they were testing bomb sniffing dogs? What about testing to see if they could carry a firearm onto a plane? Do you think the TSA would be amused if your grandmother tried to board a plane, only to find out that some idiot at Narita had put a .38 revolver in her carry-on to test security and then forgot which bag he put it in?

In this day and age, I think we can expect more from the people who put themselves in charge of things like this, but sadly, this goes to point out that they too are human, and they too can be just as stupid as the rest of us, perhaps even more so.