What's up with you guys caring if the dude/dudette in the other seat plays for the other team? Seems kinda juvenile too me. Always amazes me at the level of homophobia once the cockpit door is closed. Doesn't DAL have policies against this?

I thought there were no..."former" Marines?

But I hope you asked him, "What, you couldn't get in the Navy?"

;^)

That is one thing DAL (and a lot of other companies can do better) - train front line employees better and empower them to think on their feet and make decisions:

Flight to JFK with 30 connecting international passengers: "Sorry, we have to go."

Last flight to Palookaville with no connections: "Folks we have a few connecting passengers who will be here in 5 minutes - we are going to wait for them."

I am starting to see the later on occasion and hopefully we will continue down this path.

There is a risk with empowering employees as they will sometimes make errors but in the long run it can pay great dividends.

Scoop

Gate agents should not (and I don't even think they do) make decisions on when to hold a flight and when to let a flight go. It should all be done in operations, and most likely by a computer. Honestly I think a lot of times the gate agents are doing their job correctly. For instance, lets say in ATL they are missing a passenger. They will look to see where they should be. Lets say they had a 45 minute connection in ATL and it's D-5 and they are not there. I don't have an issue with them closing the door. They need to close up the gate house at D-5 to get an on time departure.

Now if it's someone that had a 20 minute connection and they are closing up shop at D-10, that isn't right.

It's about there relentless political rankings not their sexual orientation. Obviously Rachel Maddow's gay lover would be a chick...the guy I'm referring to is a dude.

It's all in the delivery. As an airline, we could really soften the blow with a smile and a $5 coupon to Auntie Annie's.

Umm, that was a response to Groundstop's post, not Buzz's.

I don't bring up that stuff unless it's obvious that we're in agreement. I want to avoid (obviously) arguments that distract from the task at hand. Frankly there are only one or two pilots that I've flown with at Delta that differ significantly from me in terms of personal values or political leanings. Any guy bucking for an argument on the flight deck might need a visit from a professional standards pilot.

I hope the company would support a gate agent who takes a risk to deviate from a common practice in order to do the right thing for the customer.

http://www.you-can-be-funny.com/imag...cnoodlebar.jpg

Gives me a business idea...