Agreed, and I believe the MODs said something a while back about this childish namecalling in a derogatory/malicious manner.

So the OPs family got to where they were going for $150 using codeshares vs. a higher fare on the operation carriers flight numbers. Excellent news, proves the market basis of our society works. Time to move on! This isn't unique to Delta at all. I see it as simple nitpicking with an agenda. Perhaps OP should post something similar in ALL airline forums with regard to fare differences and codeshares between oh I dunno, UA/LH, AA/BA, UA/US, NW/KL (particularly intra-Europe), on and on and on. I wager we won't see such threads (from this OP) because OAL are golden.