Originally Posted by
ForeverFO
B.S. - The problem isn't pilot whimpiness, it's USA bankruptcy laws and above all, the RLA.
These two tools give management complete and supreme power to use as needed to gut contracts and impoverish pilots. When management can unilaterally dictate pay and work rules, and our only tools (strike and/or slowdown) are declared illegal by the courts, bought and paid for by airline executives... then we are screwed.
Unions can do very little so long as the RLA remains the law of the land. A job action is our only option to influence negotiations, and that tool has been removed from our tool chest.
B.S. right back at ya. Here we go again.... blame EVERYONE and everything else. However, the 'YES' votes speak for themselves, and you can try spinning them whichever way you want.
Some things should be sacred. Airline pension gutted? Your flying outsourced against you? Suspension of Service or the so-called "ALPA nuke" as George E. Hopkins terms it. Again, some things are or should be sacred and/or contested and challenged at every step. I was an ALPA pilot when all this was going down and was absolutely disgusted with how every pilot group folded like a house of cards. I also saw the insane amount of greed by the older, senior pilots, well before the Age 65 rule.
I was laughing my head off at the whole "Taking it back" bull. While our pensions and scope were being gutted along with some paycuts going to 50%.... ALPA was valiantly fighting for TWIC. Seriously?!?
As I said, nothing is sacred to ALPA or US airline pilots. ALPA's 'red line' is a flexible, and easily adjustable target... just threaten them with something. It's embarrassing.
So before you start defending yourself again with how your hands are tied due to RLA, remember... some things in life should be sacred and worth fighting for even if you **** people off. RLA hasn't even been truly challenged in recent history. I'd say gutting the pensions, giving away your flying to 90-seat RJ operator, not to mention cutting some groups' pay by as much as 50% would qualify for a major dispute under RLA, and if not... make a stand and challenge the almost 100-year law! Nope.... house of cards, instead. That's the no-balls part.
Try again.