Activists suggest boycott of “Air Kevorkian”

To say it’s been a rough couple weeks for Southwest Airlines is like saying Eliot Spitzer had a minor lapse in judgment. Women are claiming that they’re being thrown off flights for just being too damn good-lookin’; the airline was fined over $10 million by the FAA for flying unsafe planes; and now they’ve voluntarily grounded about forty planes because of “safety-related issues.”

So what’s a disgruntled consumer to do? One aero-activist group thinks it has the answer: hop in your time machine, set it for the 1960s, and stage a BOYCOTT!

The lawyer for Quiet Rockland, a New York-based activist organization, thinks that a boycott, combined with more hyperbole than you’ll see anywhere this side of the “War on Christmas,” will send Southwest the message.

From a recent press release announcing the boycott, with original random commas left intact:

  • “The persons that should be flying Southwest at this point, should be only those referred by Doctor Kevorkian.”
  • “Irrespective of what forensic lesser charge might technically ultimately apply once further Congressional investigation concludes, the acts and omissions of Southwest and collaborator FAA were tantamount to attempted murder, on a massive scale. This WILL not stand.” [Shouldn’t the “not” be capitalized in that last sentence instead of the “will”?]
  • “Quiet Rockland asks and encourages those Southwest employees tired of subscribing to their company tombstone culture, to leave their sinking airship now to find other and better employ at a responsible airline that actually acknowledges the dignity of the individual human traveler.”
  • “[B]oycott the airline which we today re-name “Air Kevorkian” – and just say “No” to Southwest.

There are more, but I’ve gotta go. My Southwest “Ding” bell just went off. Check out the press release in full after the jump.

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“QUIET ROCKLAND” CALLS FOR NATIONWIDE BOYCOTT OF SOUTHWEST AIRLINES

Rockland County, NY – March 12, 2008:

Aero-activist group Quiet Rockland of Rockland County, New York, enraged over “callous criminal disregard for safety and human life” demonstrated by Southwest Airlines (NYSE: “LUV”) and the FAA, today called for: (1) a nationwide traveler and consumer boycott of Southwest, and (2) a federal criminal investigation of Southwest and “failed regulator” FAA to be spear-headed by the United States Attorney General and a special prosecutor.

Said John J. Tormey III, Esq., attorney and Quiet Rockland co-founder: “The persons that should be flying Southwest at this point, should be only those referred by Doctor Kevorkian. Although the depraved Southwest spin-machine audaciously ‘assures’ us Southwest’s six (6) cracked-fuselage aircraft were “never a safety problem”, Southwest should tell that to the victims of the 1988 Aloha Airlines disaster. There, metal fatigue on an aging Boeing 737 caused 18 feet of fuselage to be ripped off the plane causing grievous injuries and loss of life. House Transportation Committee Chairman James Oberstar in his press conference Saturday, posted on “www.cspan.org”, presented detailed evidence incriminating Southwest and “Bobby” Sturgell’s failed FAA. The incriminating events occurred while “Bobby” Sturgell was Deputy Administrator and Acting Administrator of the FAA. On Saturday, Representative Oberstar thereupon rightfully excoriated the aero-perps for their long-standing “tombstone mentality”. Although criminal and morally reprehensible, and now apparent after a many-month detailed Congressional investigation, Southwest and FAA are clearly in the insalubrious business of making those tombstones happen, in addition to simply reacting to those tombstones post facto.

“As recently as last year, Southwest Airlines, with the complicity of supposed federal regulator FAA, on at least 47 of Southwest’s Boeing 737 aircraft, on between 1,451 and 60,000 flights, over a period of two-and-one-half years, deliberately put approximately 200,000 or more unsuspecting travelers in harm’s way – making them fly in un-inspected, non-compliant, aged, and in some cases fuselage-cracked commercial aircraft. Southwest knew the names and faces of their potential victims. Southwest gladly took their money, and for that matter at this point Southwest owes each of them at least a rebate in full of their ticket prices. This was not mere negligence. Irrespective of what forensic lesser charge might technically ultimately apply once further Congressional investigation concludes, the acts and omissions of Southwest and collaborator FAA were tantamount to attempted murder, on a massive scale.

This WILL not stand.

“Quiet Rockland asks and encourages those Southwest employees tired of subscribing to their company’s tombstone culture, to leave their sinking airship now to find other and better employ at a responsible airline that actually acknowledges the dignity of the individual human traveler. We further ask every American consumer to now act in solidarity – cancel all flights and other business with Southwest – boycott the airline which we today re-name “Air Kevorkian” – and just say “No” to Southwest, to FAA, and to the greed of the aeromercantile complex that continually and habitually puts profits over people’s lives. And, as to Southwest stockholders? Vote your conscience”. #