Friday, February 21, 1997
Clinton should have remained uninvolved
President Clinton’s intervention in the American Airlines
dispute is deplorable, as it is clearly to the advantage of
management and not the pilots. Where is federal intervention to
prevent huge increases in CEO payments? Where is the intervention
to stop wage cuts and job losses? The pilots are right to use their
power to try to stop American Airlines from bringing in workers at
a third of current rates. American Airlines pilots are well paid
(though not as well as management). They deserve it  they
have years of training and hold passengers’ lives in their hands.
They are not well paid because of management kindness, but because
they are well-organized workers. A victory for the pilots would
demonstrate the power of organized labor.
Defeats for organized labor in the airline industry have meant
massive job losses and wage cuts, with the ValuJets setting safety
standards. American Airlines could have met the pilots’ demands if
it wanted to avoid passenger delays  it has the money.
Clinton knows this, but he decided to bail the bosses out. The
election of John Sweeney to head the AFL-CIO and Ron Carey’s
re-election as teamster president show a desire among American
workers to move away from the business unionism of the past.
Hopefully a verbal commitment to organize will be translated into
action. It was mass action and defying unjust laws that built
American unions in the past, and it is only by reviving the tactics
of the CIO in the ’30s that they will be rebuilt. I would urge
everyone to support the events this week including the Labor
Teach-In at UCLA this Friday.
Alexis Wearmouth
Fourth year
History