WASHINGTON
The place: a boarding gate at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris. The time: one hour before an aircraft is to take off for the United States. The incident: four dark-skinned 20-year-olds are holding a cell phone, looking at papers while apparently arguing in a guttural language.
Most of the waiting passengers are Americans, aggravated by all the security checks that they have undergone. They start talking, until two Americans go over to a uniformed security officer and point out the group of four.
The four young men are hustled away. The plane is delayed for hours while the luggage on board is hand-searched. Eventually it takes off -- but without the young men.
They follow on another flight. These were no Hezbollah terrorists on a mission but properly documented Israeli army men, arguing in Hebrew about whether their cell phone would work in New York where they were going to visit relatives. No one asked them what was going on. Assumptions were made, plans were rolled out and actions taken.
The ugly American has been born again, not in a foreign country but within us.
The scenario above is fictional. But similar incidents happen in our own and foreign airports every day. Because some unfortunate does not match the "normal" traveler and might be a "terrorist," there is a reluctance to fly on the same plane.
As so often, good sense has been replaced by security and Osama bin Laden's thugs have won another victory.
On Monday, five years will have gone by since the day America was obliged to exchange liberty for a very different set of expectations. Since then, intelligence units have helped avert many a potential threat. But the costly and time-consuming, overtime-earning obvious presence of heightened security appears to have achieved far less.
We either are sheep, willing to obey the yapping dogs, or we lash out in a frustrated irritation that we are no longer lords of all we see.
"The Ugly American" originated in a novel about Southeast Asia in 1958 by Bill Lederer, a retired U.S. Navy captain, and Gene Burdick, a Stanford and Oxford grad.
The book, in which the term was used positively, was republished in 1999. That, however, didn't save certain Americans abroad from being perceived as arrogant, demeaning and unthoughtful.
In the wake of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, President George W. Bush declared a "War on Terrorism." Now, in 2006, fear of terrorism and a delight in feeling that "we" are being patriotic and helping win the war against terror has become a way of life. Some of us have turned into very ugly Americans.
After this declaration, it seemed that our civil service erupted into an uncivil interdepartmental war to deny responsibilities for mistakes made on 9/11 and resist the concept of a unified Homeland Security Department. Travelers, led to believe that every flight might be their last, were the most affected.
On the Eastern seaboard, terrorism was experienced but memories are short. West of Pittsburgh -- with some notable exceptions -- international terrorism is what can be found in Hollywood movies.
Senior citizens may remember the enormous changes to everyone's lives created by World War II -- casualty lists, the draft, tank- and weapons-production drives, the launching of hundreds of "Liberty Ships" and food rationing.
Others recall the Korean and Vietnam wars -- more casualties, the draft, overtime in the factories and dissent.
Now, there is no longer even dissent. How can nanny keep her skirt clean⢠And if it gets dirty, there is always an excuse to show that she was not responsible.
Now we have an opportunity. Elections are only weeks away. And politicians are feuding. Many to be re-elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. And every one of them available to answer questions.
First, ask about the size of the budget for the Transportation Security Administration. Follow up by asking how many real or suspected terrorists have been caught at the boarding gate. (The answer: "None.")
How many have been caught on an aircraft⢠(One, but he was apprehended by other passengers.)
Next question: Do you think that terrorists ever will try to board an aircraft carrying weapons⢠Would it not be better to spend money on the infiltration and elimination of terror groups?
Then get into the whole area of "search." How many children traveling with their parents are really believed to be terrorists⢠How many businessmen from Chicago, grandmothers from Idaho or bankers from New York⢠It's all a part of the political landscape to make each one of us suffer, which, sadly, we do in silence.
Every inconvenience we experience is another defeat -- for us -- in the "War Against Terror."
Dateline D.C. is written by a Washington-based British journalist and political observer .
