DAL 88 Driver

Spot on! But 76drvr is going to take the $500 "final offer" from his customer! And his vote counts just the same as yours or mine!!!

Carl Spackler

Spot on Gloopy!

Carl

Carl Spackler

This is a level of excuse making that the NMB will not tolerate if it is attempted by management. We did not decide to buy a regional for billions of dollars, only to write it off to zero. Management did that. We did not spend billions on stock repurchases only to have said stock go to zero. Management did that. I could go on, and so could most of us. Our current problem of debt and ancient airplanes is not of our doing. In fact, OUR contract destruction and pension destruction have gone a long way to REPAIR the balance sheet damaged by the mistakes of MANAGEMENT. We've basically been a bank and an investor to the airline and have gotten nothing in return for our extremely positive actions. The NMB understands this happened under bankruptcy and also knows the continuation of it is unacceptable outside of bankruptcy. The NMB is not unreasonable...even in their new unstated role as arbitrator.

Our airline is now profitable and has a good deal of industry pricing power. Our increases we should be demanding are easily covered by a few extra dollars per ticket. The baggage fees prove that it's easily achievable. But we have two problems. One is EB who says he loses sleep over worrying he didn't take enough from the pilots. And second is a union that wants to "constructively engage" with a man who has this belief.

Carl

Pineapple Guy

Carl, I actually agree with most of what you said with two caveats:

1) I don't believe the NMB IS reasonable - on what basis do you make that judgment?
2) I agree we have two problems - one is RA/EB, but the other is DPA trying to split the pilot group.

Bucking Bar

During the Mesa litigation it was revealed that Delta had paid millions of dollars in performance bonuses to Mesa while at the same time cancelling Mesa's contract for poor performance. When asked why they paid Mesa millions extra, the answer was "because they sent a bill." It made me wonder if I had sent a bill, would Ed's department have mailed me a check for a few million bucks!

Ed should have gotten some sleep and spent his time monitoring the activities of the employees who were in his direct chain of command.Due to our outsourcing Ed will probably not be around to host an In Command group which includes me, but I'd like to hear an apology from him. We did our jobs. His Department failed to perform it's most basic accounts payable diligence.

Gomerglideslope

I saw one of the DPA gents in NY the other day....no hat, jacket unbuttoned and flapping, green DPA tag prominently displayed ...hate to judge a book by the cover, and I realize its just one guy, but the lack of professionalism was not very inspiring.

Gomer

Jack Bauer

I saw some ALPA "leadership" the other day hiding the ledgers indicating where dues money was spent (even though its clearly spelled out they are to share this information). They also treated their constituents like mushrooms.

Hate to judge a book by the cover, and I realize this is a whole group of guys tasked with leading and spending dues money carefully, but the lack of professionalism was not very inspiring.

Karnak

It is foolish to overstate the dissatisfaction with ALPA. The DPA core has done that. What you call "karma" is cycles. The economy, our industry, and our leverage, move in cycles. Need proof? Go back to my post - the chanting for C2K "restoration" - a contract ALPA negotiated when "karma" was up and we had leverage. Do you remember all the anti-ALPA, pro-DPA chanting back then? No. What you should remember is what a pilot group can do when there isn't a bunch of DPA yahoos converting their emotion into distraction.

gloopy

I saw some of the ALPA gents in LAX and SEA the other day. Crisp uniform, walking with pride, wide ALPA lanyards...hate to judge a book by its cover, and I realize its just 1400 guys, but the lack of scope was not very inspiring.

Carl Spackler

I make my judgment based on the fact that there are new members on the NMB...reportedly more pro-labor than the previous. Secondly, I base it on the fact that back when APA was demanding restoration adjusted for inflation plus large premiums, it was being demanded at a time when the comparable industry environment just couldn't support it. It was a great goal, but it was too far above anybody else in the indusry and AMR was losing large sums of money at the time. Today is different for us IF we adopt the strategy I've outlined. Which is to use the SWAPA contract as comparable leverage and reminding everyone that our massive contract destruction and pension destruction is the main reason our company is so profitable and has paid down so much debt.

This is a terribly unfair comment PG, and we've been hearing it now for the last 18 months. DPA is absolutely NOT trying to split the pilot group. We are simply offering an alternative which is our democratic right under the law. If we lose in our effort, all of us DPA'ers will get behind ALPA. Not because ALPA is a moral and ethical organization, but because it is the right thing to do since a majority of our members will have spoken.

The comment of DPA trying to split the pilot group is one of the ways ALPA is trying to permanently remove any threat to their permanent governance of our pilot group. If offering an alternative can be successfully portrayed as splitting the pilot group, then there can never be a change of ALPA as our bargaining agent. Never. Because that would be splitting the pilot group.

Carl