No guys are staying because they all want to bid into the good DAL bases. ;)

So much for the one year conversion window.

Unfortunately, nothing is ironclad protected from trial lawyers. If there is money to be made, they will come, scorch the earth, leave nothing alive, and see that as perfectly ok. Its a seperate class in law school. Reaffirmed in annual educational seminars.

Mon frere,

There are three standards of review the Supreme Court uses when evaluating 14th Amendment Equal Protection cases. Just to keep it as simple as possible....

1. Race based Classifications --(Strict Scruitiny Standard) The burden of proof is on the Defendant, who will almost always lose.

2. Gender Based Classifications -- (Intermediate Standard) The burden of proof is also on the defendant, who can sometimes win.

3. Age and other Classifications -- (Rational Basis Standard) The burden of proof is on the Plaintiff, who will almost always lose.

All the defendant has to do in these cases is provide some reason as to why the classification was used. In some cases if the defendant doesn't do this the Court will come up with a reason for the defendant.

Any rational basis will do. As in, they most likely will say the older a pilot gets, the more unsafe he/she is, and here are some reports we used to make the determination. That is the most likely position the government will take. But, as I said before, they can come up with ANY reason.

Normally, it's not the age (65) they have to defend against being arbitrary or capricious, it's the reason behind the classificastion that must withstand the challenge. More often than not, any reason will do.

The Court will probably not look into the rationality of the age, because for the most part, they defer to the legislature and feel it is not in their scope of duties to determine what age is reasonable.

Does this go directly against the Court being able to come up with a rational reason for the classification? Absolutely. Does it make sense? No. All I can say is that once the standard of review is determined, the outcome of the case is almost certian. In this case, the Age 65 classification most likely will stand.

I'm sure I screwed something up, but if you want to know what the precedent is, check out this case.

Mass. Bd. of Retirement v. Murgia, 427 U.S. 307

(Basically, the Court found that it was constitutional for the Massachusetts State Police to force a police officer to retire upon reaching age 50, even though this one had just passed his physical 4 months prior to his 50th birthday.)

New K Now

For any Delta or Northwest crewmembers that might be interested, several of us at delta (all pilots) have been working on a free layover guide that is specific to the delta hotels. We have a lot of updates yet to do, but we are off to a good start. And we are also adding a commuter section that will include crashpads, commuter hotels, and transportation information (seemingly valuable now as I have just been displaced and am now in the market for a crashpad). Check it out at --MyCrewGuide.com-- Free Guide for Delta Flight Crews. Suggestions or any layover input is welcome (via the suggestions link). Sorry to interrupt this thread.

Boo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!

Looks like you put a lot of work into this. Good job.

Looks good, but from a security standpoint, is it wise to have all that information on an open web site? I am mostly talking about info regarding our international overnights.

I had thought about doing a similar project myself but backed off of it for that reason. I realize it wouldn't be hard for a terrorist to find out where we stay, but I'm more concerned about publicizing the favorite hangouts we tend to frequent.

Maybe I'm just being paranoid and a dedicated terrorist is going to find out what he needs to know, but I don't want to make our enemy's job any easier.

I'd feel better if it was only accessible to Delta pilots via login. Verification could be based on the seniority list.

Anyway, not trying to be a killjoy, but food for thought.

You can also do a log in based on your company e-mail address. Heck even Facebook does that!

That is an excellent point. I'll look in to password protecting the site, or at least the layover information. Those are the suggestions I'm after. Thank you.