On the DPA/unity discussion...

You want unity? Here's what our MEC needs to do. Come out with a statement of objective along the lines of this: Make it clear that our objective is to restore our profession and put our careers back on track. That means significant pay restoration... something along the lines of SWA W2 all the way up to C2K+COLA. It also means scope improvement... to begin reversing the outsourcing. And no negative changes in other areas of the contract.

Sure, there will be a small minority of folks who won't want this for one reason or the other. But I guarantee you the vast majority of this pilot group would rally around this kind of objective. That's how you get unity. That's how you shut down the DPA effort. IMO, the lack of this kind of appropriate and compelling objective and the lack of effective leadership is the primary reason for all the apathy and lack of unity.

And one more thing on unity. Yes, we need it. Is it critical at this point in time? Well, we haven't exchanged openers yet and there has been no event or situation where we have needed to demonstrate unity... other than communicating to management that they are going to be facing a unified pilot group. And that bring up another question. If it's so important to set the tone/expectations with management that we are unified, then why is it completely unimportant (according to DALPA) to set the tone/expectations with management of what we are going to be trying to achieve?