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Reach for the Skies, Dude

Bah, humbug! The holidays are already over and another long year stretches out before me like a vomit-strewn layer of trouble.

What? Oh, sorry, bit too much first up? Okay let's start again.

Bah, humbug! The holidays are already over and another long year stretches out before me and I can only hope we see more of the buffoons and morons who graced our columns last year.

Now while baking in the sun, listening to the cricket, a very disturbing thought struck the old grey matter. Just who are the brain-dead tossers who have okayed the use of - sky marshals - in Australia.

These guys sit on planes as they zoom around our great land, ready and waiting with a gun to deal with any terrorist, would-be hijacker or the occasional over-friendly steward.

"Yo, terrorist-looking dude, reach for the sky man!"

"Put the jam sachet down, and put your hands behind your head."

"Freeze! When I tell people to be quiet so I can watch the movie - I mean be quiet."

Now the Poms have just rejected the notion of having armed chaps on planes and who can blame them.

In our case, the sky marshals (damn I wish I could do the Dr Evil impersonation on-screen while saying sky marshals) won't even be police officers. Nope, some seriously deluded fool reckons the job can be done by security guards.

It may come as a surprise to some, but the thought of some nong straight out from guarding a payroll, sitting on my plane, with a loaded gun, does nothing to increase my comfort level.

Have you seen the tatts on those guys? Have you ever heard them speak? We are not talking about brain surgeons here, folks. Hell, they may even struggle to spell their names when picking up the ticket.

The biggest danger with having a guy with a gun on board a plane is that there is only one. What if that person goes nuts and starts waving his weapon around demanding to be taken to Brisbane?

Hmmmmm, I've got the answer. How about we have the gun-toting sky marshal all organised and looking pretty in his 4-litre hat and spurs AND a secretly armed copper on board to guard the guard. Then we give the stewardesses an Uzi to keep an eye on them both, then me a bott of champers so I can keep an eye on the stewardess (ooooops) and the pilot can have a bazooka to ....

Could work, you know.

If there is something that has really got up your nose, let Grumpy Old Coot know at grumpy@webwombat.com