Organized labor is running ads claiming that current labor laws prevent them from signing up new members.  Too bad the facts aren’t cooperating.  Today the Bureau of Labor Statistics is reporting that 428,000 more workers joined unions last year, the largest such jump since the Bureau began keeping track in 1983.

So if union membership is growing at a healthy clip and unions typically win well over half of workplace elections, why do they need the so-called "Employee Free Choice Act"?  The answer is simple: unions want the ability to organize on the cheap by stripping workers of a secret ballot and putting the government in charge of union contracts.

And as usual, it all boils down to politics and money: AFSCME head Gerald McEntee called Card Check a "payback" for organized labor’s 2008 election efforts. The unions get the power to conduct quick-and-dirty organizing, while workers are stripped of a private vote and subjected to binding contracts without a vote.  To top it all off, the bill would impose one-sided penalties that would only encourage questionable "recruitment methods" by union organizers.

Today’s BLS numbers reveal that Card Check is a power grab in search of a problem, as unnecessary as it is unsavory in terms of diluting worker protections and threatening American jobs.