The U.S. no-fly list. Tit for tat?

It's hard to imagine that the people currently in charge of the U.S. could piss off their "friends" any more than they already do, but what else can you think about this?

The price of airline tickets between Canadian cities could go up if the United States implements an anti-terrorist strategy that would force domestic airlines to fly new routes far north of the American border, Transport Minister Jean Lapierre said Wednesday.

The minister said he is fighting hard to keep Washington from getting its hands on Canadian passenger lists for domestic flights that stray into U.S. airspace.

But if he fails, added Lapierre, Canadian carriers might have to take pains to avoid conventional routes that cross over northern U.S. states.

Calling it a "very hot issue," Lapierre said Washington hasn't finalized its proposed new rules but he's already lobbying to protect Canadians' privacy.

"I'm very worried about it," Lapierre said outside the Commons.

"We don't think it's a good idea that Canadians travelling from one [Canadian] city to another [Canadian city] would have to be checked under the American no-fly list."

Washington warned recently that, as an added security measure against terrorism, it intended to require that all foreign airlines passing over the U.S. check the names of passengers against American government watch lists.

Uh, right. Refresh my memory -- weren't these the same people who were howling about how they really didn't give a shit about Canadian sovereignty and air space when it came to launching missiles in this direction? But all that hypocrisy aside, just which security-related parts of the U.S. are currently at risk by these overflights of Canadian airliners into American air space? Well, holy crap:

To save time and fuel, flights from Montreal to Halifax pass over Maine, while flights on the Toronto-Calgary route almost always cut across northern U.S. states.

That's right, these incursions into American air space apparently represent an unacceptable terrorist risk to Maine, northern Michigan and the Dakotas -- irresistible targets of international terrorism, the lot of them.

But, wait. What's this? According to Mapquest's handy-dandy map of the U.S., is it possible that Americans flying from Minnesota to New York might actually pass over Ontario? And what about flights from places in the mainland U.S. to Alaska? Is there a chance they might fly over some part of Western Canada? Perhaps some frequent flyer can enlighten us here.

SNARKY AFTERTHOUGHT: If I was running things up here, I might just suggest that we Canucks would also like a chance to vet passengers on American flights that cross Canadian air space, to make sure they're not carrying, oh, people who have committed international war crimes. But that's just me.