What, and Richard Anderson, Doug Parker, and Jeff Smisek aren't? Give me a break.

Who cares? Reality isn't a popularity contest. Over time, when more facts come out, more people will understand.

HKG is certainly a very nice airport. But I'm sure our passenger taxes don't cover its cost. The infrastructure expense that went into building that facility -- and the related transportation links -- would probably cover about 20 "normal" airports. There's no way you can take a taxi from Kowloon to HKG without thinking "ka-ching." Of course, HKG didn't have another good choice.

I guess that's why you created a thread with a poll, right?
When you saw that the poll results didn't match your preconceived notions, the "yes" votes mysteriously doubled overnight...
Pretty much everyone in this thread understands the difference between facts and someone's wet dream about US3 CEOs, but there is one obvious exception. @:-)
More assumptions without any facts. Nobody's surprised.

An ME3 CEO less likeable than Clark
 

While Tim Clark is a bully, it's hard in polite company to describe Qatar's Al Baker's public relations style. Let's just say if you believe what he says is true, you are gullible.

In the Mideast papers last week, he said he would travel to Washington today and "open the books."

http://english.alarabiya.net/en/busi...rt/2015/05/06/

Let's just say that while he hurled plenty of insults at the US3 today -- deriding their "crap service" was particularly diplomatic -- those books are still in lockdown. And no new financial information was provided whatsoever.

Al Baker also said today that Qatar Airways' IPO would be coming soon. Joe Brancatelli made the following observation about this promise:
Indeed it does not. And never will.

https://twitter.com/search?q=qatar%20ipo&src=typd

Looks like we need another thread with a poll: Are the ME3 CEO's bullies? :D

Perhaps the OP can oblige...

Ah, I see, so the US3 can accuse the ME3 of 9/11 but the ME3 is evil when they accuse the US3 of offering terrible service? Congrats, me and many other posters have fell for the bait.

^

Here's another poll thread: Can the OP stick to the topic of his own thread?
Or, how about this one: How many times will the OP try to deflect from ludicrous allegations that he can't back up?

If the OP had anything to back up his allegations, he would've presented his proof by now.

As with other posters on this thread, you resort to ridiculous hyperbole.

Richard Anderson made the valid point that it's not very diplomatic for the state-owned ME3 to complain about the money given to the US airlines to help keep them afloat when they were prohibited from flying due to certain horrific actions taken by the 9/11 terrorists. Those terrorists included citizens of the UAE.

It is also not "evil" as you put it for an ME3 CEO to note the "crap service" of the US airlines. It is just an incredibly stupid strategy if his goal was to try to make friends.

Here's a mirror for you:
http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lmae5uYkH61qctkcl.jpg

So the US Airlines were all reporting 10% plus profit margins in 2001? By all means he had a right to state the the subsidies they received was due to an event outside of their control, but to try and link the ME3 to the attack was as low as you can get.

Does the fact that it is a 80 page report count in its favour or against it? If you could prove subsidies, surely it would have been a shorter report?

Do you consider having debt a signal that a company isn't well run and in the case of EK, it must be a scam? Seems to me that whilst having debt isn't great, as long as you have manageable debt you are fine. However if you run into a event that will impact your industry you are more exposed if you do have too much debt.

So a new route from an airline is bad if it doesn't show a profit from day one, even if the company is looking long term (10 years out instead of the next quarter)?

Do you think it is possible that EK built up their empire by starting with a few routes and making sure that they are profitable, therefore allowing them to have a buffer period when new services were started to become profitable? Or are you still of the opinion that all their routes that you were able to look at all those years ago are still losing money?

It seems to me that EK is just following what US consumers want and giving it to their passengers, but instead of domestic passengers we are talking international passengers. They are offering frequency and options to most of their clients.

Yes, no harm in that. Competition is healthy for the consumer.

Interesting that you should say this. It is the US3 who seem to be barraging the airwaves with ads and interviews, rather than the ME3. This fact is one of the reasons that I am suspicious of their argument. If it really was as rational and straightforward as they make out, I would think the US3 would do as you suggest. Rather, it seems to me that they are trying to get the public to call their congresscritter in support of the US3.

The egregious bullies, masters of insults, and seller of scams are the US3 executives who are screaming Uncle -- for help from the strongest sovereign around (namely, Uncle Sam) -- to help them beat up and admonish relative "shrimps" in the U.S., are throwing lots of mud (while hoping some of the mud sticks), and are scamming US consumers daily and repeatedly by way of rip-off fares, rip-off service fees, and rip-off games with the frequent flyer programs.

And I say this as a repeat critic of QR's CEO.

I don't know, I think Tim Clark's comments ("If the Swedes or the Danes were to approach us...") are rather smart seeing as there isn't much the US3 can really say in response.

--Sorry for talking about QR on this thread--
Akbar Al-Baker's comments is a different story, and btw I don't see why he wants a flight to PIT given that he already serves PHL, ORD, MIA, and soon BOS. But whatever. Is there a video online of his press conference in DC?

The monies were given to the US3 airlines way before 9/11, and way after 9/11 -and still are for various reasons other than 9/11.

RA did NOT make a valid point, and wasn't certainly how you see it. He said:
"That is categorically false. And it’s a great irony to have the UAE from the Arabian Peninsula talk about that, given the fact that our industry was really shocked by the terrorism of 9/11, which came from terrorists from the Arabian Peninsula. That caused us to go through a massive restructuring. And in the United States our restructuring process is transparent and there is no government subsidy. And in fact there were billions of dollars of equity and unsecured debt that were wiped out through that process."

For starters, the shock wasn't just for US carriers, all airlines around the world got it too.

Secondly, the real irony is alleging subsidies by state owners when private US enterprises benefited from public US money quite selectively too.

Thirdly, you can't associate the acts of a criminal to his/her citizenship. You don't see anyone coming out and saying the US3 airlines and the government that backs them should shut the hell up because there are 2.5 million US citizens in prison who committed crimes, some of which affected citizens and enterprises of other countries.