Originally Posted by
Bucking Bar
The Delta MEC and Delta pilots saw nothing to gain and much to lose by pursuing unity with pilots who performed their outsourced flying. Delta management had always been benevolent and the concepts of "unity" which were a religion to some within our union were considered something of a quaint notion at Delta, if the concept of "unity" as a way to fight management like EL Cord's was understood at all.
I think the Delta pilots made some critical mistakes along the way, but you're probably drifting into some serious revisionism here. My impression is that we tried to reach out to the regional groups, mostly CMR/ASA at the time, and got the finger. This was just before my time... so I can't completely comment on the Delta pilots at the time, anymore than you can, but I don't think you can look at this without factoring in the RJDC and people like Lawson.
Today we are at a crossroads. The experienced hands say "trust us, Delta management has our best interests at heart." The junior pilots see nearly half the airline outsourced in a decade and are fearful of just the sort of alter ego replacement EL Cord (and early airline managers) did as a matter of routine.
You must be completely shielded from senior pilots. I've NEVER heard anyone not in management suggest Delta management has our best interest at heart. I think this kind of talk died in 1996, if there was any left after the early nineties. Also, on the subject of outsourcing... I'm not very senior (hired late in the 1996-2001 push), and I found many senior pilots were not properly concerned about RJ's
initially. But today? On the 7ER, the Captain that isn't aware of the dangers of outsourcing is probably in a 1% "club".
We need a return to our roots...
Amen to that.