Good read from another board
This past week while reading the news about the ATSB's rejection of the United Airlines loan application in the New York times, I glanced at my television and happened to see a clip of the 9/11 commission being covered on the news. The clip I saw was a reenactment of United Airlines flight 175 crashing into the World Trade Center shortly after American Airlines suffered the same fate in the adjacent tower. In recent months, the public has been told by many of our nations business leaders and politicians that United Airlines does not deserve a government backed loan and that United was not a fundamental and essential part of the nations aviation system, but the likes of US Airways and Americawest are. Commentary suggested that the winds of the free market place should pick the winners and losers in an industry with too much capacity and that the severe attacks on our nation that tragic day did not cause any of the problems that United and the industry face today while at the same time, Holman W Jenkins Jr. of the Wall Street Journal states in his editorial, Let Failure Be An Option, goes on to blame the bailout board for not taking full advantage of the post-9/11 crisis and let brand name airlines die. Sen. Peter Fitzgerald of Illinois, a long time opponent of any support to the airlines post 9/11 is now insisting on an investigation on whether or not improper political pressure is being used on United's behalf, but has no interest in investigating the improper political and business lobbying pressure that has been exerted against United since the loan process began. So the following questions must be asked and addressed to expose the inconsistencies and hypocrisies that now face United's request. At what point since United's first request for a loan did the rules change as far as who qualifies and who doesn't. When was it determined that United was no longer an important part of the national aviation system? Are we to believe that that determination was just made shortly before the second rejection or was that determined prior to the first application? At what point in the loan process did the board determine that United could survive without assistance which was disqualifying? When was it determined that the US government did everything in its power to prevent 9/11 and was in no way responsible for what happened to the first victims to arrive on the new battlefield that was New York City? Who determined that the money given to the airlines shortly after its historic grounding, was more than adequate to cover the existing cost and future security expenses that were directly attributed to what happened? When did it become acceptable to funnel BILLIONS of US tax payers dollars overseas to foreign governments and puppet leaders while being unacceptable to support companies with tax payers money who were most affected by 19 murderous highjackers? Why is it OK to relax the terms of the US Airways loan when it became clear that they would default, but considered it wasted tax payer money to cosign sign a loan for United? Did the opponents of the United loan application, vigorously oppose the applications of the other recipients that were not greatly impacted by 9/11? Should United be penalized for having the foresight to apply for a loan while Northwest, Delta, and American chose not to? Did United create the ATSB to help itself or was the ATSB created by the federal government to assist airlines most affected by 9/11? These questions must be answered and accounted for. No politician or business leader can honestly look United employees or family members of one of our lost employees in the eye and say this 80 year old company that has contributed so very much to the safety and innovation of the system we now operate in is of no value and should just go away. If we let al Qaeda pick the winners and losers in the market place, there will only be losers!
This past week while reading the news about the ATSB's rejection of the United Airlines loan application in the New York times, I glanced at my television and happened to see a clip of the 9/11 commission being covered on the news. The clip I saw was a reenactment of United Airlines flight 175 crashing into the World Trade Center shortly after American Airlines suffered the same fate in the adjacent tower. In recent months, the public has been told by many of our nations business leaders and politicians that United Airlines does not deserve a government backed loan and that United was not a fundamental and essential part of the nations aviation system, but the likes of US Airways and Americawest are. Commentary suggested that the winds of the free market place should pick the winners and losers in an industry with too much capacity and that the severe attacks on our nation that tragic day did not cause any of the problems that United and the industry face today while at the same time, Holman W Jenkins Jr. of the Wall Street Journal states in his editorial, Let Failure Be An Option, goes on to blame the bailout board for not taking full advantage of the post-9/11 crisis and let brand name airlines die. Sen. Peter Fitzgerald of Illinois, a long time opponent of any support to the airlines post 9/11 is now insisting on an investigation on whether or not improper political pressure is being used on United's behalf, but has no interest in investigating the improper political and business lobbying pressure that has been exerted against United since the loan process began. So the following questions must be asked and addressed to expose the inconsistencies and hypocrisies that now face United's request. At what point since United's first request for a loan did the rules change as far as who qualifies and who doesn't. When was it determined that United was no longer an important part of the national aviation system? Are we to believe that that determination was just made shortly before the second rejection or was that determined prior to the first application? At what point in the loan process did the board determine that United could survive without assistance which was disqualifying? When was it determined that the US government did everything in its power to prevent 9/11 and was in no way responsible for what happened to the first victims to arrive on the new battlefield that was New York City? Who determined that the money given to the airlines shortly after its historic grounding, was more than adequate to cover the existing cost and future security expenses that were directly attributed to what happened? When did it become acceptable to funnel BILLIONS of US tax payers dollars overseas to foreign governments and puppet leaders while being unacceptable to support companies with tax payers money who were most affected by 19 murderous highjackers? Why is it OK to relax the terms of the US Airways loan when it became clear that they would default, but considered it wasted tax payer money to cosign sign a loan for United? Did the opponents of the United loan application, vigorously oppose the applications of the other recipients that were not greatly impacted by 9/11? Should United be penalized for having the foresight to apply for a loan while Northwest, Delta, and American chose not to? Did United create the ATSB to help itself or was the ATSB created by the federal government to assist airlines most affected by 9/11? These questions must be answered and accounted for. No politician or business leader can honestly look United employees or family members of one of our lost employees in the eye and say this 80 year old company that has contributed so very much to the safety and innovation of the system we now operate in is of no value and should just go away. If we let al Qaeda pick the winners and losers in the market place, there will only be losers!
