Check;

In my USAF standard 3 main points briefing style, thanks for the kind words. I agree with your conclusion. When the rubber hits the road, unity is the only option.

 

3 words: Meet and confer. That's a conflict of interest regardless of outcome.

I dont have anything against the RJ guys either, they are just a squirrel trying to get a nut like the rest of us w-2 employees. However, I disagree with your assesment that the mainline (wholly) created the conflict of interest...the Union sealed that deal.

I don't recall having any vote to spin off Compass, Mesaba or ASA. Now the only wholly owned is getting shrunk to 44 jets. How is that good for the company or assoc. The wholly owned is the shock absorber in the system and despite previous bad blood, Comair REALLY IS a part of Delta. How is this good?

 

THAT'S for sure! Better yet, how about a new election whereby you have to print an authorization card, mail it via snail mail, then log on to a website with an authorization code after your printed card is received, then confirm you actually want to be a member. Wonder who'd have the most cards then?

Carl

 

Make it that difficult and nobody would have 50%.
Management would love that.

 

Meet and confer never caused the outsourcing, so I don't follow your logic. I'll keep an open mind, but if the DPA is claiming that it was having RJ pilots at ALPA that caused the outsourcing then that is cheap rhetoric and nothing more. The RJ guys didn't vote on our contract, we did. Delta spinning off Compass, Mesaba and ASA wasn't a union decision and neither was cutting CMR to 44 aircraft.

 

Exactly.

Meet and confer might be a good time to start talking strategies to recover flying, to sunset outsourcing, to build bridges for union members so that a guy who only flies Delta passengers does not have to reset his longevity twice in a career. (it is BS that rampers and gate agents kept their longevity (for pay and bene's) in the Delta system, but pilots check their years of service at the door)

The President of ALPA has ALWAYS had the power to with hold his signature from a contract. If there was a problem (as there was once with a regional carrier, see CC Air) the President could refuse a pilot ratified contract. Nothing that egregious has happened in recent memory, but what the "meet and confer" does is formalize a process that has always been part of ALPA's internal system of dispute resolution.

To understand "meet and confer" you have to understand the problem it is designed to avert and the cooperation it hopes to foster.

 

My question wasn't who would get 50% of the total pilot group, my question was: Who would have the most cards?

And by the way, it IS that difficult a process to turn in a DPA card. And over 3,800 Delta pilots have done it.

Carl

 

Meet and confer was my answer to your conflict of interest question.

I agree that the spinoffs of the wholly owned commuters was a business decision made by management to hide debt from the balance sheet as a quasi - lease expense. DALPA certainly facilitated the Compass spin off at a minimum.

As far as Comair is concerned, I just dont get any of that... business decision wise or union wise.

PS, I am not a rhetoric guy. I dont use DPA talking points.

 

This does not appear to be a case of hacking according to the article. It says that someone created a bogus hotmail account. That's not hacking. It's just pretending to be someone else. Very different animal.

 

IF that's true, that would take away the Federal crime component. But it would still leave whoever did it wide open to a civil suit where the damages could be huge.

Can't wait to see where the facts take us.

Carl