COMAIR in Atlanta....

[CarjCapt]

<but your management is being advised by Lawson, and that is where the animosity comes from.>

General, the above statement is the laugh of the decade.

Our MEC only agrees with our management on this issue. They don't advise and if they didn't agree do you think management would listen? Especially since our management is doing Delta's management's bidding.

Again, Sir, you are barking up the wrong tree you and your MEC need to talk to Delta management as long as you want to remain alone and apart. When you want to show a unified front to Delta/ASA/CMR management come see us and we'll welcome you warmly. The door is open.

 

[Heavy Set]

It is about reciprocity...

Embdrvr and CarjCapt,

You are both wrong. General Lee is correct. Lawson and his cronies screwed it up for the "typical" Comair pilot by doing the opposite of ASA in terms of hiring furloughed pilots (not displacing current pilots - just adding to the list). Why would it do that? How idiotic!

Aren't Comair pilots aware that Delta mainline guys are involved in the mainline hiring process and are ABSOLUTELY ENRAGED by Comair's ludicrous decision not to help furloughed pilots? How do I know this? I just called two of my Delta buddies and relayed them your positions - they were aghast. This is not a superficial issue. All of the Delta guys I talk to are upset. They supported Comair in their strike and now there is no reciprocity or extension of help.... I don't care if it is a long-standing policy for Comair - ASA did - Comair should too. There is no displacement of pilots... Get it? It shouldn't be a problem. Delta OWNS Comair. Delta OWNS ASA. Comair's pilots should WANT to support Delta's furloughees and either replace the MEC or petition the management to get some change in policy - if they want to improve their chances of getting hired by the mainline - it is that simple.... If you don't want to support Delta furloughees, get your apps out to Southwest and wait in line forever... ASA guys are in a great position now.

Ebrdrvr,

Are you in the 3rd grade? I like your lame name calling... You reduce the effectiveness of your arguments when you do that. Stick to logic and you will be fine. All General Lee is talking about is the need for reciprocity given the mainline's support of Comair during their strike - the furloughees should be accorded some assistance - that is all. Sure, General Lee can be really sarcastic and a bit emotional at times - but he does make sense.


My 2 cents.

 

[CarjCapt]

You just don't get it.

You said it Delta ownes ASA/CMR. We aren't in control YOU are.

That's all folks.

 

[higherflyer]

BVT1151,

And, guess what? Delta pays your bills.

Bye Bye---General Lee

You might want to double check things there-- at the moment, I think that ASA and Comair are paying a lot of the bills at big DL. And before you launch another of your attacks, I don't work for either!

 

[bladeusa]

I read that ASA and COMAIR are paying DELTA bills. Where is the proof and how much? What is the precentage of Delta flying and revenue?

Lets see some facts so we can get a better idea of your point.


DAL holds the books and the numbers.. and both of which could be manipulated to show anything u wanted.... gain or loss.. however... when every dollar counts, as it does right now.. who is growing...buying airplanes and hiring?... and who is shrinking?

 

[General Lee]

Bladeusa,

I think if Delta is bleeding so much they should stop all of their future expenditures for this year right now and conserve cash. They are buliding new terminals in BOS and JFK---and that should stop. Oh yeah, they are also buying $1billion worth of RJ's this year. We all want mother Delta to survive, right? Let's stop the buying and start conserving $$$$---oh, but that might stop YOUR growth. All of the RJ's you have gotten over the last 2 years were appropriated from money that Delta made in the late '90's. The money we lost last quarter was mainly due to the War and high gas prices coupled with our stopping many European flights. I guess your RJ's could have flown those European flights from JFK, huh? Give me a break. The flights are now oversold to Europe---I just checked to go to Frankfurt from ATL next week, and they are all oversold--on 777's, and that goes the same for CVG and JFK. Our Revenue is coming back, with or without your RJ's.

Bye Bye--General Lee

 

[bladeusa]

i hope it comes back for everybody...none of this with or without drivel... im happy to have growth on all sides of the industry. Do u? Seems like its always us vs them with u.. U seem bitter that we are expanding ... like u want us to shrink and suffer.. i don't wish that on u.. Im looking forward to having everyone recalled and hiring to resume.

 

[AFELLOWAVIATOR]

Private Lee, wrong as always. Comair and ASA support their own growth. We were buying airplanes before we were bought, and we continue to do so. We are just buying and leasing them from Delta now.
Good greif, I swear I don't know why you feel you have to make up this stuff.

 

[FlyDeltasJets]

Private Lee, wrong as always. Comair and ASA support their own growth. We were buying airplanes before we were bought, and we continue to do so. We are just buying and leasing them from Delta now.
Good greif, I swear I don't know why you feel you have to make up this stuff.

That's very interesting. ASA and cmr are now buying planes from Delta? I wonder how that would be depicted on a financial statement. Could you possibly explain further?

Did we make a profit by selling the airplanes to a company that we own?

 

[surplus1]

To Captainv Part 1 of 3

Originally posted by captainv

Actually, beyond the issue of furloughees, Gen. Lee and I rarely agree.

Thanks for your reply; nice post. First, I'll apologize for yanking your chain a bit hard. It's just that it gets very frustrating when a Comair pilot appears to trust the words of a pilot from another airline more than he does the words of his own people. I'm happy to hear that you don't agree with everything he says, because most of what he says is nothing more than political rhetoric and hyperbole. You asked a lot of questions so this is going to be long. It is unfortunately too complex for a couple of paragraphs. Bear with me if you can.

I appreciate your concern for your furloughed friend. That is a good thing, but it is also a personal thing. I also appreciate the General's concern for his fellow furloughed pilots. That is a good thing and his zeal is admirable. We should all be concerned for every furloughed pilot, not just the pilots from a particular airline and our airline is hiring furloughed pilots from many airlines, in significant numbers.

The fact is that the Comair MEC is NOT preventing Comair from hiring Delta pilots. They are not being hired by Comair because they choose of their own free will not to comply with Comair's requirements. The Delta pilots have a right to make that choice and Comair management also has a right to establish and maintain its own hiring requirements. Those requirements were not put in place to prevent the hiring of furloughed Delta pilots. They have been in place much before the current rounds of furloughs. What exactly makes a Delta pilot so different from a United pilot, a USAirways pilot, a Midway pilot, an Eagle pilot, a NWA pilot, an American/TWA pilot or any other airline pilot that's furloughed? Why should Comair have a different policy for furloughed Delta pilots than it does for furloughed pilots from those other airlines?

At this point I'll venture a guess that you're thinking --- well, Delta owns Comair. Yes, Delta does own Comair but the Delta pilots do not. The Delta pilots also do not own or control Comair pilots or the Comair MEC, they just think they do. Maybe they would like to, but at some point in life even a Delta pilot has to understand that you can't have every thing you would like.

This is as old as the hills, so I'm sure you've heard it before. There's a long line of pilots at the pearly gates waiting for St. Pete to check their ID and grant admission. Suddenly a guy in a Delta uniform walks up, bypasses the line, ignores St. Pete and walks right in. A UAL pilot in the line turns to the guy behind him, a NWA pilot, and says, "Look at that dam*ed Delta pilot, who's he think he is anyway, God?" "Shhhh," says the NWA pilot, "that IS God, he just thinks he's a Delta pilot."

Delta management can tell Comair management what to do and when to do it at any time. If the Delta MEC really wants to help furloughed Delta pilots, a political campaign against the Comair MEC (and that is exactly what this is) isn't going to do it. Why is the Delta MEC asking the Comair MEC to secure the hiring of furloughed Delta pilots? Why doesn't the Delta MEC ask Delta management to direct Comair management to do so?

It's pretty simple, the Delta MEC saw an opportunity to attempt to discredit the Comair MEC and cause Comair pilots to fight among ourselves. They know that Comair has a large number of new pilots (25% of the total) that were not even at Comair during the strike. Most of those new pilots have dreams of one day flying for Delta. That provides a perfect opportunity for the Delta MEC to try to turn those pilots against their own MEC and divide Comair pilots against each other. Why does the Delta MEC want to do that? Because the Delta MEC is actively engaged in attempting to take aircraft assigned to Comair for itself (the 70-seaters) and has been trying to do so since 1994, with the help of the ALPA. The Delta MEC and ALPA together have a goal of doing that and further, of restricting Delta's use of the 50-seat CRJ. Both of those acts injure all Comair pilots and some of them are fighting it in the courts. That annoys the Delta MEC and prevents/delays it from directly screwing Comair pilots even more than it already has. This preferential hiring BS is nothing more than a political maneuver that is designed to do two things, 1) help to cover the Delta MEC's ineffective efforts to help the furloughed pilots, and 2) facilitate the Delta MEC's ability to take from Comair pilots while diluting our will to resist. They would like to do to Comair (and to ASA) exactly what the APA is trying to do to American Eagle or what ALPA and the AAA MEC have done to six different regional airlines, and this whole preferential hiring scheme is nothing more that a part of the political effort to accomplish that. If they can succeed in dividing Comair pilots, it will make it easier for them. It really has nothing to do with their furloughed pilots. This is politics plain and simple and you ought to recognize that.

The Delta pilots, not all but most, don't think Comair pilots should be on their seniority list and have said so repeatedly. They even hired "outside counsel" to prevent any possibility of that happening. Why is it wrong, for us to feel the same way? The General feels that the Comair MEC is doing an injustice to furloughed Delta pilots because it has not made a statement urging Comair to waive its hiring policy with respect to his furloughed friends. That's his opinion and he has a right to it, but that doesn't make it so. Because he doesn't like the CMR MEC's decision to decline trying to make a special exemption for Delta pilots, he and many of his associates, have repeatedly threatened to black-ball every Comair pilot from any possibility of ever being hired at Delta in the future. When his MEC made the proposal, it couched it together with the threats that it would "go public" and do exactly what the General is trying to do if the Comair MEC did not roll over and do their bidding. They kept their "promise".

Apparently the objective of the threats is to intimidate Comair pilots. Since that hasn't worked, he is now saying that he doesn't hate Comair pilots (anymore), he just hates the MEC Chairman and "his cronies." Can't intimidate the pilot group at large, attempt to intimidate the MEC and turn Comair pilots against their own. They have further recommended that Comair pilots should recall their MEC, because it has chosen not to discriminate in favor of furloughed Delta pilots, as opposed to furloughed pilots from other airlines. Well, we all have a right to our opinions and my opinion is that the Comair MEC was chosen by Comair pilots to represent the interests of Comair pilots, and to protect the job security of Comair pilots, not the interests of Delta pilots and that is exactly what it is doing.

The General and his associates then remind us all, again repeatedly, that the Delta pilots "helped us during our strike" and therefore (I guess) we "owe" them. Well guess what, the ASA pilots and the UAL pilots helped us too and so did the USAirways pilots, the UPS pilots, the Eagle pilots, the ACA pilots and every other pilot group that's out there. Those that have furloughed pilots as well as those that do not. Even the American pilots helped us and they belong to a different union. In just about every post on the subject, the Delta pilots remind us of the fact that they paid strike benefits. Well, bully for them. That happens to be a requirement of membership in the ALPA and it is mandatory, not optional. Every ALPA pilot paid strike benefits and none of them paid any less or any more than the Delta pilots. All ALPA pilots paid the very same assessment. Why then do Comair pilots "owe" the Delta pilots more than we owe anyone else?

The Delta pilots further remind us that they contributed to our family fund and again, we "owe" them for doing that. Yes, some of them did give to our family fund; most of them did not. Well guess what, a lot of other airline pilots also gave to our family fund and yes, we are all grateful for that. However, we do not "owe" the Delta pilots any more than we owe anybody else. If you or anyone else really wants to know exactly how much the Delta pilots "gave" to our family fund, why don't you ask our MEC? Maybe they'll tell you. Maybe they will also tell you that the check we got from the American pilots alone, was the biggest and was nearly as much as the donations we received from ALL ALPA carriers combined. Maybe they will tell you how much the United pilots gave and compare it to what the Delta pilots gave. Then you'll have an idea of just who the BS spin-doctors really are and who we really "owe".


Continued in Part 2