Originally Posted by
Carl Spackler
You would only have to look to NWA. We came out of BK with a contract that was equal overall compared to DAL. And I would not be able to describe either of them as "the best contract."
It was the leadership on both sides as well as the fact that our two pilot groups are relatively sensible people.
Our machine is not running smoothly man. We're currently first among customer complaints. Hopefully that will get better soon, but I don't know how you can say that given the data. Future looking engagement is fine and Lee is not the first one to approach the job that way. Some of us feel that he lost perspective and went beyond future engagement, all the way to being too spring loaded to the management vision. The truth is that no MEC Chairman can ever be management...although most CEO's will be glad to let you think you are. Mostly they are glad to let you think you're "plugged in", as long as you keep giving more than you should. Like SCOPE!!!
Carl
Sure Carl, red is gray and yellow white and we decide which is right, and which is an illusion.
For the rest, in order to decide on a direction forward you at least need to get your facts straight about the past. It took about a 13% increase in total compensation to completely bring the NWA contract completely to the DAL contract. Whether that is better or not you can make the call.
For anyone outside the process or anyone inside NWA, there are few who would say that the NWA pilots came out of bankruptcy as a unified group or a unified MEC. Most would say the the DAL pilots and DAL MEC were unified.
Everyone that had a front row seat to this new labor paradigm in the merger knows that Lee was the guy that created the plan and the Delta MEC worked to create the environment to close the deal. It surely took both sides working together, but there are few who wouldn't say that the Delta side was driving the ship.
This doesn't mean that fDAL pilots are better than fNWA pilots, these discussions always end up in "I'm better than you" arguments that have no purpose. It also doesn't mean that DAL always had better leadership than NWA, these things ebb and flow and will again in the future. My opinion is that we had better leadership going through bankruptcy and through this deal and the results back this up. You can either agree or disagree, but at least deal with facts when you are trying to decide your future. We live in an age of truthiness and spin, where we can actually have people believe there is some Islamic invasion trying to take over America and burning Kurans is the only way to stop them. Let's not deceive ourselves in a similar fashion, it rarely leads to good outcomes.