Say What?

Or make that, "Allege what?"

Headline of the day, from the Web site of the Air Transport Association, the domestic airlines' trade group in Washington:

"Airlines Profitable Despite Alleged Decline in Customer Service"

The summary says:

"Investors in U.S. airlines are smiling about industry profit reports, even as passengers complain of what they say is declining customer service. A spokesman for the Air Transport Association says many of the delay problems travelers experience are out of the airlines' control. "The reality is the (air traffic control) system can't handle the volume" of air traffic, he said.

Whatever. But words do matter, even in the screwy airline industry. Someone needs to have a talk with whoever stuck that word "alleged" in there to modify "decline in customer service" and then compounded the knucklehead offense by stating that "passengers complain of what they say is declining customer service." [My italics].

What is this, Albania in 1972? Turkmenistan today?

I mean, I know there are real problems with air traffic control, but give us a friggin' break here: Does the Air Transport Association really think that the "decline in customer service" is an allegation, perhaps a figment of our wild imaginations, rather than a fact?


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