Originally Posted by
StoneQOLdCrazy
Yes, the premise of this entire thread is ridiculous. Each party (CEO and ALPA) made the best low-risk/low cost decsion.
Of course the CEO asked for public support. There was zero downside, and it was free. He probably told his gardener to write the judge. Why not?
And for Spirit ALPA, again. Their play had almost no downside, aside from the second-guessing here. There was much more upside to trying to leverage their support for better terms than throwing in their support from the beginning.
The real question is why we're even talking about this merger at all. Spirit is worth a fraction of JetBlue's bid from 18 months ago. No profitiability in sight. Bid debt. There is no way JetBlue is goign to get itself get saddled with that dog.
The point is, the Spirit MEC thought their support had enough value/consequence on the process that they could withhold that support for money. You don't get big chunks of money for nothing. They believed their support had enough consequence that they could leverage a big pay day out of the deal. But now you're telling me their was no value in their support?