UPDATE:
Judge Jason Dimitris was elevated from County Court to Circuit Court this week, replacing the retired Judge Brennan. Congrats. The Captain has the details in the comments. And that means a county court spot has opened and the dominoes are lining up.
While money isn't everything, we will just note that, as indicated below, most members of the judiciary fly coach...
Warren Buffet, commentating on the success in
investing in airlines, once famously quipped that “the best thing that could
have happened to investors who want to invest in airlines is if Wilbur would
have shot Orville from the sky”.
Airlines are difficult companies to run. A little history: in the 1960’s the emerging
Jet age was regulated by the Civil Aeronautics Board which regulated interstate air routes for commercial airlines
(the ol’ commerce clause of fame and misfortune rears it’s ugly head yet
again). Airlines that wanted the
lucrative New York-Miami route (remember Eastern Airlines and Pan Am?) would be
awarded that route IF they also agreed to the less lucrative New York-Dayton
route. Fares were also regulated because
flying and interstate travel were deemed to be “in the public interest” (the
economic philosophy of altruistic-collectivism for those of you paying philosophical
attention).
Some capitalists found a loophole- intra-state travel
was not regulated. While this didn’t mean a lot for say, New Mexico, it did
offer an opportunity for regional airlines in Texas and California. Thus was
born Southwest Airlines which made a small fortune flying from Dallas to
Houston to San Antonio.
Economically, inter-state travel was so expensive
because of regulation and the obligation to fly money-losing routes, that
adjusted for inflation, cost-per-mile basis was double what it was today. The system worked in a way. Air travel was
luxurious. Airlines competed for customers on their routes, but mostly they
lost money.
Enter James Earl Carter the 39th POTUS, Senator Edward Moore Kennedy and his
bright aide Stephen Breyer. Kennedy was a frequent critic of the airlines, and
Carter was dealing with a spike in gas prices and airlines were facing
bankruptcy. And just like that- a
bunch-a-liberal do-gooders de-regulated an industry. Yep, it wasn’t the
republicans (their weren’t that many around in those post-Watergate days
anyway) it was a democratic congress and president that unleashed the power of
capitalism and competition on the airline industry.
Airlines sprung up and went away- who remembers
Air-Tran, not to mention Trump-Air?
Eventually, as the market predicted, the industry consolidated as some
airlines failed because of market inefficiency, and successful ones bought-out
smaller ones and a few regional powerhouses like Southwest and Alaska Air emerged.
And thus we flew through the 80’s and 90’s with cheap travel (cheap oil and
gas) and a strong dollar and a flying stock market and Rumpole became well
known for flying to Paris or London or Berlin for a long weekend as the
stock-market roared with new tech stocks and Bill Clinton cast a longing and
lonely eye at White House interns.
But then, like the bubble stocks that fueled our
European travels, we landed, the economy landed, 9/11 occurred, oil prices
soared, and airlines collapsed under new security and energy costs. By the end
of the Obama administration, the sea of airline red ink was so vast, that Moses
couldn’t have parted it on his best day, and the loses of that decade wiped out
the existence of every single dollar of airline profit ever made since the 1960’s.
Warren Buffet- he’s a pretty smart guy. You invest against
his recommendations at your own risk.
To survive, airlines needed to do a few basic things.
1) Fly full. Every trip. Every seat maximized for what investors call the
-dollar-per-seat-per-mile basis. 2) Fly profitable routes- which means flying
though hubs. Shuttling passengers from New York to Atlanta to Chicago and then
dumping them on a small regional to get to Dayton became the way to survive in
a competitive market. This is capitalism and competition for better or worse.
Seats became smaller. No more meals. Take a small bag of peanuts and watch your
ipad and be quiet. 3) Monetarize everything- EVERYTHING. A few more inches of
leg room costs more. Exit rows cost more. Getting on first costs more. Flying
for a two week vacation? Have fun! If you decide to bring a change of clothes
in a bag or two, that will cost $25/bag. Want a slice of cheese and a few
grapes at 32, 000 feet? $11.50 please.
And now on the Friendly Skies of United.
That passenger was a complete moron. An idiot. And as
it turns out- a convicted felon who as a doctor traded sex for pain pills and
was placed on probation by a hospital he worked at after he somehow managed to
get his license back.
Every airline ticket comes with the agreement that
your seat is NOT guaranteed. This has been the case since Carter and Kennedy
channeled their inner-Rockefeller. Everybody knows flights are overbooked. And if
you are asked to leave- then like the couple just before the doctor- you get
up, you grumble, you threaten to call Rumpole or Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio and
Rachel Maddow on MSNBC and your cousin Arnie who knows a guy who works with the
CEO of United, and you grab your back-pack and you shuffle off the plane.
That doctor caused this incident. He had two good
working feet. He could have gotten off the plane. Throughout our life we all
encounter situations that we don’t like or are unfair. The obnoxious person who
steals your parking space at Walmart as you are preparing to back into. The
person who cuts the line at Joes (guilty as charged). The cop who tells you to do something she has
no right to tell you to do.
What you do in those situations, is you take a deep
breath, understand that being adult means sometimes life isn’t fair, and you
back down, you get off the plane and you move on with your life. You tell
yourself you believe in Karma and that the cop, or the parking spot thief, or
the nasty airline employee will get theirs-if not tomorrow then in their next
life when they get continually ripped off by their Chinese-food delivery
service and don’t get the spare ribs they ordered and were dying for- and you
MOVE ON.
Four year-olds (and many people who wear black robes
in Broweird) throw tantrums when they don’t get what they want and they
discover that life isn’t fair. Adults deal with the situation as adults.
United was wrong. The cops who dragged the doctor were
wrong. But this doctor caused the problem. He didn’t act like a responsible
individual. He’s not the guy we want operating the emergency exit (much less a
sphygmomanometer on our arm in the doctor’s office), and he’s probably the guy
talking on his cell-phone right through take-off. He’s the type of guy who
steals your parking spot at Walmart; he cuts in line at the bank; he is nasty
to the people who take your order at the drive-through; he doesn’t tip hotel
maids when he checks out of the Hampton Inn after a mid-afternoon illicit
tryst. The world owes HIM because he has an MD degree. And they say trial
lawyers can be obnoxious.
Airline travel is no longer fun (but those shops at
airports are getting nicer). Small seats. Full planes. No food. Long delays.
Nasty employees. It’s all part of the price we pay for affordable travel. So
understand what it is, and that one time you get bumped for the crew that has
to get to Indianapolis to get that jet
of people to Albuquerque, so that a crew
can hot-seat to Albuquerque to get that flight to Minneapolis- you get your
stuff and put on your ear phones and turn on Public Enemy (Fight the Power!) and walk off the plane like an adult with your
head held high, albeit a bit smaller.
Or do what we do- Fly NetJets.
From Occupied America, where the planes are full, the
skies not friendly, and the president is mad, turn on Public Enemy and Fight
the Power!
