As a current regional puke, I know this merger is anything but a done deal, and I understand the need to keep my comments short and let the adults do the talking, but:

Look at the current state of the UAL narrow body fleets. Look at their mainline vs. regional departure statistics. Look at their furlough list. All of this is according to the plan of UAL's current management. Since he showed up on property, Tilton has displayed a near-pathological desire to cripple his own company in the long term in order to ensure a merger. Now that his objective nears completion, I doubt very much that he and the UAL management group have a real plan to lead the company back to viability. The unified pilot group needs to do everything in their power, however painful the process will be, to limit such destructive practices.

Pushing to adopt CAL's scope, instead of allowing UAL's current scope nightmare to expand to a largely healthy airline, would be the SINGLE MOST POWERFUL action a pilot group could take to reverse the downward trend this profession has followed for the past decade+. Every day I come on here, I hear the usual hawkish comments about "taking it back", "getting the camel out of the tent", etc. I've heard about how much people have learned from the past mistakes of scope relaxation. As difficult as the still-hypothetical merger would be for all involved, it strikes this outside observer as the first real opportunity to take a stand on this issue.

Having flown both turboprops and jets, here and abroad, my current position is as an FO on a plane entirely too large to be an RJ. I got into this industry because I saw first-hand what kind of company UAL used to be. I, and many others, would be happy to go right back out on furlough again if it meant UAL/CAL limited scope to fifty seats. It would be clear evidence that people are still willing to fight for this profession.

-$.02