"Airlines" on A&E

Did anyone see the documentary on "Airlines" on the Arts & Entertainment
Network just now? The promos said it was about what really goes on with
airlines. But it turned out to be a program that honed the camera in on
people who spent too long at the bar, and got back to the gate two minutes
before the flight was scheduled to leave, when the doors were already
closed--as well as people who showed up at the gate to claim seats with
expired coupons.

The "airline" was actually Southwest. Person after person with clearly
limited means, in all senses of the phrase (with exceptons*), who had paid
$47 for a ticket and had not met some primitive sense of personal
responsibility (e.g. left for a smoke to an area OUTside of security and
didn't get back until the flight had left) was shown strutting like Donald
Trump insisting on accomodation to things that they themselves couldn't even
conceive of. And scene after scene had drunken or clinically disturbed
people (*see below) who "missed" their flights (e.g. show up two minutes
before official departure time because they were themselves obviously
"missing in action") seething with indignation, and demands, and threats
about how there would be hell to pay--all of which would make a dog laugh!
They generally asked to speak to the "supervisor" or the "manager", only to
be told that the person they were speaking to WAS the supervisor and the
manager. They all generally swore they would never fly Southwest again, and
would cancel their grandmother's reservation for that big Halloween trip
coming up on Southwest to boot.

At first I wondered why Southwest let themselves be associated with such a
concatenation of missed flights,
miserable clientele, and general riff-raff--but the answer was soon obvious:
all the drool-drippers who strutted and complained and demanded in the most
prepostrously self-important of ways--and insisted on 'rights' that simply
don't exist anywhere--only made the "airline" look supremely reasonable in
contrast. I hope not to have to fly Southwest myself if I can avoid it,
but my heart goes out for them.



* P.S. I might add, given legal liability considerations, pardon my
French, that there WERE intelligent, conscientious customers portrayed in
the program who presented themselves with dignity and had legitimate
concerns about rights and airlne responsibiliites that they expressed
cogently and sincerely. Cough cough.

Douglas W. Hoyt wrote:

Did anyone see the documentary on "Airlines" on the Arts & Entertainment
Network just now? The promos said it was about what really goes on with
airlines. But it turned out to be a program that honed the camera in on
people who spent too long at the bar, and got back to the gate two minutes
before the flight was scheduled to leave, when the doors were already
closed--as well as people who showed up at the gate to claim seats with
expired coupons.

This is what really goes on.. I saw it happen tonight.
The guy was at a bar when WN called his name for the flight.
His seat was given away to a standby.
I don't get to observer WN behavior very often, but I think the TV
program is good for them. I flew WN tonight as I gave up my seat on my
overbooked AA flight. In addition to the voluntary bump compensation, AA
also gave me $150 for the WN ticket that was $102.60. AA even called WN
to book the seat, but WN told them there were no seats. They must call
someone at the airport (SNA), as I called WN from the AA gate as the
agent was processing my compensation, and they gave me a seat. Almost
$250 in vouchers (tax free value after the money I put out for WN) was
sufficient for me to take a 40 minute later flight, even though I gave
up my favorite Embrarer seat on AA (exit row, single side). Too bad you
can't use vouchers online at AA. So, I flew WN.. I ended up near the
front of the B line, by hanging out near the end of the B line for the
earlier flight from that gate. I got an aisle seat about midway back. I
wonder about the WN "people of size" policy as I observed a very large
woman in a rear facing exit row seat, and she clearly imposed on the
person sitting next to her. He was a late boarder and all that was left
was the middle seat next to the large woman. It seems that this policy
isn't enforced as it should be. The flight wasn't too bad, although I
wish airline's could actually part with a full can of softdrinks. I am
glad to see they have honey roasted peanuts and toss out 2 bags without
asking, though they didn't mention the pretzel option. While collecting
the empties, the FA was asking people if they wanted anything else. I
asked for a coke and got it. That was a first for me on WN.

There are a couple of things that stop me from flying WN regularly.
One of these is seat assignments, and the other is the lack (no
existance) of upgrades.

My favorite was the one where a guy showed up to board and smelled so bad
they wouldn't let him on until he cleaned up.

Seriously though, I fly SWA all the time and I think the show does a good
job of capturing reality. Of course they are going to show interesting
snippets, after all it wouldn't make an entertaining show if they just
showed the typical flight where everyone gets on board without incident and
the plane leaves on time.

For flights of less than two hours SWA is my favorite airline simply because
they usually have the most frequent flights between the cities I usually fly
to and they almost always are on time.

Matt




"Douglas W. Hoyt" wrote in message
...
Did anyone see the documentary on "Airlines" on the Arts & Entertainment
Network just now? The promos said it was about what really goes on with
airlines. But it turned out to be a program that honed the camera in on
people who spent too long at the bar, and got back to the gate two minutes
before the flight was scheduled to leave, when the doors were already
closed--as well as people who showed up at the gate to claim seats with
expired coupons.

The "airline" was actually Southwest. Person after person with clearly
limited means, in all senses of the phrase (with exceptons*), who had
paid
$47 for a ticket and had not met some primitive sense of personal
responsibility (e.g. left for a smoke to an area OUTside of security and
didn't get back until the flight had left) was shown strutting like
Donald
Trump insisting on accomodation to things that they themselves couldn't
even
conceive of. And scene after scene had drunken or clinically disturbed
people (*see below) who "missed" their flights (e.g. show up two
minutes
before official departure time because they were themselves obviously
"missing in action") seething with indignation, and demands, and
threats
about how there would be hell to pay--all of which would make a dog laugh!
They generally asked to speak to the "supervisor" or the "manager", only
to
be told that the person they were speaking to WAS the supervisor and the
manager. They all generally swore they would never fly Southwest again,
and
would cancel their grandmother's reservation for that big Halloween trip
coming up on Southwest to boot.

At first I wondered why Southwest let themselves be associated with such a
concatenation of missed flights,
miserable clientele, and general riff-raff--but the answer was soon
obvious:
all the drool-drippers who strutted and complained and demanded in the
most
prepostrously self-important of ways--and insisted on 'rights' that simply
don't exist anywhere--only made the "airline" look supremely reasonable in
contrast. I hope not to have to fly Southwest myself if I can avoid it,
but my heart goes out for them.



* P.S. I might add, given legal liability considerations, pardon my
French, that there WERE intelligent, conscientious customers portrayed in
the program who presented themselves with dignity and had legitimate
concerns about rights and airlne responsibiliites that they expressed
cogently and sincerely. Cough cough.

Cisco troll/netkook/asshole Michael Voight mrtravelkay trolled:

There are a couple of things that stop me from flying WN regularly.
One of these is seat assignments, and the other is the lack (no
existance) of upgrades.

Well ... DUH ... ! They only have economy class, so where the hell are they
going to upgrade you to, ****er?

So let's get this straight. You fly down to Orange County every Sunday to see
that daughter of yours, and you get back after midnight, and instead of going to
bed to get some sleep, you log on and troll usenet. What a loser. Well, it's
not like you have to be well rested for work the next day. You don't do any
work at work. You just troll usenet all day.

About rogue Cisco employee and netkook/troll/usenet flooder
Michael Voight, alias "mrtravel", "mrtravelkay", etc.

"mrtavelkay" is the latest usenet handle of a brainless troll whose real name is
Michael Voight, e-mail .

Michael D. Voight
111 Bean Creek Rd
Scotts Valley, CA 95066-4148
(831) 438-2485

He is better known by his previous stupid handle, "mrtravel".

The idiot works for Cisco in their Scotts Valley, California
Technical Assistance Center (TAC) and apparently they don't
keep him busy enough so he has to troll usenet newsgroups all day long from
work.

***WARNING: THIS IDIOT HAS BEEN CAUGHT FORGING PEOPLE'S IDENTITIES ON USENET
AND CANCELLING THEIR POSTS.***

If you are one of his victims, or are simply fed up with his trolling/newsgroup
flooding, forward his posts to .

He works in technical support, so forward them to too.

See further below for more Cisco contact information.

He often posts through sbcglobal and prodigy, so forward them to
and as well.

His main hangout is alt.visa.us.marriage-based, a sleazy newsgroup where
foreigners wanting to immigrate to the US hook up with losers like Voight who
are willing to marry them for money so they can get their green card. Voight is
a pro at this, handing out daily advice on how to be a sleazoid like him and
sell green cards.

When he isn't giving out advice on how to commit federal crimes on
alt.visa.us.marriage-based he is usually on rec.travel.air flooding that
newsgroup with trolls and harassing posters and picking retarded fights with the
regular posters there.

He also tends to post a lot in the personals and penpals newsgroups as well as
the support groups for fat people, lonely folks, and for depression. Obviously
after his Russian Internet brides get their green cards they flee, leaving him
lonely and desperate for company. Maybe that's why he keeps a P.O. Box at the
post office, so he can get his personals mail the

Voight, Michael
P.O. Box 67016,
Scotts Valley, CA 95067
(408) 461-8707

He also seems to frequent the teenage newsgroups. Creepy.....

He's got a daughter in Orange County that one of his ex-wives had the
intelligence to take away from him. Lord only knows what could have
happened to her if she had continued to live with the kook. The other kids he
has belong to his previous Russian sleazy brides, and since they come and go so
do the kids. It wouldn't hurt to let Cisco know what kind of deviant sexual
pervert they have working for them.

Many people have wondered how Cisco ever hired such a psycho. It cheapens their
image and credibility in the corporate world after all. Well, they didn't hire
him directly, he came as baggage when they acquired the company he used to work
for, TGV Software. His e-mail address there used to be .

All intelligent members of the usenet community have killfiled him, so he takes
great pains to get past their killfiles by rubbing his only two cerebral neurons
together and coming up with gems like: mrtrav , mrtrav3
, mrraveltay , and mrtravelkay
, and mtravelkay and ""a.a\"@a,a,a.

Some of his other trolling aliases are Network Guy,
, sleepydoc , jlhunt
, and Lost 5 of 8 , mrt ,
news.sf.sbcglobal.net , not-nomen
, David Tanner
, Jeff Davies , BobTheBuilder
. The lastest product of his brain diarrhea is Bill
Clarkj .

It would be a good idea to call Cisco at 1-800-553-2447 and ask to speak with a
supervisor and explain that you are EXTREMELY unhappy that this idiot spends his
whole day at work playing on the internet on company time. THEY WILL NOT LIKE
THAT.

Then write to corporate headquarters explaining what this idiot is doing and
telling them HOW BAD IT IS FOR THEIR COMPANY IMAGE. They will LOVE that you
brought this to their attention:

Cisco Systems, Inc.
170 West Tasman Dr.
San Jose, CA 95134
USA

Then also call them. You should always follow up email or letters with phone
calls. Always ask for supervisors or managers. Try to get as far up as
possible.

(408)526-4000
(800)553-NETS or
(800)553-6387

Contact Investor Relations and tell them you are interested in investing in
their company but won't do so until they get rid of this asshole who is wasting
company resources:

Cisco Systems, Inc.
Investor Relations Department
170 West Tasman Drive
San Jose, CA 95134-1706
Phone: (408) 526-8890
Fax: (408) 526-4545
Email:

Might as well contact customer service too, they LOVE to hear about this type of
stuff:

USA 1 800 553 6387




Then finally, send letters with copies of his nasty posts addressed
personally to each one of the OFFICERS of the company using the
headquarters address. Believe me, they READ your complaints and are VERY
INTERESTED in them, especially if it's about one of their employees. They will
take a PERSONAL interest in rooting this ASSHOLE out of their company:

John Morgridge, Chairman
John Chambers, President, CEO
Donald Valentine, Vice Chairman
Larry Carter, CFO, Sr. VP-Fin. and Admin., Sec., Director
Richard Justice, Sr. VP, Worldwide Field Operations

Have fun!

"Max Mustermann" wrote in message
age.info...
Cisco troll/netkook/asshole Michael Voight mrtravelkay trolled:

There are a couple of things that stop me from flying WN regularly.
One of these is seat assignments, and the other is the lack (no
existance) of upgrades.

Well ... DUH ... ! They only have economy class, so where the hell are
they
going to upgrade you to, ****er?

So let's get this straight. You fly down to Orange County every Sunday to
see
that daughter of yours, and you get back after midnight, and instead of
going to
bed to get some sleep, you log on and troll usenet. What a loser. Well,
it's
not like you have to be well rested for work the next day. You don't do
any
work at work. You just troll usenet all day.


Your the troll and the loser Mr. Mustermann....or whatever your name happens
to be this week. Get a life.

Matt

"Matt" wrote in message ...
My favorite was the one where a guy showed up to board and smelled so bad
they wouldn't let him on until he cleaned up.

Seriously though, I fly SWA all the time and I think the show does a good
job of capturing reality. Of course they are going to show interesting
snippets, after all it wouldn't make an entertaining show if they just
showed the typical flight where everyone gets on board without incident and
the plane leaves on time.

For flights of less than two hours SWA is my favorite airline simply because
they usually have the most frequent flights between the cities I usually fly
to and they almost always are on time.

Matt




"Douglas W. Hoyt" wrote in message
...
Did anyone see the documentary on "Airlines" on the Arts & Entertainment
Network just now? The promos said it was about what really goes on with
airlines. But it turned out to be a program that honed the camera in on
people who spent too long at the bar, and got back to the gate two minutes
before the flight was scheduled to leave, when the doors were already
closed--as well as people who showed up at the gate to claim seats with
expired coupons.

The "airline" was actually Southwest. Person after person with clearly
limited means, in all senses of the phrase (with exceptons*), who had
paid
$47 for a ticket and had not met some primitive sense of personal
responsibility (e.g. left for a smoke to an area OUTside of security and
didn't get back until the flight had left) was shown strutting like
Donald
Trump insisting on accomodation to things that they themselves couldn't
even
conceive of. And scene after scene had drunken or clinically disturbed
people (*see below) who "missed" their flights (e.g. show up two
minutes
before official departure time because they were themselves obviously
"missing in action") seething with indignation, and demands, and
threats
about how there would be hell to pay--all of which would make a dog laugh!
They generally asked to speak to the "supervisor" or the "manager", only
to
be told that the person they were speaking to WAS the supervisor and the
manager. They all generally swore they would never fly Southwest again,
and
would cancel their grandmother's reservation for that big Halloween trip
coming up on Southwest to boot.

At first I wondered why Southwest let themselves be associated with such a
concatenation of missed flights,
miserable clientele, and general riff-raff--but the answer was soon
obvious:
all the drool-drippers who strutted and complained and demanded in the
most
prepostrously self-important of ways--and insisted on 'rights' that simply
don't exist anywhere--only made the "airline" look supremely reasonable in
contrast. I hope not to have to fly Southwest myself if I can avoid it,
but my heart goes out for them.



* P.S. I might add, given legal liability considerations, pardon my
French, that there WERE intelligent, conscientious customers portrayed in
the program who presented themselves with dignity and had legitimate
concerns about rights and airlne responsibiliites that they expressed
cogently and sincerely. Cough cough.



It is a good show! The passengers are ridiculous. There is no sense of
self responsibility.

p.s Max - let it go !!! You have posted all over this board. Lets keep
it on topic. This is why we read these boards, you have made your
point!

Max Mustermann wrote:

Cisco troll/netkook/asshole Michael Voight mrtravelkay trolled:


There are a couple of things that stop me from flying WN regularly.
One of these is seat assignments, and the other is the lack (no
existance) of upgrades.


Well ... DUH ... ! They only have economy class, so where the hell are they
going to upgrade you to, ****er?

I think I said it didn't exist.. Did you miss that. (surely you can
understand that I meant "non existance" when I typed "no existance".
What did you think I mean by that? Yeah, they don't have first class,
therefore I can't upgrade. What difference does it make what the
limiting factor is, it still doesn't get me a first class seat.


So let's get this straight. You fly down to Orange County every Sunday to see
that daughter of yours, and you get back after midnight, and instead of going to
bed to get some sleep, you log on and troll usenet.

I see.. First you are concerned about my work and now you are concerned
about my sleep.... Thanks Mommy...... Don't forget my good night kiss.
By the way, the flight arrive in SJC before 10. I was home by 11.
Surely you know that both SJC and SNA have curfews... Oh yeah, that's
right, you never fly.

Did anyone see the documentary on "Airlines" on the Arts & Entertainment
Network just now?

This is a weekly series on Southwest Airlines and while I missed tonight's
show, and have never flown SA before . . . after watching too many weeks of
this series, I would never choose to fly SA ... and I have stopped my
recommendations to our Airport Commission (of which I am a former member)
that SA be added to the Memphis hub !!

007

--
******************
Bill E. Burk
Publisher, Elvis World Magazine

[Remove "NOSP" from my e-mail address]

I have stopped my recommendations to our Airport Commission (of which I
am a former member) that SA be added to the Memphis hub !!

But wait. If Southwest comes to Memphis, then fares on all the airlines
that you WILL want to fly will drop dramatically! Invite them in. BEG
them. PLUS, I have to admit, that they are simply a good airline. I
flew them once. It was o.k. They offer low fares, cheerful staff, and are
incredibly decent all around. I don't fly them for two reasons: 1) they
don't serve anywhere within 200 miles of where I live (Chicago Midway is
also a bit of a hassle); and 2) I would much rather fly Northwest (to
maintain elite status) or Midwest Express from here in Madison. My
brother, though, who is Delta Medallion, STILL flies Southwest a whole bunch
from Kansas City, and really likes them, and likes how quickly you can earn
and use free flights on them.

Douglas W. Hoyt wrote:
Did anyone see the documentary on "Airlines" on the Arts & Entertainment
Network just now? The promos said it was about what really goes on with
airlines. But it turned out to be a program that honed the camera in on
people who spent too long at the bar, and got back to the gate two minutes
before the flight was scheduled to leave, when the doors were already
closed--as well as people who showed up at the gate to claim seats with
expired coupons.

The stories that strike me are the blatant airline errors and mistakes
which are more often than not blamed on others. Nobody at SWA or any
airline really seems ready to take responsibility for anything unless a
passenger politely but forcefully argues with them at length.

Two examples - the incident on this week's episode in which the power in
the cabin of a jet went out. There was one (just one) gate attendant
helping passengers get their bags out of the plane and helping them
figure out what to do with missed connections. And worse, the guys who
were supposed to be fixing the plane laughingly said "oh, sometimes
these things take time to figure out" - in other words - "it'll be fixed
when it's fixed."

A much more extreme example - when a young bride-to-be's wedding dress
arrived at her destination with giant black tire marks on it. This
wasn't the old retiree with too much time on his hand who is complaining
about a quarter sized blemish on the outside of his luggage. This
lady's wedding dress was completely ruined. And the reaction of the
ariline was to argue first that it wasn't their fault and that they
weren't responsible for the destruction of the dress while it was in
their care!

At first I wondered why Southwest let themselves be associated with such a
concatenation of missed flights,
miserable clientele, and general riff-raff--but the answer was soon obvious:
all the drool-drippers who strutted and complained and demanded in the most
prepostrously self-important of ways--and insisted on 'rights' that simply
don't exist anywhere--only made the "airline" look supremely reasonable in
contrast. I hope not to have to fly Southwest myself if I can avoid it,
but my heart goes out for them.


I hardly ever fly SWA myself, for two reasons. First, their whole 'no
seat reservation' thing is just plain annoying and invites trouble.
Second, It's a pain for me to fly anyone other than Continental, given
that I live in one of their hub cities.



* P.S. I might add, given legal liability considerations, pardon my
French, that there WERE intelligent, conscientious customers portrayed in
the program who presented themselves with dignity and had legitimate
concerns about rights and airlne responsibiliites that they expressed
cogently and sincerely. Cough cough.



You see irresponsible passengers as the norm. I see irresponsive airlines.

Let's compare airlines to Greyhound Buses. After all, Greyhound caters
to people even worse off than the discount travelers on SWA, and more
than that, they are in a business similar to the airlines (getting
people from one place to another).

If a plane suffers technical difficulties on the tarmac, then passengers
just have to wait for it to be fixed. If fixing the plane proves
impossible to do within 1 or 2 hours, the flight is cancelled. By
contrast, if a Greyhound bus breaks down the company brings another bus
around to pick up the stranded passengers.

If an airline overbooks a flight (as many of them do), passengers who
don't get a seat are just plain out of luck. They'll have to make the
case for compensation, and come back tomorrow. If more people show up
at the bus station than a Greyhound trip has seats for, they get another
bus in to handle the overload.

These are just two things that the airlines should try to figure out how
to do. I'm not saying it will be easy, but the point is that Greyhound
gives better service and has better policy towards its passengers than
airlines do, even though it can hardly be said to offer luxury travel.
(And yes, I am aware that the higher ticket prices on airplanes are
justified because they are so much faster than buses).