Originally Posted by
Opus
For those wanting to vilify Richard Anderson I would like to take you to task on that. Look at the facts:
1) He fought against Mike Levine and John Dasburg and argued against them taking Northwest to a strike in '98. After the strike Levine wanted to park the 74s and fill the pacific with used DC-10s. It was Anderson that argued and won (being appointed to CEO over him) to update the NWA fleet. 319/320s in place of 727s and 330s to replace the DC-10s.
2) He offered the NWA pilots a 10 percent raise after 9/11 without a fight, which is why I personally believe that we will see a SWA like contract mid next year.
3) When Anderson left NWA in October of '04 he left millions of dollars of NWA stock on the table. He knew what was coming down the pipe and wanted no part of it.
4) What Anderson made at United Health Care was multiple times more than what he is getting at Delta. He took a massive pay cut to come back to the airlines. Anybody that has ever heard him speak knows that he loves airplanes and does love this industry. He truly has a vision of building a world class airline. That is his motivation not money. Yes, he is cutting back and Delta is saving money/paying down debt, because, once again he is trying to build a financially stable airline.
5) Look at the rest of the industry. Tell me that every other wouldn't love to have Anderson as a CEO. DAL has posted a 3B profit in the last 18 months where AA has lost 1B. That is a 4B differential in a very short time. That's staggering!
Look at the rest of the industry:
-USAir-civil war between the east and west.
-United/Continental 10 year differential in relative seniority. Wait till that battle begins.
-AA-Sad. Truly poor and sorry management!
-Southwest- Let's see how this stapling of AirTran works.
Carl, before you refute my points, I'll admit I can't beat you in a debate however I am pro DPA but not because I see a ghost behind every management team decision but because I see Alpa as conflicted.
I'll take our management team over any in the industry.
First of all, I'm not one that vilifies Richard. I've known him and watched his career progress for a long time now. I think he's a relatively good CEO. I do NOT feel that way about our #2 guy. Kinda like FTB's video from a few weeks back: "Honeybastian is pretty badass, he just goes where he wants...Honeybastian don't give a sh!t."
With regard to seeing ghosts behind every management decision, again that's not my fear. I know they're not looking out for my interest, they're looking out for shareholder interest. My fear is the decisions
DALPA is making for me...especially, the unelected MEC bureaucrats that craft LOA language and MOU langauge, then SIGN THEM INTO EFFECT without any LEC input whatsoever.
Carl