I've always felt strongly both ways on this issue. I can see why some guys look at it as departing the true faith and they have too much inside union information. But, I also like the idea that you have a proven pilot advocate in a senior management chair (or even just a chief pilot chair for that matter).

We had a couple exunion types in management at NWA and I thought they were good fits (especially one DTW Chief Pilot). Now, with that said, there was some controversy with with our VP of Flight Ops during our strike. He was an exunion type who made sure we didn't have any scabs by shutting us down, but he did go to his office and get paid (said it was an FAA Certificate problem as I recall).

Anyway, my last serious post for a while.

Ferd