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An article that is a must read!!

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I've come to realize something about CAL that I didn't full really appreciate before I worked here. Despite all the Fortune 500 Awards and 'Worst to First' lingo, Frankie Lorenzo mentality dominates middle management. This is precisely why the crap you see above happens. I'm tired of it and I think an awful lot of us are at our boiling point. This place needs a serious corporate culture makeover cause like Barrack said you can't put lipstick on a pig...

+1
Man, that Marine story is unbelievable! For those who are offended by the FUPM acronym being tossed around, I'd just like to say that I find actions like the one from the Red Coat way more offensive. Absolutely disgraceful!
 
When Comair started doing the Shuttle service, the Delta pilots picketed. They had ALPA file a lawsuit in court against Delta INC. Comair was wholly owned and the pilots were ALPA too! Now Republic, an independant contractor - not ALPA, is taking over a huge chunk of Shuttle and we hear nothing.


The silence is reflection of the current MEC leadership. Lee Moak will never fight to defend scope.
 
Re: An article that is a must read!!!

That is what killed it...

No. There is so much disinformation about this.

Saying it died because of a few regional line hotheads is what you're supposed to believe but the MECs went out of our way to not talk about how the lists should be merged. It was inappropriate until the merger was sanctioned by ALPA, then there's a negotiation process to make a combined list.

The problem was the ASA and OH MEC's went over DALPA's head to ALPA national, I think without telling them what they were going to do, and that angered DALPA.

We approached Giambusso at least three times that I know of about merging before we filed the PID. Like I said, by the time the paperwork went in, we had absolutely nothing to lose.

Believe what you want but my conscience is clear about the unraveling of this profession and who's responsible for it. The Comair and ASA MECs did everything they could to protect their pilots but were undermined by their own union.
 
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No. There is so much disinformation about this.

Saying it died because of a few regional line hotheads is what you're supposed to believe but the MECs went out of our way to not talk about how the lists should be merged. It was inappropriate until the merger was sanctioned by ALPA, then there's a negotiation process to make a combined list.

but by definition, the message that is sent by not (up front) letting them know that they had nothing to lose, and everything to gain (by a staple with DOH for pay) would have made them far more likely to talk. The silence, along with the loudness of those few hotheads lead them to believe we were going to sue them under ALPA M&A bylaws for DOH (or some sort of parity) which was a none starter in their eyes (and rightfully so).

I don't blame those who lead ASA's MEC, I blame the 90% of those "young/junior" guys who came to ASA as a stepping stone for better things and who's whisper to me "I agree with your view on this"; but didn't have the courage to demand their MEC acted in THEIR best interest.
 
but by definition, the message that is sent by not (up front) letting them know that they had nothing to lose, and everything to gain (by a staple with DOH for pay) would have made them far more likely to talk.

Highly unlikely. Believe me, as a practical matter, the very best we could have done was a staple and everybody in the leadership knew it.

Ask the PanAm pilots how they fared with their integration with Delta. Some of those guys lost seniority in dog years. My understanding is that some of them were put behind new hires not hired yet.

I believe they thought they could control us with scope and didn't want to spend negotiating capital buying a merger, thereby dragging their contract down. At the time, the DMEC was expected to deliver United plus 1% to their pilots.

Water under the bridge. That window of opportunity was open briefly as
both Delta and Comair were in Section 6 negotiations. We made a good faith effort to defend the profession by putting some teeth back in the mainline scope clause and lost. ALPA got into bed with management and left us twisting in the lurch.
 
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Originally Posted by FMS-Speed
From talking to some DAL people both during and after this period, my assertion is that it wasn't that the DALPA guys weren't ready to talk to us, it's that they weren't ready to digest our (read the senior pilots who dominated the MEC's of both Comair and ASA) unrealistic "Career Expectations" in terms of demands on seniority integration. I can specifically recall a senior ASA Captain telling me when I had mentioned the idea of a staple with DOH for pay rate... "I ain't drop'n no gear for a G'D' Delta pilot! I've been flying DAL passenger for xx years and I deserve more than a staple!"..

That is what killed it.. I was there in the thick of it, and I recall people like FR and JB (both enemies ironically) but both on the same sheet of music when it came to this critical topic.


but by definition, the message that is sent by not (up front) letting them know that they had nothing to lose, and everything to gain (by a staple with DOH for pay) would have made them far more likely to talk. The silence, along with the loudness of those few hotheads lead them to believe we were going to sue them under ALPA M&A bylaws for DOH (or some sort of parity) which was a none starter in their eyes (and rightfully so).

I don't blame those who lead ASA's MEC, I blame the 90% of those "young/junior" guys who came to ASA as a stepping stone for better things and who's whisper to me "I agree with your view on this"; but didn't have the courage to demand their MEC acted in THEIR best interest.
If this story were true, your point would be that the Delta MEC was manipulated and controlled by a few crew room hot heads at a little regional airline.

Giambusso did not do anything he was not already predisposed to do and his actions were entirely consistent with his statements to both his pilots and the leadership at ASA and Comair. Also, it fit the pattern of bargaining already established at US Air and United.

If your version is true, JB & an out of office former ASA MEC Chair, was able to control the Delta MEC. That makes no sense - and if true, it would have been a childish reaction to let anger and retribution undermine no less than the future of our association, profession and mainline NB flying.

Now those parties you mention were politically unpopular and the DAL MEC latched on to them as public bogeymen, or maybe straw men is a better term. JB's fault? Like he had the power to effect the situation. :rolleyes:

We need to move forward.
 
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I'm just going by my own recollection of 1st hand accounts.. Agree, I nor those people were players in the decision game, but their voices were heard loud and clear nevertheless, all over the ALPA message boards, and the positions seemed to be staked out well in advance of any formal meetings between the two (or 3) MEC's. In other words, a staple was a non-starter, and some will say it's because the unrealistic expectations of ASA's MEC, while others will say it was an aloof DALPA MEC.
 
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I agree they did negatively effect the politics at the line pilot level.

Still wish my suggestion to print "I'd be grateful for a staple" tickers had been adopted. It would have taken the straw men out of the picture and preserved a higher degree of unity.
 
I agree they did negatively effect the politics at the line pilot level.

Still wish my suggestion to print "I'd be grateful for a staple" tickers had been adopted. It would have taken the straw men out of the picture and preserved a higher degree of unity.

and btw, I agree with you, the elephant in the living room is the majors membership who keep selling out their junior guys on scope.. I spent a short bit at American and AMR has been trying to shift it's CG from American to American Eagle for the past 20 years...

Were it not for scope, I'm sure most major airlines today would be nothing more than travel agencies.
 
Yet you allow yourself to be forced into making a choice? Why?

Rather, why not a POTUS that brings economic strength and is a ffreind of labor?

what is econimic strength? A dispairitive gap? Repressed wages?

The socialism spectre is a distracting facade.... We live under a one party system... the Economic Party, with two factions within: Dems and GOP...


Back the USMC/Guam story....

Right out of airline managements playbook.... use a tool to beat down the CA's authority....



This is why I argue hats.... when we shuck the hat we blend into to rest of the low wage workers at the airport....

Super senior B747 or B777 Captains riding the employee bus from the parking lot to the terminal with third world people working for sh tty wages cleaning toilets... This is what management thinks of us...

Keep in mind... management has their own parking lot at the airport....

You and I don't always agree but I couldn't agree with you more.

Oh ya, here is to those guys with the defeatist bucking attitudes. YGTBFKM. Just because we haven't done well in a while doesn't mean give up. Just because you are bitter doesn't mean we don't still try to win the war, if not for ourselves than for the ones to follow. I would rather ride the bus with a group that fought their guts out, even management, than a quitter.
 

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