The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Layover in Long Beach

Posted on | October 21, 2011 | 14 Comments

LONG BEACH, Calif.
The airport terminal here is a low-tech, low-budget affair — a single-story building with two large, bare waiting areas and a sort of vestibule where the TSA has its security-screening operation. The restrooms are located in a couple of temporary-looking out buildings.

There are none of those covered gangways to or exit the planes. Instead, upon arrival at Long Beach, you descend down a stairway and walk across the tarmac to the terminal.

So far as I can tell, Jet Blue is the only “major” airline operating out of Long Beach, with departures to maybe a dozen destinations. This low-budget airport and its low-budget airline, then, seems to function mainly to provide low-budget transportation out of Southern California, and thus relieve pressure at eternally congested LAX.

Via Memeorandum, the news upon my arrival here was: “Protesters storm campus after Cantor cancels visit.” Evidently, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) had been scheduled to give a lecture at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business. A bunch of left-wing protesters — “Occupy [Fill in the Blank]” types — had planned a big disruption, so Cantor canceled the lecture and the mob ran amok.

The good news: No “Occupy Long Beach Airport” demonstrations have yet been announced, although the passengers here are clearly victims of social injustice.

Hit the freaking tip jar!


Comments

14 Responses to “Layover in Long Beach”

  1. Anonymous
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 12:15 am

    Not much of a coincidence that Slow Joe took his motorcade to Penn on Tuesday with 2-4 hr. complete shut down of traffic and no open doors for the public or OWS peoples at Joe’s closed event.  I figure Joe whispered to Amy Gutman (president of Penn) “Hey babe, you know Eric  Cantor?  He’s one of your kind right, I mean Jewish and all…  Why dont you invite the OWS crowd to his speech on Friday? ”

    Amy, EVER the one to please the Administration (after hiring Rahm’s brother Ezkiel Emmanuel to a big endowed profesorship) said, “Wood eye, wood eye” and Joe said, Thanks!  Wait till I tell the big man….

    who run barter town?
    Say it Loud!

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hgq4w4dqKsU

  2. Anonymous
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 12:31 am

    Well over half the signs were nocuts.org. Reading the comments most seemed to be either Cantor favorable or anti disruption, kinda surprising for a college campus.

  3. Adjoran
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 2:12 am

    Off topic, but in case we hadn’t heard, at the WRLC Straw Poll it was Cain 31%, Romney 29, Gingrich 20, Paul 10, Perry 4, Bachmann 1. 

  4. Finrod Felagund
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 3:23 am

    I remember seeing a list one time of the five worst (regularly-scheduled) airline flights.  Most of them were pretty obvious (e.g. Chicago to Orlando, packed with kids that haven’t gotten to Disney World yet or have just been taken away from there); the one relevant to this was the Las Vegas to Baltimore red-eye, because it was the cheapest flight from Vegas back to the East Coast, so it’d be packed with gamblers that couldn’t afford a better flight.

  5. Anonymous
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 7:53 am

    I don’t know about LAX- BWI, but LAX-IAD was packed to the gunwales. I don’t think there was an empty seat anywhere on that flight, even back in the galley jump seats. 🙁

  6. Joe
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 9:39 am

    Cantor should have given his talk and let them disrupt it. 

  7. Joe
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 9:40 am

    Good news for Cain, but ouch for Perry. 

  8. Joe
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 12:01 pm
  9. richard mcenroe
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 12:47 pm

    Actually, the Long Beach Airport is quite historic, the hub of what used to be the CA aviation industry.  There actually IS a second floor, with a nice little restaurant overlooking the runways and a series of historical displays. See what you miss when you keep your nose stuck to the laptop?

  10. Anonymous
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 2:10 pm

    That’s all blocked off at the moment. Everything’s being done out of a bunch of “temporary” trailers which will probably remain in place until ten years after the renovations were supposed to be finished.

  11. Adjoran
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 2:36 pm

    Government projects that come in on time and on budget are like intelligent Obama voters:  you know there must be some somewhere, but you never seem to actually find one.

  12. richard mcenroe
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 3:35 pm

    They must have shut it down post-Xmas, that’s the last time I went through.

  13. Joe
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 5:05 pm

    Cain is now double digits leading Romney in Iowa.  Ouch. 

    But Romney has Christine O’Donnell pulling for him.  http://hotair.com/archives/2011/10/22/latest-romney-backer-is-christine-odonnell/

  14. Polly
    October 22nd, 2011 @ 9:24 pm

    In addition to JetBlue, Delta, Alaska, Frontier, and US Airways also fly out of LGB.  It’s the best airport in So Cal to fly out of and in to.  I hope it stays a bit of a secret.