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Poli was also criticized by other unionists for failing to try to explain the issues to members of Congress and for even refusing the offer of a public relations firm to help him get his union's story across to the public. Said one labor insider about Poli: "He may be a good traffic controller, but he is over his head as an administrator and political strategist." A former PATCO official said acidly of Poli: "He's taking his members on a trip to Jonestown with a few gallons of Kool-Aid."
Despite a genuine spirit of camaraderie, the picket lines were not without expressions of fear and even some criticism of Poli's strategy. At New Jersey's huge Newark Airport, a controller with eight years experience said sadly, "I never thought it would come to this. I thought Reagan was bluffing." Poli, he said, should have taken the court injunctions banning the strike as a reason to surrender with honor. "He could have said that he didn't want to give the Federal Government an excuse to bust the union and that he was ordering us back under protest. I think he blew it." Sandi Engel, a controller at Illinois' busy Aurora center, is married to a union welder who opposes the strike. Says she: "Every morning he tells me, 'What you're doing is illegal. You're going to jail.' "
Any doubts, however, seemed much in the minority. At a noisy PATCO rally in Hollis, N.H.,* Controller Joe Gannon, 39, noted the nonstrike oath he had taken but observed: "I have a much higher oath. I could not bring myself to the position of handling all those aircraft under the stresses I was being subjected to, knowing that I was affecting hundreds of lives. I had a moral obligation." Picketing at New York's J.F.K. Airport, Pat Hagen, 36, said firmly: "Some of us may go to jail. I don't think I'd be normal if I wasn't frightened, but I'm not intimidated. This union is tight, almost like a family." Walking beside him was his own family, Wife Diane and three children.
Said she: "I can tell when he walks in the door, by the slant of his shoulders and the way he's holding his head, that he's had a bad day."
Almost unanimously, certainly wishfully, the striking controllers predict that the Administration's plans to replace them will not work. Contended Controller Dick Holzhauer at an Oakland, Calif., radar center: "If we hang together, I know they can't run the system without us. They're going to want their pound of flesh, but they'll settle." Asked Controller Roger Hicks at Houston Intercontinental Airport: "Where are they going to get 13,000 controllers and train them before the economy sinks? The reality is, we are it. They have to deal with us."