ALPA/USAPA topic of the week

[AAA73Pilot]

Bear wrote:
So if elected USAPA thinks it will be able to do a better job serving its members by travelling NRSA instead of postive space?

Interesting. No doubt USAPA will move quickly to give up whatever PS benefits it might inherit from ALPA, correct? YOu know, to show "support" for the "fellow pilots suffering inferior pay rates/etc."

Sorry, but was there an answer somewhere in there to the questions I posed?

Or was it just the typical modus operandi of ad hominem attacks against those who don't agree with you to dry to dodge the issues.

No. There was no answer. Either answer would have elicited an anti USAPA or anti east retort. Therefore your question was ridiculous at best and flame baiting for sure. As a supposed neutral, why don't you use your supposed intelligence for better purposes?

So in effect, I am not dodging the issue as it is a non issue. Next.

 

[EastUS]

You misread, or I wasn't clear enough - the "new hires" referred to when they went to Trump, not as of the integration with US.

A line like that would be low hanging fruit for someone like EastUS



Well, let's see. The Shuttle issue was "not as simple as that" (see oldies quote above). "The issue was which date of hire should the shuttle guys get, their Eastern or Trump DOH" (see oldies quote above)

Would you not agree that not giving them the fragmentation rights afforded them at Eastern by using their Trump DOH is exactly what happened to the MDA folks? They didn't get the fragmentation protection specified by the contract when planes were sold to Republic, courtesy of the East pilots vote, did they?

Jim

" A line like that would be low hanging fruit for someone like EastUS" Naah..that'd be a ground ball..but you might perceive such as "low hanging". Were I to jump on anything here..I'd go with "You misread, or I wasn't clear enough". Now that's the type of prefacing material from which one could easilly produce a full meal

BTW: Your latest arguments serve as perfect examples of why a national seniority list should have long ago been established by the illuminati at Alpa..but wasn't. Look at the messes nowadays so sadly common. I won't even start on the RJ issues...

Oldiebutgoody:"This isn't what I witnessed at all. It was more like the MEC asking the company, "mind if we jump?" and after the initial jump the company saying "not high enough". Then the MEC said "how about we just give you everything we have in our pockets too?. Then the company replied, "OK, we'll take that, but you still have to jump higher". After which the MEC responded, "why not take my pay, workrules and retirement". The company responded "OK, but you still have to jump". That sort of negotiating resulted in LOA 93. The pilots were then advised by the "all knowing" ALPA to take the deal or else.

That's my recollection. I'll bet a lot of others saw it the same way."

Identically in fact. We must have been seated in the same theater..come to think of it..we were. I used to ridicule the French for their history of expeditious surrender in recent warfare...but then..along came ALpa...and they don't even need to hear a shot fired first.

 

[oldiebutgoody]

You misread, or I wasn't clear enough - the "new hires" referred to when they went to Trump, not as of the integration with US.

The context:



Would not you agree that using their Trump DOH was the same as saying they were nothing but new hires when they went there?

You'll also notice the 2nd bolded part. Putting them behind their former colleagues could imply treating them as new hires when they integrated into US. But I didn't pounce on that line because I understood what oldie was saying in that context (although I can see where you might think that is the part I was referring to). A line like that would be low hanging fruit for someone like EastUS



Well, let's see. The Shuttle issue was "not as simple as that" (see oldies quote above). "The issue was which date of hire should the shuttle guys get, their Eastern or Trump DOH" (see oldies quote above)

Would you not agree that not giving them the fragmentation rights afforded them at Eastern by using their Trump DOH is exactly what happened to the MDA folks? They didn't get the fragmentation protection specified by the contract when planes were sold to Republic, courtesy of the East pilots vote, did they?

Jim

Please note, before you get off on a tangent which I did not intend, that I was NOT saying that I thought that the shuttle guys shouldn't have been given their Eastern DOH. I was merely pointing out that there was more to the issue than you were stating in your post. I have no problem with the Shuttle guys getting their Eastern DOH. It created a difficult situation for ALPA to justify when many came from Eastern as new hires after losing their jobs in an ALPA strike, only to find themselves "career disadvantaged" to the Shuttle guys who did not. That was the point I was making. Of course, expecting ALPA to have any sort of national position on complicated issues like this would surely have been asking way too much from a group of "I've got mine" union members.

 

[AAA73Pilot]

Identically in fact. We must have been seated in the same theater..come to think of it..we were. I used to ridicule the French for their history of expeditious surrender in recent warfare...but then..along came ALpa.

Couldn't agree more. But when presented to us lowly line pilots, "It was the best we could do". "You better take it". Those same ALPA advisors disappeared for months after the fact. In fact was looking for one at the ALPA road show. Ooops. They were still absent. Wonder if they really exist?

 

[dariencc]

Point taken on the first part, Jim. On the second part, you are missing the point.

Would you not agree that not giving them the fragmentation rights afforded them at Eastern by using their Trump DOH is exactly what happened to the MDA folks? They didn't get the fragmentation protection specified by the contract when planes were sold to Republic, courtesy of the East pilots vote, did they?

Jim

The point is not whether the above can be offered as an argument. The point is that oldie did not make that argument, you did. It is a huge strtch to get from there to the quote below:

I now understand why you'd be in favor of the Shuttle pilots not getting their Eastern DOH. Your furloughed brothers/sisters didn't deserve it so neither do the Shuttle folks.....

Jim

Such mischaracterizations of an opponents views often happen in debate, and I don't think it's a big deal. My only point was that we are all susceptible to it, including you. <_<

 

[AAA73Pilot]

FYI:

This is the USAPA phone message for Wednesday, March 12th, 2008

Fellow Pilots,

The last week has been somewhat more ‘interesting’ than we had expected. To have witnessed last week’s meltdown of the AAA MEC was hard to watch. The expulsion of so many qualified and experienced pilot committee volunteers was a destructive and heavy-handed reaction to the events at hand.

ALPA recently alleged that USAPA has a negotiating goal of an achieving an inferior, “cost-neutralâ€￾ contract. The reality is that USAPA is the only non-career-destructive means by which the East/West merger can be consummated. We know it, ALPA knows it, and we believe the corporation understands this as well. Because of this, USAPA is also the fastest road to a new contract where the very same contract improvements ALPA refers to in abstract terms will actually become available.

A pair of recent ALPA comments allege that management somehow favors USAPA because the participants of the Save ALPA/FPL bus tour were directed to stay clear of the crew rooms as per NMB rules. You may recall that it was USAPA that first got tossed from the CLT crew room last year. Welcome to our world.

The USAPA organizers believe that the US Airways pilots have been disadvantaged for many years by the competing and conflicting interests of a very large, multi-carrier union. The relevant issue, the issue that is being skirted by ALPA, is whether the needs of the US Airways pilots have been met.

Thank you your attention to these matters and thank you for your support.

Mark Thorpe
Interim VP

 

[BoeingBoy]

This isn't what I witnessed at all. It was more like the MEC asking the company, "mind if we jump?" and after the initial jump the company saying "not high enough". Then the MEC said "how about we just give you everything we have in our pockets too?. Then the company replied, "OK, we'll take that, but you still have to jump higher". After which the MEC responded, "why not take my pay, workrules and retirement". The company responded "OK, but you still have to jump". That sort of negotiating resulted in LOA 93. The pilots were then advised by the "all knowing" ALPA to take the deal or else.

You see - I don't disagree with that at all. I just take it one step further in the cases where the pilots voted. Enough went along with what they were told (they jumped too, in other words), or at least enough did that the concession passed. You can certainly say they were led along.....like sheep to the slaughter. But not everyone - there were no votes too - so who's at fault when pilot's don't think for themselves or worse yet don't even care enough to vote.

And, by the way, I still believe that if everyone was given their DOH for seniority and all other purposes from the day they began working at LCC or a predecessor airline (with appropriate no bump, no flush provisions) we would not be in this situation. The F/As have always done it this way, and it works.

Any method that is accepted, grudgingly or not, works. You could do it alphabetically, by age, by hair color, SS number, whatever, and as long as it was accepted it'd work. Any method can also be declared unworkable by a group that thinks they're adversely affected.

The problem comes, as always, when a solution that was accepted as working before suddenly becomes unworkable depending strictly on who thinks they got the short end of the stick.

Jim

 

[BoeingBoy]

The point is not whether the above can be offered as an argument. The point is that oldie did not make that argument, you did. It is a huge strtch to get from there to the quote below:

And you are entirely correct.

Oldie, you have my profound apology. I made it personal when I should have mede it about those in the East pilot group that didn't want to recognize the Shuttle folk's fragmentation rights then blythely gave away the MDA folk's jobs without fragmentation rights.

Jim

 

[Bear96]

. . . . I've no problem with union reps traveling space positve . . . . The point was that space positive travel for union work most directly beneifts those who personally do such[.]

So when you were criticizing ALPA for trying to maintain that right, you were being, to put it politely, disingenuous? Deceitful? Just what were you trying to accomplish?

Do we have a double standard here for USAPA? If the company comes to USAPA and tries to remove the right for USAPA reps to travel PS on union business, and USAPA tries to stop it, will you criticize USAPA?

 

[BoeingBoy]

Do we have a double standard here for USAPA?

Really just one standard Bear - ALPO all bad, USAPA all good.

Jim

 

[EastUS]

You see - I don't disagree with that at all. I just take it one step further in the cases where the pilots voted. Enough went along with what they were told (they jumped too, in other words), or at least enough did that the concession passed. You can certainly say they were led along.....like sheep to the slaughter. But not everyone - there were no votes too - so who's at fault when pilot's don't think for themselves or worse yet don't even care enough to vote.



Any method that is accepted, grudgingly or not, works. You could do it alphabetically, by age, by hair color, SS number, whatever, and as long as it was accepted it'd work. Any method can also be declared unworkable by a group that thinks they're adversely affected.

The problem comes, as always, when a solution that was accepted as working before suddenly becomes unworkable depending strictly on who thinks they got the short end of the stick.

Jim

The first section's another interminable justification flow typical of Alpo supporters. I'll phrase it as I see it = "It doesn't matter if the Reps were brain-dead cowards, who'd believe ANYTHING from their "advisors" without any analysis, and who routinely crumble and squirm at the first contact with even a warm spring breeze..and fed the line pilots a wholesale batch of incorrect FUD"...."Well..it's always the pilots' fault"...Alpa's just great...I got that.

For the remainder: When exploring ALpa "policy", It doesn't matter whether anything that's accepted, whether grudgingly or not, will work. The current situation offers full proof that the existing "Policy" didn't serve well....period. It produced a result that's clearly NOT being found to be acceptable. We can dance around this forever. The fact is that ALpa's methodolgy's fatally flawed.

 

[EastUS]

So when you were criticizing ALPA for trying to maintain that right, you were being, to put it politely, disingenuous? Deceitful? Just what were you trying to accomplish?

Do we have a double standard here for USAPA? If the company comes to USAPA and tries to remove the right for USAPA reps to travel PS on union business, and USAPA tries to stop it, will you criticize USAPA?

Nope> Alpoids wanted that for themselves, as was directly noted in my post. Should you ever burden yourself with actually taking the time to read any given post that you're "responding" to herein; you'll also note that I made no suggestion about removing anything as regards space positive travel for reps..at least twice.

I believe it best to again turn the floor over to you, and leave the "disingenuous? Deceitful?"/etc for evaluation by others. I even doubt that I'll fret much over determining: "Just what were you trying to accomplish?" since I know you to be a neutral and unbiased individual with only the best intentions. Of course, as seems most likely..you may have simply been intending to amuse

 

[Bear96]

No. There was no answer. Either answer would have elicited an anti USAPA or anti east retort. Therefore your question was ridiculous at best and flame baiting for sure.

Wrong, as usual.

The correct response from EastUS (and a response which would not have elicited an anti-USAPA retort from me) would have been something like, "Upon reflection, I realize I was wrong to criticize ALPA for that, since it is something ANY union (ALPA or USAPA) would need to represent their members most efficiently. In my overzealousness to paint all things ALPA as bad, I lost sight of the fact that it is easy in a non-leadership position to hurl stones with no repercussions, while being in a position of leadership takes a bit more maturity and the ability to see the big picture. I lost sight of that fact and I apologize. As much as I disagree with ALPA about many issues, I will try to do better not to tear down the infrstructure ALPA has built (no matter how insignificant I like to think it may be) which would enable USAPA to do as good a job as possible to represent its members should it be voted in. Beacuse I have such confidence that USAPA will prevail in the coming election, I will try to have a little more class from now on towards ALPA, since no one likes a gloating winner. And because tearing away at whatever solidarity we might have left will cause more long-term damage than it does short-term enjoyment on my part, I will try to remember the real enemy is not those pilots who might in good faith prefer a different representative than I, but LCC management."

I have confidence that EastUS was typing out just such a response, but it got lost in cyberspace. No doubt she feels horrible about that.

 

[BoeingBoy]

The first section's another interminable justification flow typical of Alpo supporters. I'll phrase it as I see it = "It doesn't matter if the Reps were brain-dead cowards, who'd believe ANYTHING from their "advisors" without any analysis, and who routinely crumble and squirm at the first contact with even a warm spring breeze..and fed the line pilots a wholesale batch of incorrect FUD"...."Well..it's always the pilots' fault"...Alpa's just great...I got that.

Just to be sure - you're saying that pilots are incapable of thinking for themselves, so just do what they're told by their ALPO "handlers? Sorta like a trained monkey?

For the remainder: When exploring ALpa "policy", It doesn't matter whether anything that's accepted, whether grudgingly or not, will work.

Just to be sure again, you're saying that the Shuttle integration didn't work? Somewhat surprising claim since they've been on the same seniority list with you for about a decade now.

Or that it worked but just didn't go the way you thought it should? If this is the case, the AFA/IAM/etc seniority didn't "work" by your definition since there are undoubtedly some West folks that don't think those should have been DOH. Remember the West AFA trying to change AFA merger policy?

Or maybe a third choice - what "works" is whatever meets your definition of the right way to do it. Doesn't fit your definition it's unworkable.

Jim

 

[Bear96]

[Y]ou'll also note that I made no suggestion about removing anything as regards space positive travel for reps..at least twice.

I don't agree. You "suggested" that trying to retain PS travel for union business represented greed. Therefore, since USAPA in your eyes is all things virtuous and is not greedy and since it is the anti-ALPA, the implicit suggestion was that USAPA would never do anything as dirty as accepting PS travel for union business.

But I see you are backpedaling now.