I picked up on a story Monday that I thought might be a good topic for today’s post but didn’t realize how timing would play out with President Obama speaking to the Nation last night. I’ve got to admit, our new President is one of the most eloquent speakers I’ve seen in some time. I can appreciate a well delivered speech when I see one and he needs to get Congress on his side when he submits his tax and spending plans to Congress on Thursday.

Last week, President Barack Obama signed the sprawling $787 billion economic stimulus package into law, saying it will help the struggling U.S. economy but warning that the recovery process will be challenging. I would agree with the warning, because it will end up costing over $1 Trillion when it’s all said and done. (It needs to be paid back, you realize that?) The Market reacted to the news by selling off and savvy investors realize how much this bailout will hurt when it’s time to pay it back.

Right or wrong about this stimulus package being good or bad, bailing out America seems to be a hot topic these days and there are large numbers who appear to want a piece of the action, including the ASTA. I don’t know if you saw this editorial cartoon in Travel Weekly the day after the inauguration, but it spoke volumes about how demanding and desperate this industry is. I’ve had it up to here with all this talk about how everything is fine and things are “great” when actions certainly don’t provide a very good foundation to those statements. With all the victim talk we’ve read about day after day, the mud slinging and spin on the “issues” with Travel MLM’s, Agencies either downsizing, or disappearing overnight, and involuntary bankruptcy filed by Agents themselves things aren’t as rosy as some claim. Things have gotten so bad for the industry that after decades of fighting to keep banks out of the industry, all of the sudden Agents are willing to look the other way.

And now we find out that the ASTA DID have it’s hand out for part of the $787 billion to stimulate there struggling model once again.

“The inclusion of a direct lending program in the House-passed version of this bill raised hope among ASTA’s small business travel agents,” said Chris Russo, ASTA president and chair. “Sadly, Congressional negotiators, meeting behind closed doors, chose to remove the direct lending provision mere hours before the bill was complete. Whatever small cost savings they achieved came at the expense of the small business community.”

In a letter sent last week, Russo asked President Obama to call for the swift passage of legislation to expand the authority of the Small Business Administration to lend directly to small business owners.

Based on what I heard last night, they’ll be given another shot at even more money to be spent by this new administration next year.

But I have to ask why the ASTA even needs this money in the first place when everyone is telling me that business is better than ever? Some certainly know how to talk the talk, but when it comes to walking the walk we get this? Very odd don’t you think?

The ASTA is still pitching (or promoting) how important they are to the Travel Agent community after this failed attempt to help the industry while even they admit that “the brand damage from the old days when ASTA was perceived as too political”. The ASTA claims agents need an “attitude adjustment” (finally, something we can agree on!) but Agents need the ASTA to help them.

To be fair, I have seen a couple of issues they’ve been helpful in over the last year, but apparently it’s not enough for the majority of the Travel Agent community to shift their perceptions concerning how this organization can help them. Honestly, I’ve come to the conclusion most of these agents who don’t join are just more comfortable about complaining than they are about effective change, so this plea by the ASTA in this article will fall on deaf ears. In addition, most agent don’t truly understand what leverage can do to benefit them. Instead, most ridicule the concept and poke fun at it being only an MLM concept.

It is however comforting to see that even the ASTA is having difficulty getting their message across to a group who believes they know better, and not willing to change their flavor of Kool-aid, because it sounds too much like MLM.

Maloney said that ASTA now has some 200 Premium members and 4,000 Core members, a number that he said “we can grow,” if agents are aware of the range of services they can get from ASTA for “77 cents a day” – the per diem cost of annual Core membership.

This “.77 cents a day” is taken directly from MLM, (or so they think) and it doesn’t play well. Instead of seeing the benifit, they reject this concept because most have been trained to. (It’s also called brainwashing.)

Time will tell if this industry wakes up and pulls ITSELF out of this funk they’re in. I see people everyday who are making smart choices and even sacrifices today that will pay off for them in the long run. I promise you’ll see a good number of people who will come out of this extremely wealthy because of it.

I doubt it will be because of a handout or bailout, it rarely is.

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