WORDS HAVE MEANING
IGNORING THEM HAS CONSEQUENCES



Recently Mr. Rich Cordell, Senior Vice-Pres.- ACS, felt the need to clarify for all ACS employees at Delta Air Lines a statement Delta made to the Bankruptcy Court in its Disclosure Statement concerning potential further staff reductions in 2007.

Mr. Cordell stated in his clarification e-mail to us that; “those job reductions are now substantially completed. There are no further system-wide reductions planned in ACS. We have NO PLANS to further outsource any part of ACS in 2007.”

I am a person who likes words and realizes the importance of carefully choosing them in my writing. It appears that Mr. Cordell is also cautious in the words he uses. People of consequence and substance choose their words carefully and use them judiciously. Men and Women of character and integrity take it a step further and stand by their words.

Mr. Cordell has utilized words in his above clarification that make it virtually impossible to question him on in the future. Take out the words “substantially, system-wide, and planned” in the above statement and see how clear the statement becomes: “those job reductions are now completed. There are no further reductions in ACS.”

You see, Mr. Cordell has used words in such a way as to provide himself cover no matter what happens between now and the end of 2007. The word “substantially” is defined by Webster to mean, “being largely but not wholly that specified.” Why didn’t he just say “entirely” if he meant that outsourcing was done this year? By saying that outsourcing is “substantially” done “system-wide”, he leaves open the option to reduce more jobs in individual cities as needed. There are certainly more reductions coming, they are just not going to be everywhere. Words have meaning. The words used by Mr. Cordell were meticulously chosen with lots of probable lawyerly input. You can bet your bottom dollar on that.

We don’t “intend to”
We have “no plans”
“Substantially completed”
No further “system-wide reductions planned”

I hope many of you are beginning to see the pattern of this carefully crafted deception and can see through the words and discern the truth. There are no commitments worth the paper they are printed on unless it’s a contract signed by both parties, a union contract.

Yes, words have meaning and lack of action on our part will result in adverse, negative consequences. Which cities will be next if we don’t stop the process? SLC, LAX, HNL, CVG, BOS? Maybe one of the Florida or New York area cities, no one really knows. By saying we are “substantially” finished outsourcing in 2007 that naturally leads one to wonder about 2008. The ultimate goal of this management team is to finish the job. This is a process that we can’t hide from or run from. We have to stand and fight together or be annihilated one city at a time.

Let's secure a union contract by signing union authorization cards and winning an election. This is the only way we can ensure that the words used by our management carry weight, value and have meaning.