Here’s a fun FACEBOOK interchange that I had with a banker friend of mine. There’s some additional commentary at the end.
Him:
Not the most penetrating analysis, but the essence of the folly is captured.
Financial Overhaul Is Flopping – Barrons.com, “The banking-reform bill misses the mark”
Me:
So you agree with me that the national economic solution is more “innovative financial products”? Maybe something with an acronym like “COWBELL”.
Cigarettes include a substantial tax for societal costs related to cigarette smoking. The justifying argument is; why should everyone have to pay for the costs of the few who have willingly embraced personal health care complications?
Likewise with weapons. Without a loaded weapon there can be no cause for costly medical assistance or law enforcement action resulting from a weapon discharge. Why should the broad citizen population continue to be expected to share in the costs associated with intentional, malicious, or accidental discharge of a weapon? Outside of Government authorized law enforcement and military actions, the answer has to be “No!” What for? Weapons related behavior should be fully costed to those involved.
(Continued)
A friend asked me about my thoughts on Delta Air Lines’ sale of Mesaba Airlines to Pinnacle, and Compass Airlines sale to Trans States Airlines.
My opinion is that it means there is no way for the CAL-UAL pilots to capture the 70 seat aircraft under a scope clause in their common contract. Delta’s given it up, American’s given it up, and US Airways has given it up. Competitive market conditions will not allow CAL-UAL management to do otherwise. With the sale of these airlines, 70 seat turbofan a/c are now a confirmed regionally competitive commodity operated by some half dozen multi-entity holding companies, and those firms will be contracted by all the major brands on lowest cost/best performance.
I know this is heresy to the CAL pilots. But doctrine is usually hope, and rarely an analysis of reality.
(Continued)
I had a First Officer the other week who was age 29, engaged to wed, a serious recently-subdued southern conservative, who had an older brother pilot at Continental Airlines. So he already knew everything, with a firm immutable mental model, having completed his learning phase of life.
In discussing some travel pass particulars that effect my personal situation now and post UAL-CAL merger, he made the statement that the U.S. Department of Justice would not approve the airline merger until the two pilot unions had reached a seniority integration agreement. “They don’t want to end up with another mess like they have over at US Airways.”
It sounded like arithmetic hokum to me, which I tried to convey to no avail. But then, I’m merely an elderly small-jet captain.
So I’m reading the WSJ today and come across this article about US Airways’ business success.
(Continued)
I was in the jumpseat of a CAL 757 earlier today talking a small business strategy with the first officer, a former XJT guy (the place where I work now). So the FO missed a couple of radio calls because we’re talking about his tiny business operation and I’m giving input. Some of you know how my talks can go.
Of course the captain can’t answer the radio calls because he’s too busy just sitting there doing nothing. The ancient guy, who previously hadn’t said a word and just made uncanny hand gestures says, “Let’s keep the conversation down!”
I’d think about it differently if the captain were a lot older than me, but I’m about as old as you can get and still be on the flightdeck. I gratefully thanked him for the ride.
Reference an earlier post.
Finished up a smart document for my old friend Dale’s guitar. Well, actually his father’s guitar. And his father touched American music history as a friend of Bill Monroe and Homer and Jethro, and this guitar was originally owned by Arkie the Arkansas Woodchopper. I sent the PDF to the guy who literally “wrote the book” on this special guitar. The local guy who works on my Martin says it’s a $10K-$20K instrument. We’ll see.
Sitting as a passenger in an airplane, not flying it.
Sitting on the ground, not in the air.
Each time when the air-conditioner (PAC) wasn’t working.
It was summer-hot outside.
Sitting on the ground a longggg time.
Inside temps were so extreme I thought that I would expire.
Once on a Thai Airways 747 in Bangkok.
Once on a Continental 737 in Houston.
It’s legal.
We do it all the time.
“Ladies and Gentleman, we know it’s hot back there.”
“The air-conditioning will work once we get into the air.”
Two of the many times I almost died.
[Edited from an earlier post on Facebook.]
A winter morning this year I had a meeting with 19 other professional pilots from all different airlines. We were discussing a topic of Sensitive and Secure Information. During the kibitzing period, talk centered around the super-cold snowy weather and a general mocking of global warming concerns.
Real funny stuff like; “How about that global warming today?”
I asked matter-of-factly, “You guys are both airline pilots and scientists?”
Those who answered said, “No.”
“Oh, well, I don’t know anything about the science of global warming, but I have a bit of professional scientific training. Science is really hard. I couldn’t image making layman judgements either way about the atmospheric science literature.”
“Hey, did you guys ever have a passenger stop by up front and say: ‘I’ve flown your airplane for about 100 hours, all around the world. It was easy! I was using Microsoft Flight Simulator.’ ”
Yeah…. not funny.
No worries. I’m a professional. And there was adult supervision.
[Story Update:] Now it’s summer. I noticed it has been kind of warm across the south. “How about that global warming today?” Pretty funny.
I’ve given up. From now on my pre-flight PA announcement will include the phrase:
Welcome to this company’s ‘Small Jet Service‘ to =>Destination.
Everybody’s a lousy comedian as they walk on the flight, with tiny/ small-size/ munchkin/ midget/ headroom/ stooping/ kid’s-bus/ male-threatening type of already swallowed and regurgitated not-funny jokes. There’s no way around it, might as well address the deficiency head on.
If the airlines were actually functioning as competitive entities rather than jostling to position themselves as too-big-to-fail government utilities, they’d market “Small Jet Service” versus “Big Jet Service“, and charge an appropriate premium fee for the “Big Jet Service“. If the consumer interest groups were actually interested in consumers they’d be promoting this. Customers would be happy to pay for the opportunity to not feel compelled to practice amateur-night stand-up comedy.
If you don’t want to pay for a big jet then you can expect a small jet. That seems perfectly normal.
[An old friend was complaining about the current administration in Washington, employing the standard boilerplate complaints about all-of-a-sudden excessive debt spending, and in particular the amount of interest expense going to China. So I responded with the following:]
China holds about $4.5 trillion in dollar and dollar equivalent reserves. The Chinese are not nice. They have no reason or obligation to be. They will skin you, cook you in a soup, and call it beef if they can make money off of it. I know, because I made money there at the beginning, in the early ’90s.
The Chinese have our dollars because we wanted to buy things made with their cheap labor. We hate union organized workers, and U.S. employees are such a hassle with their real-life needs, taxes, and insurances. We took our labor off the job, sent the machinery over to China, sent dollars over to there to import the cheap goods, and marketed the American Good Life as: “Owning lots of cheap crap is better than owning a few quality items.” Three cheers for Walmart, which happens to have been my major benefactor! (…. significantly ahead of BP.)
(Continued)
