PCL: Does the truth sting a little? Was anything in my post about your career inaccurate?
Sting? Not at all. In case you haven't noticed, I never try to hide my career path. I just don't find it relevant to the conversation at hand. If you want to have a PFT discussion, then by all means, go start the 10,000th thread that deals with that dead horse topic.
Enduring hardships has everything to do with the topic at hand. The USAir pilots, under the rule of ALPA, have endured more BS than any pilot group in history. Was some of it self induced? You bet. Was some of it heaped upon them when they needed the help the most by a decrepit, out of touch, and outdated association that has failed to adapt to the changing needs of the very constituents it represents.......ABSOLUTELY.
You're blaming the Association for things that it had no control over. Your blame should be directed at the RLA, the bankruptcy laws, President Bush and his lapdog NMB, the various scumbag managers that USAir has had over the years, etc... ALPA is not responsible for the hardships of the AAA pilots. I know you guys would like to find an easy scapegoat to make yourselves feel better, but ALPA isn't the evil force that you pretend it to be.
Further, the fact that you landed with a company that has its own in house union, who has enjoyed success while ALPA carriers have floundered speaks volumes.
This airline has had success, but this union has not. If you want to see just how effective an in-house union is, then by all means, stop by the AirTran TA threads and see just how wonderful life without ALPA can be. Pay particular attention to all of the pilots calling for ALPA representation because our own union is so incompetent. Gee, don't you want to join the non-ALPA club? [/sarcasm]
Since you are such an pro-ALPA zealot, I suspect that you will be supporting an ALPA card drive at AirTran.
I'll support ALPA at AirTran if the majority of the pilots at this airline decide that that's what they want. I certainly hope that they come to that conclusion, since I definitely feel that having ALPA representation is in our best interests, but it's up to the majority. I hope the majority of the pilots at AAA and AWA make the right decision and stay with ALPA.
They are interested in calling ALPA out so that they answer for the inadequacies of the very group that should have protected them.
If you want to "call someone out," then I suggest you look at your own MEC. This issue never should have gone to arbitration in the first place, and after it did go to arbitration, it was horribly mismanaged. ALPA National does not get involved in the seniority integration debate at individual carriers. The C & BLs prohibits it. The direction that your MEC took was based entirely on their own strategy, not that of ALPA National. Place the blame where it belongs.
