Humble SLF
I think the people talking about US carriers are missing the point. The product both hard and soft is just not good enough. You can go on about govt support and everything else but even the soft product is poor in comparison. I travel a fair bit and tend to use 3 carriers SQ/LH/EK for all long haul travel. The US carriers are not in the same league as the above in either faculty. Also I would point out that as I am UK based, I would also say BA has also lost my business for the same reason,s, combined with the fact that they are London centric and I chose to live in the north where BA have just about abandoned us anyway !
To sum up if the US customer service reverted to somthing like it used to be when I first started traveling over there when I was a student (and we are talking about mid 1970,s) then you might start to see some improvment, but the only thing I have noticed over the intervening years when I have to go there (I tend to get work in swathes there so approx 10 year gaps) has been the race to the bottom by all of them. Slick advertisment like that does not make it any better, just shows the oposition you are worried that you are not good enough.
Regards
Mr Mac