Why are you so immune to that sweet Skywest koolaide? It's probably from all those years of meth and acid. Just let it penetrate your head.
By the way those guys in the Golden days where golden because they could be, airlines were regulated. Pilots were considered important. It all started to go down hill during deregulation, management made an experiment where they lowered salaries and still watched their pilots come to work. Time travel those "golden age" guys to to our time and watch them go at each others throats.