Hi Joe,

You are absolutely correct on calling me on my flippant remarks. However, they were prompted not by your post but rather the information presented in the articles you cite and most others on the subject. When I measure the opinions and facts in the articles against data from research, I find they paint a picture I don't agree with.

In one of the examples you cite, 'the airport slots sewn up for a long time', those slots have been sewn up since 2005 under the TPA's Commercial Carrier Operating Agreement during the 3 1/2 years Porter has been operating with no competition. In all that time, Porter has never posted an annual profit and is flying with below breakeven loads. There are reasons to believe that the situation will not change, but that's only an opinion.

In the other example, the Q4 profit in 2009, measure it against the other 2009 quarters and you'll see that the loss for the year is $4,609,000. In this case, the author has chosen to emphasize one part of the picture and ignore the rest.

There are other examples in each of these articles.

Bob Kotyk