Well, life goes on with or without us, that is rule #1. So the HP acquistion is something that was always out of our hands. Unfortunately both east and west flyers were then placed into the hands of a management which was out of its depth when it comes to running with the big boys. It did not help that these folks were also a touch arrogant. The results have been what we all read here.

I'm not so sure that FF expectations were always realistic when the merger occurs. The days of wine and roses ( well easy upgrades anyhow ) were ending as carriers reconfigure cabins and search for revenues in a still dysfunctional business model. My own hope was that Tempe would play straight up with us which of course they elect not to. This magnifies the magnitude of mistakes and is compounded when Tempe simply resorts to lies with a smirk on their faces. But remember rule #1. Lots of us were either creatures or habit or we were stuck flying how we fly.

The unpleasant irony is that our opinions never really mattered nor did Tempe really mean anything in the bigger game where larger forces were at work. The game changed for all carriers and it takes a lot of time before any of these carriers admit the reality of the post 9/11post BK playing field. Finally, fuel costs have cemented themselves into reality and with no more meaningful employee benefits to pillage or pax perks to cut, we're finally seeing consolidation in the full sense of the word.

The good news is that US, or more specifically Tempe have demonstrated how not to play at the airline game and hopefully they remain on the sideline where they can not do more harm than they've already done. I still think that a hybrid lcc model can work if someone ever looks real hard at which sort of customers are out there and how to configure their service ( look at WN's first effort to lure business travelers -- the idea is sound but still needs tweaking).

This time, fares will go up as the big players attempt to improve revenue with their new found merger synergies. And it's not necessarily a bad thing. The question is how long before one of these carriers realizes that with some additional tweaking, they can also reinject more value into the pax product/experience. Things are gonna move in circles, we can't tell how long it all takes. I just hope that the management in Tempe either stays on the sideline or is sh!tcanned and has the buzzards circling over them.

Barry