A couple of days ago, I posted a note from the president of the Communications Workers of America, Morty Bahr, who questioned my assertion—and that of others—that the rebel unions accounted for 40 percent of the votes of AFL-CIO unions. Morty asserted that the rebels only accounted for 30 percent of the per capita votes—the difference, in theory, being that while the unions accounted for 40 percent of the unions on the AFL-CIO council, they were not paying dues to the AFL-CIO on their full memberships, which is how votes are tallied when it comes to the July convention.

So far, I stand by the numbers. I’ve checked with a reliable source who says that all the rebel unions (UNITE-HERE, Teamsters, UFCW, Laborer, SEIU) pay dues on their full members; so does the UAW, which supported the rebels positions on the Teamsters proposals. The total votes cast for the Teamsters proposals were 5.2 million out of 13 million which works out to 40 percent. If Morty or anyone else has better info, please post.

Though I have to say, rather than quibble about the numbers, it would be far more useful to talk about the substance of the proposals.