Tony Woodlief has some observations on air travel and the silly consequences that flow from a legal obsession with safety.

[P]art of my trip required me to fly from Phoenix to Tucson. It’s a 22-minute flight over sand and rock and an occasional patch of farmland cultivated no doubt at the expense of low-income taxpayers in New Jersey. As we prepared for take-off, the stewardess explained to us how we can use our seat cushions as flotation devices in the event of a water landing.



I’ll let that sink in for a minute.



It’s not her fault — our safety-obsession leads us to make silly rules, like the one that requires stewardesses to demonstrate how to work a seatbelt

Oh, and Tony warns us about peeing in a bucket on the train.