You will find active discussions of the difficulties of booking Delta award seats in the Delta forum. You will also find similar discussions of the difficulties of booking other airlines' award seats in their forums. None is perfect in that regard, as they (for some strange reason) prefer to sell seats to paying passengers. Go figure.

The credit card decision should, IMHO, be made in conjunction with your normal paid travel patterns (if any). Credit card miles turn into rewards much more quickly when they can be combined with miles earned through flying, airline bonuses/promotions, hotel stays, etc. So, what airline(s) do you fly?

The Starwood card is an AmEx card issued by the Starwood (includes Sheraton, Four Points, etc.) hotel chain. Aside from the limited number of places that accept AmEx compared to Visa/MC, it's a good card to have. It gives you flexibility in which airline program you move your points to and offers a 25 percent bonus if you move 20,000 points at a time.

Citibank offers a variety of AA Visa/MC cards. Some are for businesses. Some aren't.

The best way to be sure you're getting the miles you deserve is by checking each month's credit card statement, making sure the total there corresponds with your purchases for the month, and checking your airline statement to make sure the miles have posted properly (if you use a card that's linked directly to an airline program).