( – promoted by odum)

It’s amazing to me that, to date, the Vermont press has given Lt. Governor Dubie a free pass on his oft repeated claim throughout this campaign that he is “a union man.”

While it’s true that Dubie is a member in good standing with his union, the Allied Pilots Association (APA is a small independent union representing American Airlines’ pilots), his inaction and silence over the past few years-as his boss, Governor Douglas, was slicing and dicing state government-did little to bolster his claim that he’s a union man. Dubie’s lack of solidarity with his VSEA brothers and sisters is especially appalling when you look at the issues confronting his own union.

A search of the APA’s in-house magazine, and we excerpt the following:

•From APA Secretary Treasurer’s column in Jan. 2010 Flightline magazine:

“We often think of APA as the entity tasked with negotiating increased pay and benefits on our behalf. An equally important but sometimes overlooked role for APA is defending and preserving the benefits we have already negotiated and achieved over the years. American Airlines pilots enjoy one of the richest benefits packages in the industry, consisting of medical, disability, life insurance and pension benefits. These valuable benefits are undoubtedly worth defending, preserving and saving;”

•”Management expends a great deal of effort on communicating with us during contract negotiations. The chief goal of management’s communications is to lower our expectations by generating anxiety and concern. Using a powerful in-house communications team as well as expensive outside consultants, working internally through chief pilots and externally through the media, management will continue to exert pressure on APA pilots and attempt to derail our pursuit of a restorative contract;” and

•From a May 2010 APA press release on Spirit Airlines labor problems:

“We are well acquainted with the challenge our Spirit Airlines colleagues face,” said APA President Captain Lloyd Hill. “They are dealing with a management team engaged in delay tactics and intent on extracting further employee concessions, which has unfortunately become a familiar refrain throughout the airline industry. “As professional aviators, we cannot permit the industry-wide ‘race to the bottom’ mentality that prevailed during much of the past decade to continue,” he said. “We therefore pledge our support to the pilots of Spirit Airlines as they attempt to conclude their contract negotiations amicably and without inconvenience to the airline’s customers.”

And a quick search on YouTube revealed several recent videos reporting on unrest within the APA ranks because of management proposals to cut the workforce. In one video, it’s reported that Dubie’s own union is promising quick legal action to stop the cuts and APA leaders vow to fight management tooth and nail.

So the question for Brian Dubie is, if you are the union man your purport to be, why did you not join in solidarity with your VSEA brothers and sisters when they were fighting the exact same battle as  you and your APA brothers and sisters? As a proud union man, did you make any effort at all to work with VSEA to stop your boss’ wholesale cuts? Did you advise Jim Douglas that, as an APA member, you know what it’s like to be trapped in a race to the bottom? Did you try and get him to rethink cutting the nearly 1,000 state employee positions he did?

It’s one thing to crisscross Vermont proclaiming you’re a “union man,” but as any good union member worth his/her salt knows, when it comes to labor disputes, actions often speak far louder than words.

If Mr. Dubie is elected governor, I trust he will put his money where his mouth is, especially when he sits down to look at our state’s hundred-plus million deficit and begins hearing from his apparatchiks about how we need to keep cutting services and jobs and leave wealthy Vermonters and the state’s Rain Day funds alone.  After all, it’s pretty clear what your union, the APA, will do if American Airlines proposes new staff cuts.

You can’t have it both ways Brother Dubie. A true union man/woman would have stood in solidarity with VSEA in its fight against Gov. Douglas’ cuts, or with any other Vermont union members’ facing the same management tactics and demands as American’s pilots.

What’s your excuse for sitting idly by Mr. Union Man?