Maybe I should go into politics

In light of a former Sen Al D’Amato (from New York) being thrown off a Jet Blue flight Monday after trying to lead passengers in a rebellion, after a 6-and-half-hour delay, I was reminded of my coup in a San Jose airport.

If you’ve been a consistent business traveler, as I have, you know what I’m talking about.

Related: Mainstream media can still save itself

I was in the San Jose airport and my flight was late back to Seattle.

Now, the way this works, at least at that time, is that once a flight is marked late, the airlines are not incentivized to care about you anymore, because you’ve already blown their on time percentage.

There were two flights on the same airline back to Seattle. (I had done something sneaky and booked myself beforehand on both flights. The airlines didn’t like that I did that but that’s what I used to do.)

The second flight was boarding before the delayed, first flight. I was outraged because I wanted my friends on the first flight to fly with me. And I thought the flight that was scheduled first should leave first.

I stood up and yelled “Ladies and Gentlemen, as an MVP Gold member of this airline, I want you to know something. Those of us on the earlier flight are getting the shaft. Our flight is already late but they’re not boarding us. They’re boarding a plane that is on time. They’re doing it to preserve the on-time percentage. People this unfair. The people on the first, late flight should get to fly on the second airplane. Come and stand with me and get on the second flight.” And everyone yelled hurrah!

And the airline changed it. The people on the earlier, late flight got to leave first. To the credit of the people on the second flight, they said, yes this is fair. And they let the late people go first.

I couldn’t believe that people were being nice, in an airport, on a Friday night, on the way home.

But I led the revolt. Maybe I should get into politics!

As always, please listen to the full audio clip for complete context.