[Polonius]

From the evidence available so far, it appears that the captain made the right call. According to the testimony posted by McGavin earlier on this thread, other airline employees also said that the agent became belligerent when they got to the point of wanting to call and check on his identity. That, coupled with his apparent difficulty in filling out a form (something no government employee should have difficulty doing, one would think) puts him in the wrong. Unless others can confirm the agent's version of events, I choose to believe the account of the captain and airline employees.

And as for ImphClinton's defense of the agent, you said something rather absurd in post #28:

Seems the President should outrank any captain. The president ordered this man on to this flight to protect the President. This Captain had no right to refuse passage without even bothering to call a local number.

The president may be commander in chief and the leader of the free world, but he doesn't "outrank" anyone when it comes to private enterprise. He has as much right as anyone to come down to my or anyone else's workplace, but neither I nor anyone else is obligated to follow any "orders" he may give to a private citizen regarding his job.

[Howlin]

One other thing that bothered me: in this day and time, this "atmosphere," if you will, why on EARTH would this guy be carrying a textbook about the history of Islam? I mean, if I know not to carry that onboard, why wouldn't a Secret Service agent have the sense not to????

[ImphClinton]

This was sort of a joke. The President is Commander and Chief and Captain is a rank in the Air Force. All I ment is this pilot should have respected the President enough to at least try to verfy this agents identity. He should have called the Whitehouse. The number is easy to find. Had this been some podunck sheriff it would have been different. In fact this Pilot did this so some sherriff a while back and that is fine with me. The President of the United States deserves the utmost respect and deserves to have his agents guarding him. This dis-respectted the President as well as this agent.