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Ivy League economist ethnically profiled, interrogated for doing math on American Airlines flight
Washington Post ^ | May 7, 2016 | Catherine Rampell

Posted on 05/07/2016 9:46:45 AM PDT by Republic_Venom

On Thursday evening, a 40-year-old man — with dark, curly hair, olive skin and an exotic foreign accent — boarded a plane. It was a regional jet making a short, uneventful hop from Philadelphia to nearby Syracuse.

Or so dozens of unsuspecting passengers thought.

The curly-haired man tried to keep to himself, intently if inscrutably scribbling on a notepad he’d brought aboard. His seatmate, a blond-haired, 30-something woman sporting flip-flops and a red tote bag, looked him over. He was wearing navy Diesel jeans and a red Lacoste sweater – a look he would later describe as “simple elegance” – but something about him didn’t seem right to her.

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...


TOPICS: Local News; Miscellaneous; Society; Travel
KEYWORDS: catherinerampell; districtofcolumbia; math; newyork; pennsylvania; philadelphia; profiling; security; syracuse; washingtoncompost; washingtonpost
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To: Republic_Venom

I’m glad I know know what everybody was wearing. This story is written like a J. peterman catalog


41 posted on 05/07/2016 11:40:09 AM PDT by Donglalinger
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To: Republic_Venom
or whatever heritage usually gets ethnically profiled on flights these days

Oh, f**k off, WaPo scumbags.

42 posted on 05/07/2016 12:05:37 PM PDT by Future Snake Eater (CrossFit.com)
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To: Republic_Venom
I always suspected math is dangerous. Very dangerous.


43 posted on 05/07/2016 12:09:28 PM PDT by Daffynition ("We have the fight of our lives coming up to save our nation!" ~ Jim Robinson)
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To: CodeToad

Americans must constantly be vigilant regarding the danger posed by those villainous terrorists of al-Gebra!!! /s ;)


44 posted on 05/07/2016 12:24:03 PM PDT by Frank_2001
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To: miss marmelstein

I guess that is about to become the new liberal mantra-everything will be Trump’s fault...

I had to laugh at the fact that two adults on the flight did not know math when they saw it, or thought it was Arabic-but it really isn’t funny-it is part of the ignorance everywhere that I think will allow us to be attacked again, ala 9-11...


45 posted on 05/07/2016 12:55:11 PM PDT by Texan5 ("You've got to saddle up your boys, you've got to draw a hard line"...)
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To: Texan5

There may very well be another part of this story that isn’t being told - specifically the woman’s story - the one everyone wants to call dumb because she wore flip flops on a flight. I have to laugh because after the San Bernardino slaughter, Penn Station in NY was awash with soldiers and constant alerts “If you see something, say something.” At the time I thought, Yeah, and if I say something that turns out to be a mistake, I’m spread across the New York Post as a racist, sexist, bigoted homophobic.

I blame the airlines who after 20 years of this stuff, can’t figure out how to quietly and quickly decide whether someone is a threat or not.


46 posted on 05/07/2016 1:04:03 PM PDT by miss marmelstein (Richard the Third: With my own people alone I should like to drive away the Turks (Muslims))
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To: Republic_Venom

47 posted on 05/07/2016 1:07:25 PM PDT by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: Republic_Venom

In this one instance it comes across as stupid, but subjecting people to ridicule for reporting behavior on planes that they find suspicious due to occasional errors such as this is not a good idea, I don’t think. There is still a threat.


48 posted on 05/07/2016 1:09:55 PM PDT by RegulatorCountry
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To: central_va

49 posted on 05/07/2016 1:12:01 PM PDT by dfwgator
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To: Republic_Venom
Gotta ditch the scarf, dude ...

Maybe shave a little, too ...

50 posted on 05/07/2016 1:28:56 PM PDT by x
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To: miss marmelstein

I live in a remote rural area, where most people don’t give a damn what anyone thinks of them-flip flops in public would be an improvement over the bare feet or mud-and-cow/goat s*** caked boots seen in the general store...

When my husband was in the military and traveled, civilian flight crews were very polite, quiet and circumspect in determining the seriousness of an incident like the one described-they even managed to keep things calm if there was a threat of a hijacking or other crime-I guess maybe the airlines just instruct them to go into panic mode immediately now...

If I lived in a city now, my first thought about that see something, say something admonition would be the same as yours-why would I want to look like a racist?


51 posted on 05/07/2016 1:38:22 PM PDT by Texan5 ("You've got to saddle up your boys, you've got to draw a hard line"...)
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To: Texan5

We seem to learn nothing, do we? 9/11, the guy who checked in the charming Mohammed Atta thought he was a creep as did the next door neighbors of the San Bernardino murderers! But this woman, perhaps as silly as other freepers say, chose to speak up and for her pains, the Washington Post embarrassed her choice of clothing, her hair color and her lack of education. As a woman of middle years, who buys most of her clothes at Food Emporium, why should I speak up? So that Page 6 of the New York Post can humiliate me? No way!


52 posted on 05/07/2016 1:53:35 PM PDT by miss marmelstein (Richard the Third: With my own people alone I should like to drive away the Turks (Muslims))
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To: x
Actually, that scarf looks pretty damned Palestinian. What's the name of thing, again?
53 posted on 05/07/2016 1:55:36 PM PDT by miss marmelstein (Richard the Third: With my own people alone I should like to drive away the Turks (Muslims))
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To: onedoug

ping


54 posted on 05/07/2016 2:36:30 PM PDT by windcliff
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To: miss marmelstein

No matter how many times I hear it, I still can’t did not very quietly just stop by the PD to say they saw suspicious packages being delivered all the time-even if the cops had just taken a cursory look around outside when nobody was home, they might have suspected that Mr. and Mrs. Jihadi lived there, and had a bomb making factory right in the garage-maybe no one would have died then...


55 posted on 05/07/2016 3:23:08 PM PDT by Texan5 ("You've got to saddle up your boys, you've got to draw a hard line"...)
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To: windcliff
Not really so dumb that she didn't recognize differential equations, as she may never have been exposed to calculus. If I'd seen them, I'd have probably talked the guy's ear off, asking how such math figures into "menu costs and price dispersion", and end up telling him that I'd take his paper up with the next waiter I encounter.

"Consider a seller whose nominal price has a real value of Qexp(􀀀t). Let V (t) denote the present discounted value of the real pro…ts of this seller, which is given by V (t) = max T Z T t e􀀀r(x􀀀t)R 􀀀 Qe􀀀x dx + e􀀀r(T􀀀t) (V  􀀀 c)  , (1) where R(Qe􀀀x) = b Qe􀀀x + 2b (1 􀀀 ) 􀀀 1 􀀀 F(Qe􀀀x)  Qe􀀀x...."

56 posted on 05/07/2016 3:24:01 PM PDT by onedoug
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To: miss marmelstein

Oops-No matter how many times I hear it, I still can’t see why did not very quietly just stop by the PD to say they saw suspicious packages being delivered all the time-even if the cops had just taken a cursory look around outside when nobody was home, they might have suspected that Mr. and Mrs. Jihadi lived there, and had a bomb making factory right in the garage-maybe no one would have died then...


57 posted on 05/07/2016 3:24:13 PM PDT by Texan5 ("You've got to saddle up your boys, you've got to draw a hard line"...)
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To: Texan5

Why a neighbor did not-that works, but it didn’t on re-post...


58 posted on 05/07/2016 3:26:10 PM PDT by Texan5 ("You've got to saddle up your boys, you've got to draw a hard line"...)
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To: PghBaldy

That’s very astute. Leftists enable terrorism by making us afraid to speak out or question the motives of anyone non-white or Arab.


59 posted on 05/07/2016 11:54:45 PM PDT by Crucial
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To: Yogafist

She’s probably in on it. It just sounds too contrived.


60 posted on 05/07/2016 11:58:18 PM PDT by Crucial
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