Originally Posted by
skybolt
I was one of ten board members sitting on the committee that approved the resolution that ultimately went before the entire ALPA Executive Board.
John Prater never once twisted my arm for a pro age 65 vote. He, nor anyone else, made any attempt to influence the committee.
Thanks for your reply. I'll take it at face face value that Prater never personally twisted
your arm. I will not believe that "neither he,
nor anyone else, made
any attempt to influence the committee". I don't live in a world where a union allows a committee to operate in a vacuum, floating above earthly concerns and self-interest, guided only by their conscience and the facts.
And neither do you.
My roll call vote was insignificant in general assembly, and I must admit that it is possible that Prater politic'd long and hard for changing ALPA's stand, but the vote would never have gone to the floor if my delegate committee had not made a positive recommendation and I will again assure you that John Prater made no attempt to get the ten of us to vote either way.
So he politic'd long and hard, but that didn't translate into an attempt to influence?
It's of no consequence to me what action he did or did not take in front of your committee. I don't know what the exact role of that committee was, and quite frankly, I don't care to visit the minutiae of how he and his peers got Age 65 pushed through. Suffice to say his position was absoultely clear.
BTW, we decided to remove our support for age 60 simply because we looked at the evidence and decided that the FAA administrator (and Presidential administration) had already made up her mind to change the rule. The only way to have any influence on the final language was to end our oppostion and send our lobbyists in to work for us.
The APAAD and associated groups were going for RETROactive re-instatement of over age 60 pilots. How would you have liked that?
You've got the two ends of the dog confused.
Legislators and the Executive chnaged their mind, not because they have any interest in the issue, and certainly not because of any public interest, because of intense lobbying by certain groups. Previously, whenever said lawmakers turned to us on this issue, and in the absence of any public will to raise the retirement age, the union stood firm, and said groups were indefinitely delayed in their efforts.
When the signal came that the union would turn, and Woerth abstained on the ARC, there was no reason to deny the requests of the (very active, and growing) minority that wanted a higher retirement age. I won't deny that they were driven by the failure of pension plans and other finanical hardships, but I refuse to believe the soft revisionism that lets you agrue the change came from outside the group.
At any rate, Prater has delivered on his promise to the older guys that got him elected. For the sake of unity among all pilots, and for the sake of finding a better, more effective person to advance the profession, I say it's time for this pony to go, his single trick having been performed.