Originally Posted by
johnso29
I don't think I ever said that.
K prolly not, but you've struck me as having pretty similar views in the past...not "natural born enemies" on this T/A so to speak.
Also don't take my conversation with gloopy as my opinion of this TA, or how I will vote for it. My issue is with people who continue berate the NC, yet aren't willing to do the job they do. They insult the NC's methods, when they have no idea what their job truly entails. They will talk the talk, but not walk the walk.
Eh, that's uncomfortably close to the "If you don't volunteer for ALPA, you can't criticize ALPA!" line of thinking you occasionally hear from unionoids. I have volunteered within ALPA. There
is no such thing as criticizing from within ALPA, not publicly, because ALPA is
very controlling of all communication its volunteers pass along to outsiders. Everything, no matter how trivial and uncontroversial, has to go through the lawyers, and often the full MEC admin as well. You're prohibited from posting on message boards (hmm, funny how that doesn't apply to slowplay). It's ok to disagree in private, but those who don't publicly fall in line are quickly marginalized (just watch what happens to those five reps). It's very Politburo-esque. I think it's unfair to say that just because someone is unwilling to work within
that system, they have no right to disagree with the results.
If someone doesn't like the TA, that's fine. Just vote NO. But stop insisting that the NC rolled over, & implying that it's so easy to do a better job.
You know, that's fair to a certain extent. I'm sure it's not easy to do a better job, especially when you're a pilot by trade, not a professional negotiator. I
very much doubt that I, put in that position, would come up with a better TA than they did. But you know what else? In the position they were in, I would say, "OK, I'm pretty sure this is the best we can do, and the lawyers and MEC admin says its the best we can do, but it didn't come in anywhere near the survey results, so we need to confer with the assembled reps of the MEC tomorrow before announcing we have a TA and putting them in a tough spot." That would have been the right thing to do. Their decision to present the MEC with a fait accompli demonstrated loyalty to the unelected and indirectly-elected MEC administration over the directly elected reps, and that's a decision that I think is perfectly open to valid criticism.
Now, I would suggest that one's decision on the TA should probably be divorced from what you think of the process. It should stand or fall on its own merits. But after this is over, I think there needs to be a very serious discussion about the process. What you think about the process should be divorced from what you thought about the TA. In other words, don't let the Yes vs No divisions help sweep the topic back under the rug, because I think that's exactly what ALPA will try to do after the contract is settled.