I Hereby Volunteer for Democracy

Let it be known.

I am ready to take off my clothes for freedom.

All this hoopla about strip searching escapes me.

I'm not joking or making light of things. I'm being totally serious. I think this is a mostly reasonable safety measure, and one that might actually make life a little bit better. Maybe even a little bit safer.

Seriously. I don't see how this will impact my life in any particularly distasteful way.

For the following reasons:

1. Other people have already seen me naked. My parents saw me naked when I was born. The doctor did, too. And I don't even know his name. Or her. And I'm certain that nobody took me out to dinner and a movie before that moment of other people seeing me naked. I once mooned the entire state of Montana. In fact, I was housesitting once and the cat saw me naked. So I'm not afeared of being seen naked by people trying to save my life.

2. I don't have any body parts that people haven't already seen elsewhere. You're already on the internet. Most of you have seen a painting of a naked person. If you haven't, try it. You might learn something about art. Or anatomy.

3. I never rush through airports. I get there a full hour and a half early. That way I can go to the Hudson News, the loo (at least twice), eat at least one full meal, play a few games on my PSP, and needlessly walk past all the gates to fantasize about where else I might want to go. In fact, I recommend this to everyone. Especially you, the idiot who is in the line freaking out about being late. You wouldn't be freaking out if you got there on time. A few extra minutes in the line ain't gonna kill you.

4. It's important to air things out every once in a while. Consider the following. The house. The bedsheets. Your feet. The litter box. Art studios. The Bubonic plague. Frankly, I think a few extra minutes of ventilation at the airport might make things more pleasurable once I get inside of that big metal tube.

5. Airport screening is already too impersonal and adversarial. Nothing will familiarize us with the TSA people who are trying to protect us than a little bit of the ol' whatcha looking at.

So, Mr. Rove, Mr. Beck, and all those other presumably conservative, heterosexual, morally superior white males...

I'm ready to take off my clothes for you if it makes you feel safer.

And God Bless America.