Talk about going down to the wire.

Today both sides showed up in U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Allan Gropper’s courtroom to present their sides of the “A strike is legal, strike is not legal” argument.

The verdict?

Come back Monday. Yes, that is Monday, as in August 14. One day before the AFA says it will begin CHAOS, or targeted work stoppages, against the airline in protest over the contract Northwest recently imposed on the group.

The judge listened to arguments presented by Northwest Airlines and attorneys representing the airline’s flight attendants, and correctly assessed his situation in our opinion, as he said, “The question before me today is a fairly narrow one of the intersection between the bankruptcy code and the Railway Labor Act.”

Exactly right.