Mickey Kaus Misses The Proof In His Own Backyard

Mickey Kaus, posting at his Slate Kausfiles column, raises doubts to a claim at The Note regarding expanding union membership (again can't link just to that post, so I'll quote instead)

ABC Buries the Lede--For a Reason: Here's Point #4 from yesterday's ABC News Note summary of "key stories" that bear on whether the "Democratic Party [is] on the right track or the wrong track to break from recent electoral patterns ...." Emphasis added:

4. In a front page story, USA Today's Jill Lawrence reports on a resurgence in union membership across the nation and the two main umbrella organizations playing nicely together, which has allowed the House of Labor to move forward with plans to spend $40 million on voter turn out this fall. LINK

Is there "a resurgence in union membership across the nation"? That would be stunning news, since union membership has been in relentless long term decline for fifty years--"from more than 35 percent [in 1955] to 12.5 percent last year, including only 7.9 percent of the private-sector workforce," according to a Thomas Edsall WaPo piece from September, 2005. But I can't find any mention of this surprising resurgence in union membership in the Post, or the New York Times. I can't find it on Google (to the contrary). I can't find it on the website of the "strategic organizing" Change to Win unions--you'd think they'd boast about it. And there's no mention of it in the USA Today story ABC says reports it. (That's a story about unions raising political campaign money and cooperating with each other, which is different.) Tentative conclusion: It doesn't exist. There's no resurgence in union membership. The Note item is in error. [And "it reflects the subconscious liberal yearnings of whatever MSM summer intern wrote it unaware that the cumbersome legalistic mechanisms of Wagner Act unionism are incompatible with productive success in a fast-moving global high-tech economy"?--ed You said that.] 12:57 P.M.

Clearly, Mickey hadn't read this post at Defamer (or the follow-up post with pictures of the strikers) highlighting the brave attempt at organizing by the writers of America's Next Top Model (yes, reality shows have writers, and yes, it's surprising that these folks would want to admit to doing so and allow themselves to be seen in public in connection with that occupation).

See, there's all the evidence you'll ever need that if it wasn't for the union busting antics of evil industrialist like Tyra Banks (heh, heh, he said 'bust' and she's a retired Victoria's Secret model, heh, heh) that "resurgence in union membership across the nation" would really be catching fire.