This is for Simone! :-) Simone Cerasa Unspun . . . . . . my AFA predictions revisited . . . . . . and exaggerated rumors of my death corrected. TYPICAL THUGGISH BEHAVIOR It didn’t take long and it was fairly predictable. The response from the Machinists agitators to my last post (about the IAM’s pathetic negotiations failure over at CommutAir) was derogatory, derisive, bigoted and mean-spirited. It’s become all too predictable and all too regular with this IAM campaign: when the truth is uncomfortable and the facts are unfavorable, and the cover-up no longer works: just shoot the messenger. As has been the case with every single one of my posts, the IAM and their cohorts have failed to restate a single fact or refute a single truth. They don’t because they can’t. And so they resort to their age-old tactic of the personal attack. PATHOLOGICAL OR JUST A SUPER EGOIST? There’s something sinister and a little twisted when someone claims he knows all about another person that he’s never met and then uses hearsay, speculation and rumor as an excuse to pass judgment. Simone has elevated it to an art form. In response to my very factual analysis of the Machinists’ negotiations debacle at CommutAir, Simone lashed out in typical fashion. IRONY OR HYPOCRISY? What’s notable about Simone’s judgments and bigoted condemnations is that he and I have never personally met. We did exchange a handful of emails almost six years ago and maybe Simone developed his unflattering judgment of me from those emails, but I’ll let you be the judge of that; the full, unedited text of those emails can be found at the end of this blog. THRUST AND PARRY (or so Simone would like to think): a look at his diatribe and my response: SIMONE SAYS: “Jose used to be a union officer and VERY pro-union...until the Northwest flight attendants decided he wasnt very good at representing them and got rid of him. All of a sudden, he became anti-union. “Jose has been posting these writings on his blog ever since he was booted out of office about 10 years ago. He didnt just start now...or after the merger. Hes only upset because his peers didnt support him being a union officer so he sees this as his way of getting back at pro-union flight attendants. Sometimes you have to look not just about what happened but also at why it happened. MY RESPONSE: As usual, Simone, you have contorted the facts and twisted the truth to suit your own arrogantly ignorant personal agenda. To begin with, 10 years ago was 2004. PFAA had just come into office in 2003 and was still the union representing the Northwest flight attendants. I had just been elected to the negotiations committee and we had just begun work on contract negotiations. More importantly, I was never “booted out of office”. Your willingness to speak with mock authority, while relying on apparent gossip and innuendo speaks much more about you than any of your haughty and false judgments say about me. You demonstrate your willingness to perpetuate lies and falsehoods over seeking truth and advancing honesty. Further, I have never, ever been “anti-union”. What I am is “anti-corrupt, incompetent unions that are only supported by thuggish minions who seem all too happy to lash out against co-workers that don’t subscribe to your Fascist-style dogma that basically says ‘You’re either with us or against us and if you’re not with us, we’re going to lump you all into one group of ‘againsters’ and name-call you, mistreat you and demean your character relentlessly.’” SIMONE SAYS: “Have you ever talked to Jose? He has a heavy accent and a limited vocabulary. Hes not even writing his own blogs, someone else is and hes putting his name on it. How could you trust someone that does these things? “Maybe if the blog was in his first language then I could believe it, but its not. Its a matter of common sense. If his basic skills in the English language are less than optimal, how can we sit here and kid ourselves that his writing skills are so advanced? Its like saying that our pilots can fly a 747 but cant fly a little Cessna. “My mother for example has a HORRIBLE accent and if someone told me she wrote something like this...id say BS as well. “But what would you say if a 5 year old is doing calculus in his head? Youd say...hes only 5...theres no way hes doing that. Its just common sense. Also, he didnt leave the ranks...the PMNW flight attendants forced him out.” MY RESPONSE: Really Simone? I can only have ideas and thoughts and write blogs in my first language?!? I don’t know about your mother, but it’s not such an abstract concept to have others review what you write to get help with grammar, editing, clarity, etc. Maybe you should take a lesson and have someone review your hate-filled posts and stupid metaphors, so that you can adjust YOUR writing before you post it. I mean come on! A five year old doing calculus in his head?!? Who does calculus in their head at ANY age? It’s a ridiculous metaphor, Simone, but sadly it’s not anywhere near the most ridiculous thing you have written. And again Simone, I wasn’t forced out of any union ranks, but if that was really my motivation (as you FALSELY claim) for getting the truth and facts out there with my blog (the ones you and your gang like to cover up and deny and disclaim), then wouldn’t my tune have changed when you invited me to run for union office with AFA? (See our email exchange, below). It’s clear that you are so busy judging others that you can’t even get a grasp on a clear, logical thought process in your own head. SIMONE SAYS: (in response to this question) Would not the same people who bartered for years on this small carrier contract be the same people to barter our future? The answer to that is no. Each airline has their own negotiating team that is made of of workers within their ranks. All the negotiators at CommutAir are CommutAir flight attendants. All the negotiators at Delta would be Delta flight attendants. MY RESPONSE: Well at least you’re consistent in being wrong again, Simone. There are IAM staff negotiators assigned to the negotiations process who are not flight attendants. There are even negotiators assigned to an airline that aren’t even elected by that airline’s membership. Look at the ExpressJet IAM leaders. They were elected because IAM members from NON-FLIGHT ATTENDANT work groups are allowed to vote in the election. Of course, nothing is getting done on the ExpressJet flight attendant contract (which is now FIVE YEARS into negotiations), because all of the ExpressJet contract negotiators are working on the DELTA IAM campaign and have been busy knocking on flight attendant doors in Atlanta this week. How is THAT a service to the members who are paying their salary? But even more importantly, the IAM International carries a lot of influence on when a tentative agreement is reached or not reached. Any flight attendants on the negotiations committee have very little say. But even if they did, who are those negotiators going to be at Delta? In fact, who are the union leaders going to be? How about the IAM Delta campaign leaders? We can’t even get a straight answer from the campaign on who is running the show today, how are we supposed to expect transparency in the future? RUMORS OF DEATH GREATLY EXAGERATED BRIDGETTE EXNER SAYS: (In a comment ‘liked’ by fellow IAM agitators Kyle Engler and Jeffrey Gehring) “I though Jose Ibarra was dead.” MY RESPONSE: No Bridgette. That rumor – like all of the rumors Simone perpetuates – is greatly exaggerated. Most likely it stems from that same insecure, emotional, dogmatic mentality that wishes to silence voices of dissent and places a higher value on people that subscribe to your own unbending doctrine than on everyone else. It’s that kind of mindset that has been the downfall of many a campaign, including the previous AFA campaign. Unfortunately people like you (and too many others) don’t learn from the mistakes and are therefore condemned to repeat them over and over again. Most of us hold dear our individual liberties and free expression of thought and would never subscribe to an organization that seeks to suppress or steal those fundamental rights (a la Article L of the IAM Constitution). Of course, I’ve yet to meet an IAM organizer or agitator who has actually READ the IAM Constitution, so it’s just another case of people mouthing off loudly about something of which they know nothing. Kind of like your comment . . . kind of like too many comments against Delta flight attendants and Delta leaders. It’s disgusting, but nothing new. If you’ll recall, when we had a union at NWA, there were three anti-union websites (ClearDaze/nwaflightattendants, pfaawatch, and averagejoe) that did nothing but constantly lash out at fellow flight attendants and at union leaders. So the behavior isn’t new – it’s just cloaked itself in a different bad excuse. AND SO, WITHOUT FURTHER ADO . . . THE SUM TOTAL OF UNEDITED EMAILS BETWEEN SIMONE AND ME FROM SIX YEARS AGO! A few points to keep in mind while you read the emails: 1.Unlike his most recent attacks, Simone admits in the emails that he doesn’t know my union history 2.He invites me to run for union office (if he believed I had been thrown out of office by the NWA flight attendants wouldn’t he think they’d be upset about this invitation? We know Simone is duplicitous and hypocritical, but what is uncertain is whether he was insincere with his invitation back then, or in his speculation about my history in his attacks this week. 3.Note his lukewarm attitude with regard to AFA. He was a strong advocate for them, but doesn’t appear to have believed in them as a good union, even while he parroted their talking points. What are his “real” thoughts about the Machinists? Will we ever know? 4.He stretches greatly in his quest to put together some unrelated numbers as foundation for his shaky position in support of AFA. Those numbers are collected by a fourth party that uses publicly available data that is reported differently by each airline. At the same time, Simone ignores the very real, very simple side by side comparison of the Delta work rules with the NWA AFA contract. It’s a classic example of assuming a position first and then gathering only the facts and data that support that position, while ignoring everything else. The phenomenon is known as cognitive dissonance and a lot of the louder IAM agitators and flight attendant attackers suffer from it. On 1/14/09 3:36 PM, Simone Cerasa wrote: Hello Mr. Ibarra, I am a Delta flight attendant and I have been reading your blog for about a year or so. I also have to tell you that I am involved in the AFA campaign on the Delta side. I want you to know this before I go on. You bring up some very valid points about AFA and your current union leadership at NW. I have gotten some background info on you and PFAA and Teamsters etc, but I wasnt there so I will never know what actually happened. I am involved in the AFA campaign but I am not a rah rah AFA guy. I just believe we are in dire need of representation and AFA is the only one around. No other AFL-CIO charter can compete against AFA so that only leaves Teamsters. I contacted Teamsters last year and I never received an email back. The question I would like answered is... Do you really believe we will be better off if AFA loses this election and are left with a direct relationship? I am a Delta F/A and so far I have put up with the so called direct relationship and its a bunch of BS, its only a way for management to pay sub-par wages and benefits and to change what they want, whenever they want. I know you are pro-union, you obviously had alot to do with PFAA. If AFA wins the election, there will be new LEC and MEC elections for the combined group. Have you thought about running in SFO for LEC pres or v.p? Or maybe even being on the MEC. You seem to have the right idea about what we really need. I read your blog and get your story, I spoke to other NWA f/as and I get another. Now I know there are always 3 sides to a story. Yours, theirs, and then what actually happened or currently happens is somewhere in the middle! I just want to get your take on all of this, if you do not respond...thats ok. But I would really get your view of things. I would especially like to know the answer to the above question. Thank you, Simone Cerasa Delta F/A NYC Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 22:13:02 -0800 Subject: Re: Jose blog Greetings Simone, Thank you for your email. I look forward to the day we are merged and are working together, I see nothing but positive coming our way. I am of the opinion that AFA is going to lose the election and no matter how much more they delay it, they are going to lose. I am one vote and the decision is not mine but I can tell you from my experience they are going to lose. As an additional item for my thinking; they burned their small support base (35%) at DAL with the last election when they lied to you by telling you they had over 51% support of the DAL flight attendants when in fact they only had 38%. They have been busy burning their small support base at NWA by not enforcing our current contract. I hope you have kept up with the fiasco of our Letter of Agreement (LOA) # 35. Such letter guarantees us pay raises when other groups have received a pay raise and such guarantee is until 2010 – no if ands or buts. Guess what? Our so called AFA negotiators, when I brought this up to them, they first indicated such letter did not exist or it dropped dead after the bankruptcy. It has been hilarious to see what they have done since I brought this to their attention. Come on board the fiasco continues and it will only get better. AFA is a corrupt union that will never be fixed due to their constitution and bylaws. Pat Friend has built it as her own private playground and many years back she forgot what unions were and are for. Last time I offered them my assistance they rejected it, so be it, such is their choice not mine. Of course you already know AFA claims the opposite. Back to the core of your question – I do not decide about a union – we all need to decide about this issue and no one should stand in our way of this decision. AFA’s reasons are simply lies and delay tactics that are causing all of us financial harm and causing them financial gain, they have no right to delay the process and it is up to us to tell them so. If we vote for the union to stay – well we will have to deal with it. At such point DAL flight attendants are saying YES to an AFA negotiated contract that is one of the lowest paid in the airline industry and in my opinion negotiations will start from there. When you say “sub-par wages and benefits” sounds very interesting because last time I checked the DAL & NWA pay and benefits you surpass us at every turn with some very minor exceptions. If I were you I would read the comparisons more closely. If we vote to not have a union – such will be our decision and we will have to deal with that. Hope I have been able to provide some additional input. -- Sincerely, Jose Arturo Ibarra Airline Merger BLOG share it with others: joseaibarra.blogspot From: Simone Cerasa Date: Thu, 15 Jan 2009 20:44:32 -0600 To: Subject: RE: Jose blog Jose, you seem like a very bright individual and you information is very valuable. However there is 1 thing I disagree with you on. After speaking with someone who has experience with airline financial reports this is what I have come to find out... For quarters 1-3 in 2008 Delta has spent $327 million on wages for flight attendants, for the same period Northwest spent $198 million on wages for flight attendants. What does this tell me? Delta has 12,617 active flight attendants Northwest has 7,569 active flight attendants You do the math. $327 million divided by 12,617 = $25,917 $198 million divided by 7,569 = $26,159 Now you have to take many things into consideration before you actually make a decision on who really makes more. You have to take into consideration that Delta flight attendants are more senior then Northwest flight attendants, just by a bit. You have to consider that it takes a Northwest flight attendant 15 years to top out, versus 11 years at Delta. You also have to consider that Northwest has a higher percentage of flight attendants with less then 2 years seniority. Also consider that 850 Delta flight attendants retired in the 2nd half of 2008. Last, but not least you must look at productivity...average monthly hours. According to DOT form 41 from 2007 the numbers are virtually even at 50.1 and 50.6 respectively. All these factors actually make that gap bigger between Delta and Northwest flight attendants...in Northwests favor! I agree with you 100% that the Delta base pay per hour is higher then the Northwest payscale, but you know probably better then I do that it doesnt tell the whole story. Its pretty clear to me that you dont like AFA and think that it hasnt done much good at NW so far, and from what I hear...you arent alone! Many members arent satisfied for one reason or another. I am a very junior flight attendant, and what NW tried to do just doesnt sit well with me. 30% of international positions today would equal to over 3,000 furloughs...including myself! So please, thats all I want to hear... Are we better off without representation all together, or with AFA? Thank you, Simone Cerasa Delta F/A NYC Date: Fri, 16 Jan 2009 05:35:22 -0800 Subject: Re: Jose blog Simone, Thank you for your reply. There is a problem with the numbers that were given to you: There is no way – based on the limited information you have passed along to me – to determine that this is in fact an apples to apples comparison of the Delta and NWA flight attendant labor costs. I’m not going to trouble you by pointing out all the discrepancies and holes in the information you forwarded to me, but the fact that someone is trying to get you compare 2007 productivity (a la DOT Form 41) with wages earned in 3 quarters of 2008 shows me that someone is trying to deceive you by throwing a bunch of numbers in the air and hoping that you don’t realize that they fail to fall into the correct place. Something else that is ignored in your comparison (and defies your attempt to link 2007 DOT figures with 2008 wages) is that NWA flight attendants have been – on average – flying significantly more hours in 2008 than they did in 2007. The reason is that in 2008 they fully realized the financial travesty of the contract that Pat Friend forced down our throats, with a shady last minute delay of the closing of the polls, throwing out over 400 ballots (because the AFA membership department could not hold onto and process our membership applications) and getting the contract to pass by just over 100 votes. All this after she had secret meetings with our CEO, Doug Steenland, without allowing any NWA union leader to attend. I’m sure you can understand why she and AFA have angered the NWA flight attendants. In all this time, she has not owned up to one single mistake that she has made; mistakes which have cost each of us thousands of dollars a year in salary, and 20% more time away from our families. Pat had the opportunity to do right by the NWA flight attendants, and she had the authority of the AFA Board of Directors, who had passed a Resolution calling for a worldwide strike at all AFA carriers if any AFA flight attendants had a contract imposed on them. Did she honor that Resolution when we had a contract imposed on us? On the contrary, she defied the AFA Board of Directors and got our MEC, which consisted of her hand-picked interim officers, to avoid calling a strike in the interest of “public relations”. I’m not sure how that good PR is working out for any of the Northwest flight attendants, but I’m sure the AFA campaigners will get a spin on that for you. You may also be interested to know that Northwest (unlike Delta) has foreign national flight attendants that are not on our seniority list. I’m guessing that the salaries for those flight attendants were included in your flight attendant wages figure, but are not included in the 7,569 flight attendant figure. Your last sentence (about the 30% international) sounds like you may be referencing NWA’s attempt to outsource some of our flying. Let me give you the full education on exactly what happened with that. To begin with, that was stopped by the collective efforts of the NWA flight attendants with the full support of the former union. AFA did nothing to help us at the time; in fact that is precisely when they were raiding us, causing division in our ranks and trying to distract the union from the task of fighting the company. The former union had a legal strategy to fight the outsourcing by getting to a TA that reached the company’s number and avoided outsourcing, and set a historic legal precedent whereby the bankruptcy judge, for the first time ever, defined the terms that a company could impose on its organized members. David Borer and the AFA attorneys, even with their claimed experience of having gone through 9 bankruptcies, stated again and again that a bankruptcy judge could not “cherry-pick” contract terms: he could only grant the company’s motion to throw out the contract (and let them impose whatever they wanted) or he could deny the company’s motion (and the current contract would remain in force). The NWA flight attendants and the former union created history and made fools out of the AFA attorneys. I shudder to think what would have happened to us had AFA been on the property earlier. And just so you know, Simone, AFA General Counsel David Borer stated in writing that he believed that NWA’s outsourcing attempt was nothing more than a “stalking horse” meant to distract our negotiators. I’m quite sure we would have lost many more than 3,000 jobs had he been in charge of the bankruptcy negotiations at the time our court case was heard. In fact, with Borer in charge, I doubt that I would have even survived the cuts. And I’ve been here almost 30 years. Simone, you seem like a fairly intelligent woman, so I am going to make a suggestion to you – for what it’s worth. The NWA flight attendants are tired of half-truths and fear tactics coming from AFA. There are well-meaning flight attendants such as yourself who try to pass along incomplete or illusory information in the hopes of advancing a platform that you surely still believe in. I would caution you against signing your name to information which you may not understand, peole will see through it, and it is only your reputation at stake, not that of the people who asked you to pass it along. I would hate to see you end up with a reputation among the Northwest flight attendants like the one Tracie Kali has earned for herslef. If you don’t remember, Tracie was the Delta AFA activist, who in 2007 signed her name to a Delta AFA campaign flyer claiming that the NWA flight attendants earned $65,000 per year, when our salary is barely half that amount. People see through those shams pretty quickly and the NWA flight attendants are extremely savvy. Not to mention, Tracie probably doesn’t even realize that she has already damaged future contract negotiations with the company. You see, the company tracks and saves all the information that the union puts out and they will surely bring up Tracie’s flyer at the bargaining table and in the media if AFA ever tries to get us a raise. Of course, AFA has already failed to enforce the contract we currently have, so the probability of them trying to get us a raise is pretty slim. Did any of your campaign contacts inform you that we have a me-too clause in our contract that specifically states that if the pilots or any other group gets a raise, we get a proportionately equal raise? The pilots have gotten 2 raises: in July, 2007 and November, 2008. According to our contract, we should have gotten an 18% raise as a result of their increases, but we have gotten nothing. AFA has failed to do even the preliminary work on filing a grievance over this. You know what our AFA leaders have done instead? Given themselves pay raises. Our AFA president and secretary-treasurer pay themselves $1,500 per month in Per Diem, in addition to almost $60,000 salaries. And one of them lives in MSP – where the office is! You could fly all month long and not be paid $1,500 in Per Diem. Why do you suppose they feel entitled to $1,500 per month just in per diem for driving to an office in the morning and home at night? Worst of all, AFA is trying to forestall your right and my right to vote on whether we want them to represent us. To date they have failed to give even one legitimate reason for doing so. Most folks agree that they are simply trying to delay the inevitable loss. If AFA were as powerful and wonderful as they claim, why wouldn’t they want the vote tomorrow, so that we can merge our seniority lists and get on with negotiating the much-needed contract improvements? The only answer is that they have no power and no hope whatsoever, so they are clutching and clawing at the last dues dollar they can. The bottom line to this lengthy email is simply this: This vote is not about DAL management vs. NWA management and it’s not about the apples to oranges comparison that you are being fed. AFA leaders at NWA have already admitted that they can’t come up with a comparison between our contract and the Delta policy manual that looks good for AFA. If they could, don’t you think they would have done so already? This vote is about opportunity: the opportunity to remove those who have lied to us, who have failed to work for us, who have been too corrupt to represent us and the opportunity to focus on what is best for our future. I know – and many NWA flight attendants who have endured AFA for the past two and a half years know – that AFA is not what is best for our future. I appreciate your sentiments Simone, but unfortunately they cannot erase the harsh reality of the utter disappointment that defines AFA. I believe that good things are in store for us and I look forward to the pleasure of one day meeting you on a Delta flight. -- Sincerely, Jose Arturo Ibarra Airline Merger BLOG share it with others: joseaibarra.blogspot On 1/16/09 5:59 AM, Simone Cerasa wrote: Thank you Jose for your timely responce, however I must dissapoint you and tell you I am a male! Onto the information I sent along to you, none of it if from AFA. I actually received the information from Robert Herbst on airlinefinancials I said that the 2007 productivity was virtually the same, I dont have 2008 numbers because they arent out yet. Once they are out we can get a more complete picture. I understand that you believe that those leading the way on the LEC and MEC councils arent exactly perfect. Actually far from it, even from what I have seen in the past 6 months. With the combined carrier it would be our opportunity to elect new officers to the LECs and MEC. So once again your voice can be heard, and those who do not have the best interest of the membership at heart will simply be put down. My feelings on Pat Friend? Well...not as strong as yours, of course I dont know as much as you. But I also believe we can do better, I just dont believe she is connected to the membership at all. Once again, thats politics working for you! People like you and I, well...we just work here for a living. nothing is being spoonfed to me, actually I have called out AFA many times before. Sometimes they dont like it, but hey...its my voice! In regards to LOA 35, I am very familiar with it. Its your me too clause. According to a release by one of your favorites Kevin Griffin... Despite repeated attempts to schedule the arbitration, the Company has resisted. Yesterday, AFA sent an email to NWA’s counsel proposing dates for the arbitration along with a demand for a response by January 9. If the Company refuses to agree to arbitration dates by that date, then AFA will take the appropriate legal action to compel arbitration of Sideletter 35. Its politics and the company is stalling, can AFA do more about it?...they should! Why dont I believe AFA wont do the vote today? Not because AFA wont get the 50%+1, but because I believe that the NMB would let Delta management once again run wild and interfear with the vote...which would probably cause AFA not to receive 50%+1. I can almost guarantee you that AFA is waiting for someone new at the NMB. Honestly, thats what I think is going on. Thanx, Simone DAL F/A NY Date: Fri, 16 Jan 2009 14:58:12 -0800 Subject: Re: Jose blog Greetings, I thank you for your reply and wishing the best for all of us in the future. Thank you for your information and hope you get somewhere. The players of course are corrupt, but most importantly it is the AFA constitution that rules, those corrupt players are not interested in changing it. Best of luck to all of us. -- Sincerely, Jose Arturo Ibarra Airline Merger BLOG share it with others: joseaibarra.blogspot
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