Granted, it was his carry on luggage and the prop gun was apparently a real gun that had been hollowed out, but even so.  Couldn’t authorities have exercised some discretion upon realizing that the gun was completely disabled?  And that an 82-year-old Jerry Lewis was unlikely to hijack much of anything?

After all, our laws are intended to protect us.  Not convict/fine/imprison as many of us as possible.

And then there’s this rather Orwellian-sounding quote from officer responsible for the citation in answer to a question about whether or not a prop gun could be considered a weapon:

Cassell says if the gun were merely a prop “it wouldn’t be a weapon and we couldn’t cite him for carrying a weapon.”

Got that?  If the gun wasn’t a weapon because they cited him for carrying a weapon.  But obviously it was a weapon because they cited him for it.

Meaning that the determining factor for whether or not the prop was a weapon was whether or not the cops thought it was a weapon and not whether or not it was capable of actually hurting anyone.

Do I think people should be able to carry guns into the passenger cabins of airplanes?  I don’t, actually, but I also don’t think octogenarian comedians should be cited for accidentally putting a stage prop in their carry-ons either.