of unions to the growing debate over banning transit strikes, and for analysis we're joined by debra saunders, san francisco chronicle columnist, carla, san francisco chronicle senior political writer, and tom bakar, consumer editor. i want to begin with you, tom. what are the latest developments, and how did this situation deteriorate so badly? >> i think it deteriorated so badly because both sides had great expectations for what they wanted, and they were so far apart that there was never a chance for them to actually meet. i think this thing was dead on arrival the minute they started and even though there were certain concessions made, the reality of the situation was that they were so far apart that it was impossible for them to get together. >> they had a press blush within the half hour basically saying nothing has changed. >> basically what the union said was, look, if -- we'll take the money we've agreed on and all of that stuff, but what we want you to do is allow these other issues, these work rules issues and some of these other issues to be arbitrated, and we'll just live with wh