I'm glad ALPA has a couple fans. John Prater is another one that has received an ROI (Did he help bring back CAL, with their scabs, into the fold of dues members in good standing? Did that dues tsunami into ALPA coffers have anything to do with his meteoric rise to king of the hill? Things that make ya go hmmm.)
For every pilot that applauds ALPA you can find 20 that have seen the light. ALAP sits over numerous competing pilot groups with conflicting agendas. Its little more than a self confessed ponzi scheme that pats itself on the back when it "succeeds" and belittles pilots when "the pilots fail". Just ask Rez and PCL who is to blame.
ALPA has a lot of fans. The problem is that they don't waste their time posting here. I probably shouldn't be either.
The whole Continental thing is another argument that I don't buy from the ALPA haters. I mean, let's look at this objectively.
Obviously the CAL guys thought ALPA was their best choice for representation, and obviously they have a small number of scabs on their property, just like we do. This number will get smaller every day after December 2012.
So CAL wants ALPA representation. What is ALPA supposed to do? Tell them no, sorry, you have small percentage of scabs on your property so therefore you can't join? A few scabs get to determine what the majority of pilots want at CAL for a union? If that was the case, then I guess the scabs at CAL would win again, huh?
ALPA took them in, scabs and all, knowing these scabs would be gone in a few years.
And the other comments that people make about ALPA only caring about dues money. I think that is untrue. Again, let me give you an example.
ALPA represents many regional carriers. Many of these smaller regional carriers cannot support themselves financially, and they do not pay their "fair share" of the services that are provided to them by ALPA.
Now, answer me this: why would ALPA take on a bunch of dues draining smaller carriers if all they care about is money? That argument makes no sense. If all they cared about was the money, they would cease to represent many smaller carriers TOMORROW.
In my opinion that argument about only caring about dues money is ridiculous. I think what ALPA cares about is becoming the biggest, most powerful, airline pilot union in the country, and you get there by trying to represent every airline pilot in the country. When you represent every pilot in the country, you have power. You get a seat at the table when issues pertaining to airline pilots come up in Washington, for example. Again, that does not mean ALPA gets everything it wants, every time. That means it gets to at least INFLUENCE those decisions when it doesn't get it's way and compromises are made. How much influence did ALPA have on these rest rules, for example, vs. the JetBlue or Virgin America pilots? Who was testifying in front of Congress, telling the world about the abysmal treatment regional airline pilots face after the Buffalo crash? Was it Prater or someone else from another pilot's union? Do you think it is good or bad to have a powerful representative on the Hill when issues affecting airline pilots pop up? Or should we all be divided with our own little "utopian" unions delivering a fractured message that isn't heard at all?
On ALPA's quest to obtain this goal of representing every airline pilot, the haters just say, hey look, all ALPA cares is about the dues! Look, they took CAL pilots because they get more dues that way! That's all ALPA cares about! And of course, if you are going to be cynical, then yeah, I could see why a guy would state that. However, hopefully you can step back, look at things more objectively, realize that many decisions made are shades of grey vs. black and white, and come to informed conclusions about why this nebulous and imperfect "ALPA" does what it does.
