Flying does make me nervous. When the driving time to a destination is less than about 6 hours or so, I seriously consider going by car, even though I know it's more dangerous. At least in a car, I'm in control of the vehicle, and will have something to do in an emergency (try to swerve, pull over, etc.). As a passenger on a plane all I can do is sit and wait for my doom.
TSA makes me drive exponentially more than I would otherwise.
Dealing with the airport is terrible now. I flew probably 80+ times a year as a consultant in the 90s. My wife would drop me off 30 minutes before my flight (DFW), I'd curb check my bag and walk onto the plane and wait 5-10 so minutes until takeoff. It's hard to deal with the 2+ hours of bullshit security theater now.
I forget to take my knives out frequently, have never had them confiscated, but my toothpaste, yeah, that's a threat. Hell, the Lithium Ion batteries are probably the biggest threat, no issues there either.
If I have my ticket on my phone and I'm flying on a turboprop, I can literally arrive at the airport 5 minutes before they close the door and board the plane. I've done it before.
Even flying international is easy, took me a grand total of 10 minutes to go through security a few weeks ago.
TSA pre-check makes a big difference - almost like flying before, except you get to walk past all those other lines.
I didn't want to explicitly support the TSA, so I went with "Global Entry" - same benefits and more, and company paid for it. I have no idea if funds go to TSA or not, but I felt better about it.
People don't remember just how good it used to be. I used to lock my luggage securely, carry a knife on my person, and walk with my friends/family to the gate. Nobody asked pointless yes/no questions about the history of my luggage. When the airport wasn't busy, they might not bother to have the security station open at all, and just waved everyone through. A couple times, we drove to the airport an hour or two before the flight and bought tickets at the check-in counter (it was a very early flight that was never full), and this didn't arouse any suspicion. You didn't need to get out government ID for anything, since tickets weren't locked to the purchaser.
"TSA pre-check" sounds like it eliminates one inconvenience of flying in the USA in 2018, but not the other 34. I can't imagine what it might take to make me want to get on an airplane again.
The pre-check line doesn't involve all of the slow-downs the regular line does. I've seen it longer too but it easily moves 10x as many people through.
Nothing needs to be removed except metal in your pockets, you typically walk quickly through a metal detector instead of the slow body scanner, and while they probably shouldn't, bags don't seem to get looked at as thoroughly either, so no delays while your backpack gets sent through twice and then pulled off to the side to be inspected.
This is 100% the reason why I prefer driving. It is a matter of control, even if the numbers prove that won't reduce the risk to my life. I'm almost as nervous as a passenger in a car as I am on a plane.
I suggest you find and watch some crash videos. You are not in as much control as you'd like to believe. A lot of the time, one bad actor creates a scenario in which the others have no chance to escape.
