Slacker:

I, too, have been a loyal US Priority Gold Plus/Chairman's Preferred member for the last 10-15 years and have become concerned with the direction the airline has taken over the past couple years. As a result, after bankruptcy last year, I started flying Continental and found their product to be excellent. The only problem is that there are so many Platinum's that I NEVER got an upgrade until I became Platinum, afterwhich I don't think I've ever flown coach. However, next year may be different since CO will start taking class of service into consideration before upgrading. Since I buy lots of discount tickets, I could be relegated back to coach, inspite of my Platinum status. If that happens, I'll be looking elsewhere again. We'll see.

Nevertheless, even though I gave CO the most business, I found it hard to completely sever the relationship with US and have qualified for Gold for 2004. With over 2 million miles on US, I still enjoy flying them and hope that they survive. Certainly, the Star Alliance will bring many advantages and options for using my miles. But, hopefully, the feeder traffic from the alliance airlines should help to bolster revenue to some degree and, I pray, keep the airline afloat.

Whatever you do, AVOID DELTA, by all means! Their frequent flyer program sucks and forget trying to use your miles to go anywhere worthwhile. I've tried to book trips to Hawaii, Africa and the Caribbean and have never been successful. I'm sure I'd have more luck if I were elite, but I can't remember the last time I had a GOOD experience on Delta.

Good luck in your search. But keep flying US, in the meantime!