Local resident Dan Picton, at the outset of his irresponsible, fact-challenged harangue about the Freedom Foundation during last Thursday’s Chelan City Council meeting, waved around the hard hat he used to wear during his younger days as a union laborer.

If the “substance” of his comments is any indication, the hat might very well be made of tin foil.

Picton opened his testimony by regurgitating the familiar lie that the Freedom Foundation is funded by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and the Koch brothers—as though that would somehow be worse than cashing checks from George Soros and Tom Steyer.

Then Picton veered completely off the rails, comparing the organization to “Nazis hunting the Jews,” and calling Freedom Foundation staffers Jami Lund and David Dewhirst—who attended the meeting at the city council’s invitation—”carpetbaggers” who deserved to be “…escorted out of town after a good application of hot tar and feathers.”

Seasoned debaters recognize two things when their opponent stoops to threats and personal attacks in lieu of thoughtful discourse:

• the opponent has no substance to offer; and,
• the opponent knows he’s losing.

Picton is a perfect representation of the unions’ position with respect to the local labor reform measures Lund and Dewhirst were in Chelan to support. They know they don’t have a legal or intellectual leg to stand on in this fight. They’re also scared out of their wits by the Freedom Foundation and our efforts to undermine labor’s influence over Washington state politics.

So they respond with the only tools remaining to them—anger, threats and name-calling.

Make no mistake about it: We’re on the winning side of history in this struggle, and so are our countless friends and supporters.

The man in the tinfoil hat proves that far better than any words ever could.