"GREAT" is a relative term...my thought is that there probably has not been a "great US airline" in over 20 years, probably longer. Thinking Braniff, TWA, Pan Am in 1960s and 1970s.

"Unbundled products", employees who have lost their pensions and take it out on the passengers, first class meals that are at best lousy 1980's coach meals on a china plate with linen if you are lucky, cost cutting airport automation that fails to cover IROPs, jammed full flights and the general deterioration of any sense in the US that service is an art form and an honored avocation greatly impede any US carrier from being considered "great" probably ever again. Maybe Virgin America is attempting, but as they grow, they will probably lose the original vision much like many have observed with JetBlue.

US carriers are safe, yes, this of course most important of all. And DL/NW and UA/CO now with impressive route maps in the in-flight magazine, but not "great" airlines even compared to European carriers like LX, LH. No comparison even possible with CX or SQ or TG in terms of service excellence, and there hasn't been for a very long time.

It is likely that Smisek and some post-merger choices are impacting in a negative way, what was a marginally better product at CO. Bitter airline employees who should have resigned and taken their skills elsewhere long ago will tell pax the only "service" we need seek is Point A to Point B in one piece, and in saying that, they betray how very poor things have become in the US industry.

Maybe CO in the 2000s was the better of a pile of other relatively lousy options in the US in terms of "service". Many non-US carriers manage to proivde much more service than just Point A to Point B, and they still make a profit doing so. But I am not thinking that CO (or any US cairrier for that matter) was "great" in the immediate aviation context pre-merger either. I will agree that they seemed marginally more customer focused and driven than others though, and I fear that may be slipping...