Gentlemen (and possibly ladies), it's quite possible to have a civil conversation without the name calling. You might try it.
Let's face it-the one and only, the ONE and ONLY, way to integrate seniority lists is by SENIORITY!!!! Pure and simple, I entered the business before, or after you, hence I fit in before, or after, you. The whole idea that some subjective standards like, "my airline was stronger than yours" is ludicrous.
It's not that simple. Because of different cultures and systems, the merger in question with a direct date-of-hire merging would have put USAir FO's in many cases above America West captains.
A much better method was introduced by arbitration involving merging by means of relative position in the seniority chain. That is, those in the top third of seniority at one company merge with the top third of seniority at the other, and so on. this way a junior FO at one company isn't moved into a position being being senior to a senior captain at the other company. A much more equitable means of addressing the issue.
Whereas one company might take a year to upgrade and another eighteen...simply merging by date of hire does nothing to address fairness or equitability between the different parties. Their relative positions in seniority need to be considered every bit as much as the date of hire.
Merging is never an easy process, but it's entirely unfair and inappropriate to suggest that as a result of a merger a junior officer becomes senior to senior personnel at the other company. In this case, particularly so. USAir was five days out from bankrupcy, and was bought and salvaged by America West. Movement was slow in USAir, and USAir had more pilots. Presently there is still a great deal of divisiveness between the USAir pilots and the America West pilots, even though they're the same group. The USAir pilots are attempting to form their own union in the company which separates them from the America West pilots...again, even though they're the same company. Even though they were on the verge of becoming unemployed and the company going under, even though America West "saved the day."
What you have is a case of a body of pilots that were salvaged from a crumbling company with less than a week to go, who hope to move from junior positions to senior positions by means of the merger. Whereas they should have been grateful to have a job, they were not only ungrateful, but ignorantly adamant that they should get it all, including taking away the seniority of the company that bought them out and rescued their positions and future. They're still in the process of doing so, and in fact their own burgeoning union web site claims that they want what's their due. It was never their due...they're just trying to take everything they can get.
It's never so simple as going with date of hire, and being done with the matter, where more than one group is involved.