NORMAN — I’ve got no problem with profits.

Everybody, whether they admit it or not, is out for profit. It is not just corporations. Even if we don’t run a business, we want something left over after paying the bills. We want our paycheck to be profitable.

What I can’t stand is blatant, deliberately false advertising in the pursuit of profit. It is rampant. And I’m disgusted with myself and everybody else for letting it get that way, because we are largely passive in the face of egregious lying about what we’re being charged for products and services.

The only time it’s big news is when we are not passive.

Recall a couple of weeks ago, when several servicemen returning from Afghanistan posted a YouTube rant about Delta Airlines charging them hundreds of dollars in excess baggage fees.

It went viral. The national outrage was palpable. Faced with a public relations disaster, Delta hilariously apologized for any “miscommunication” about its fees.

There was no miscommunication. The problem was the policy — the soldiers were charged what Delta said they should be charged. Since then, Delta, scrambling to minimize the damage, has said it will allow one more “free” bag for soldiers traveling under orders.

Big deal.

The outrage was justified. It is obscene to penalize soldiers for traveling with the gear they need to do their jobs.

But it is also obscene — to a lesser degree, but obscene all the same — to charge the rest of us fees for carrying baggage when we fly. Most normal people, if they are traveling hundreds of miles from home, need to carry more clothes and other essentials than they can fit in a purse or a briefcase. Baggage is, or ought to be, as basic to air travel as wheels on a car or a blade on a lawnmower.

But it is now an “extra.” According to the U.S. Department of Transportation, U.S. airlines collected $3.4 billion from baggage fees in 2010. Oh, and another $2.3 billion in reservation change fees.

You don’t even have to be that old to recall when baggage was considered part of the basic package of air travel.

But then, airlines needed to raise their prices. Fair enough — if a barrel of oil goes from $30 to more than $100, that matters. Fuel is also essential to flying.

The problem is raising prices dishonestly — raising them while pretending you’re not. You book a flight. You’re told it is going to cost you $250. And then you show up at the airport and are told that if you want to check some luggage, it’s going to be an extra 50 bucks, or more.

I’m betting that if all of us had really freaked out when baggage fees were first imposed, the airlines would have backed off — maybe they would have raised their prices instead, but at least it would have been open and honest.

Instead, we rolled over. As soon as one company got away with it, the rest piled in. And now, we grumble but basically we just take it. So now we end up fighting with each other for space in the overhead bins. Air travel gets uglier and more stressful.

It is now at the point where one or two airlines make a big deal out of saying your bags can fly “free.” Twenty years ago, nobody would have understood that.

Airlines are, of course, not the only offenders. I recall when going to the doctor’s office produced one bill. Now, in the modern age of “unbundling,” there is a bill from the doctor, a bill from the clinic, a bill from the lab. Or maybe several bills from the lab, for blood tests that used to be done for one price. Individually, they don’t produce major sticker shock. Add them up, and you realize how much the price has really gone up.

Rented a car lately? The advertised price you are quoted is a fiction. Some of that is not entirely the fault of the companies — municipal officials, knowing they will not get any local grief for sticking it to out-of-towners, tack on a host of fees and taxes, sometimes allegedly to pay for things like stadiums. But the companies get in the game too, with cancelation fees, energy fees (even though you’re paying for the gas), even in some cases, tire fees — yes, an extra fee for a car with tires.

Government, of course, can’t stay away from such seductive deception. Elected officials create new fees for kids to ride the bus, to play school sports or participate in other activities. And then they campaign on a claim that they haven’t raised your taxes.

It was great to see the country rally behind soldiers for being abused by the airlines. But it ought to remind us that we’re all being abused the same way.

Taylor Armerding is an independent columnist. Contact him at t.armerding@verizon.net