Yesterday I posted a classic country song, so today I thought I’d post something contemporary in the country genre. I’m not a fan of most mainstream country music these days (though alt-country is a whole other thing); however, for Kacey Musgraves I will very happily make an exception. Musgraves is the real deal and an original, a fine songwriter with a unique voice.

Below is a video of her big hit, “Merry Go ‘Round.” Combining empathy and sharp social commentary, it’s a song that tells some hard truths about life in white, working-class, small-town red America. Take a listen. And check out her album, too — it’s called Same Trailer, Different Park. It’s got several other songs as good as this one.

Gail Collins has an interesting column about why it is that the Republicans have lost it over Obamacare. There are many reasons for the hysteria, of course — it’s one of those things that is entirely overdetermined. But Collins thinks that a big part of the answer is, very simply, that although they hate entitlements with a passion, they can’t go after Medicare and Social Security any more, because those two programs are sacred cows to their elderly voter base. Here’s Collins:

But here’s my long-term theory. Over the past few years, Republicans have terrified their most fervent followers about Obamacare in order to disguise the fact that they no longer knew what to say about their old bête noir, entitlements. Now they can’t turn the temperature down.

Let’s review. Not so very long ago, worrying about entitlements was central to Republican identity. Then, they began to notice that the folks at their rallies looked like the audience for “Matlock” reruns. The base was aging, and didn’t want to change Social Security or Medicare. The base didn’t even want to be reminded that Social Security and Medicare were federal programs.

Collins gives many recent examples of the spectacle of Republicans falling all over themselves to defend Social Security and/or Medicare:

During the last Republican primary debates, Gov. Rick Perry called Social Security a “Ponzi scheme.” Mitt Romney jumped all over him, then raced off to tell a conservative talk show host that if the Republicans nominated someone with Perry’s view on Social Security “we would be obliterated as a party.”

This year, when President Obama proposed a budget that actually did reduce the rate at which Social Security benefits would rise in the future, the chair of the National Republican Congressional Committee denounced it as “a shocking attack on seniors.

People like Paul Ryan still fiddled with Medicare, but only in wonkese that didn’t trickle down to the public. There were vague references to the need to “protect” programs for the elderly. But the party had lost its old rallying cry. Enter health care reform.

In fact, they’ve now decided they love Medicare so much that they’re claiming that the ACA poses a threat to it:

All over the nation, Tea Party politicians have been telling their most fervid constituents that Obamacare will bring the federal government into the nation’s health system, thus wrecking the wonderful coverage they now enjoy with Medicare. Which comes into their homes through the chimney, where it is dropped by free-enterprise storks.

I just wonder where all this leads for them. Do they have no strategy, ever, of trying to attract a broader base, a base that may well decide it likes the ACA? They’re probably reckoning that, by the time they need to/choose to reach out, so many years will have gone by that few people will remember their initial hatred of the law. After all, they are so shameless that they have no problem posing, now, as the ardent defenders of Social Security and Medicare, two programs that, historically, they despised. In years to come, what’s to stop them from embracing ACA as well?

Or maybe I’m just overthinking this. Judging by its recent actions, the G.O.P. is behaving very much as if the future doesn’t figure into its calculations at all. If they cared very much about the future of the Republicans a viable national party, it’s hard to believe they’d be taking so many actions that alienate key demographic groups (Latinos, women, young people) now.

Over at In These Times, Michelle Chen reports about an engine of economic inequality you may not have considered before: taxpayer-funded government contracts. She writes:

The progressive think tank Demos calculates in a new research report that private contractors have funneled up to $24 billion in federal funds into executive salaries. Yet, according to the analysis, the same system of contracted firms—from defense manufacturers to concession stands at national tourist sites—also employs hundreds of thousands of poverty-wage workers at the bottom.

There’s been talk about capping CEO pay, and earlier this year President Obama announced he supported limiting the CEO pay of defense contractors to $400,000. So far, such efforts have gotten nowhere. But reining in executive excess is important, in part because it complements ongoing campaigns to raise the pay of low-wage federal contract workers.

President Obama doesn’t even need Congress to do something about unequal pay in federal contracts. Activists are calling on him to sign executive orders that would both put a cap on executive pay for contracted firms, and create a living wage for low-wage contact employees.

They advocate other reforms to the federal contracting system as well:

DEMOS and other reform advocates recommend that contracting in general should be minimized “when work can be done more efficiently and effectively by government employees than private companies.” In addition, the group calls on the White House to enact reforms to avoid “contracts with companies that regularly violate wage and hour laws, workplace health and safety regulations, or other employment protections.”

Given the Republican-controlled Congress, President Obama has little power to proactively enact a legislative agenda. And with each passing month, he drifts closer to lame duck status. Actions to increase the wages of low-paid federal employees, or cap the executive pay of excessively compensated ones, would likely be widely popular. And as Chen argues, “taxpayer-funded federal contracts should reflect the values of a democratic social contract.” I hope the President acts soon.

We’ve heard about all the political madness this week, and all the needless pain and suffering that’s being inflicted on the nation by the lemmings in suicide vests.

But there was one thing I read this week that, for me, was a real bright spot. It’s a delightful Dissent article written by Katie J.M. Baker and carrying the irresistible title, “Cockblocked by Redistribution: A Pick-up Artist in Demark.” C’mon: based on the title alone, you know you’re going to read it, right?

Expanding on that title: the “pick-up artists,” for those of you unfamiliar with the term, are a community of male misogynists who share tips about how to get women to have sex with them. They do this, in part, by peddling some very nasty, long-discredited ideas about social Darwinism. They are exploitative, manipulative creeps who thrive on controlling women and undermining their self-confidence. One of their classic techniques is the “neg,” or the back-handed compliment.

One of the best-known PUAs is someone who calls himself Roosh. This charming fellow, says Baker, is “the author of the ‘Bang’ series of travel guides, which trains readers to seduce women based on derogatory ethnic stereotypes.” There’s Bang Brazil, Bang Iceland … etc., ad nauseam.

Except, quite dramatically, there is one called Don’t Bang Denmark. Roosh cautions, “This book is a warning of how bad things can get for a single man looking for beautiful, feminine, sexy women.” Why did Roosh strike out with the ladies there? Baker says it was because of “[t]he country’s excellent social welfare services. Really.”

As Baker explains, in Denmark, health care and education are free. There is universal child care and generous paid parental leave. Women earn a significantly greater percentage of family income in Danish families than in American families. The takeaway is that Danish women not as nearly so economically dependent on men as American women are, and that this results in far more egalitarian relationships and gender roles.

read more »

I am hardly the first person to point this out, but in the context of this week’s political madness, it bears repeating: it would be difficult to exaggerate the role of racial resentment in the G.O.P. war on President Obama and his signature achievement, the ACA.

Here’s some strong supporting evidence: the single group that is most disproportionately likely to be excluded from health care coverage under the ACA is poor black folks. A coinky-dink, perhaps? Hardly; it’s happening because the Republican-controlled states where they live are refusing Medicaid expansion. Still don’t get the picture? How about this: all but one state in the Deep South have refused the free money from the feds to expand Medicaid.

Yesterday in this space, Ed Kilgore noted that “Republican House members from districts with poor and black folks—or next door to heavily poor and black areas—are very likely to be more savagely opposed to Obamacare than anyone else.” And that is not a bug, it’s a feature. As Ed explained:

[Y]our average very conservative southern Republican House member doesn’t much think of black folk as “constituents.” And they are elected not to tend to black folks but to keep them from “looting” the resources of the GOP Member’s real constituents, via Obamacare or other socialistic means.

[Snip]

They aren’t really representing those people. They’re keeping them down.

Just this week, pollster Stan Greenberg released a new report on GOP voters, based on focus group research. It’s full of fascinating stuff, but what is most relevant here is what the report has to say about how large the role of racial animus continues to loom in the imagination of the GOP base:

We expected that in this comfortable setting or in their private written notes, some would make a racial reference or racist slur when talking about the African American President. None did. They know that is deeply non-PC and are conscious about how they are perceived. But focusing on that misses how central is race to the worldview of Republican voters. They have an acute sense that they are white in a country that is becoming increasingly “minority,” and their party is getting whooped by a Democratic Party that uses big government programs that benefit mostly minorities, create dependency and a new electoral majority. Barack Obama and Obamacare is a racial flashpoint for many Evangelical and Tea Party voters.

Some things never change, do they?

“Jolene” is a classic Dolly Parton song that’s been covered by everyone from Patti Smith to Miley Cyrus. And no wonder: it’s one of her most powerful recordings. But then someone was struck by the inspiration to listen to Parton’s “Jolene” 45 at 33 rpm. The result is a revelation — a performance that’s even more haunting and hypnotic than the original. Take a listen.

So the week drags to a close. Somebody let me know if there’s a breakthrough in Washington this weekend. I don’t plan to watch CSPAN. Go Dawgs and Go Braves!

Here are some final items of the day:

* Brookings’ Thomas Mann mocks GOP claims they uniquely represent America.

* Most predictable column in years: Peggy Noonan says Obama must lead like Reagan did!

* Ramesh Ponnuru gently reminds Republicans they can’t get a fiscal deal without giving Democrats some wins.

* At Ten Miles Square, Rachel Cohen pushes back against argument that powers currently enjoyed by NSA could have prevented 9/11.

* At College Guide, Daniel Luzer looks at Swiss apprenticeship system as possible alternative to universal college access (which in any event is growing more distant).

And in non-political news:

* New ABC sitcom Lucky 7 canceled after just two episodes.

That’s it for this week of destructive stupidity afflicting the Body Politic. Kathleen Geier will be back for Weekend Blogging, and will surely have much to say.

As commenter Kevin Moriarty mentioned earlier today, if the musical theme is a tribute to Sputnik, a song about satellites is essential. So here’s the incomparable Ventures performing “Telstar” in 1981.

Selah.

I’ve been wondering when it might sink into the DC consciousness that at some point the federal government shutdown will start affecting grants-in-aid to states and localities, and the essential low-income services they finance. Here’s MSNBC’s Adam Serwer:

Federal food aid for low-income Americans could dwindle if the government shutdown drags into the next month-leaving the states in charge of deciding to cut off benefits altogether or to dig into local coffers to feed the needy.

The USDA has said it will fund the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)-which helps feed about 45 million Americans a year, most of whom are children or elderly-through the end of October….

If the shutdown lasts into November, Americans reliant on SNAP could find themselves without aid, depending on the fiscal health of the state or the priorities of state leadership. A spokesperson for the Indiana Family and Social Services Administration told MSNBC that “If the shutdown continues beyond October, the State of Indiana will assess its resources and consider its options for continuing to provide SNAP benefits.” Similarly, a spokesperson for Mississippi’s Department of Human Services said they would look to the USDA for guidance.

Some states are already cutting back on assistance for the poor. Arizona has stopped paying Temporary Assistance for Needy Families benefits entirely for the duration of the shutdown. Children are being turned away from Head Start programs closed because of the shutdown. The USDA has said it can fund the Women, Infants and Children food aid program through October, but as with SNAP states could be on their own if the shutdown drags into November.

So it’s not just a matter of what happens to “non-essential” federal employees. And at least employees can be voted “back pay.” It’s kind of hard to vote “back food.”

Unfortunately, cuts in federal food aid are likely to be considered a feature rather than a bug of the shutdown to many of the House Republicans driving this crazy train.

Watching this show roll on, I’m really beginning to feel like the “girl with the mousy hair” in Bowie’s “Is There Life On Mars?”

So long as House Republicans maintain the initiative in the current fiscal fight, we’re all living in Robert Costa’s world. His latest missive from Boehnerland (entitled “The Emerging Offer”) suggests that the Speaker and such helpmeets as Paul Ryan are already far advanced in working on the end-game about which we were earlier led to believe conservatives had no clue. And guess what? It looks like a slimmed down version of the debt increase package Boenher tossed out last week as a way to keep restive conservatives on board—you know, the one I called “the devil’s Christmas tree” and alternatively “an evil child’s wish list to Santa.” Check it out as Costa cruises slowly through the possibilities:

[T]he final volley of the fiscal impasse, at least for House Republicans, is already being brokered. And according to my top sources — both members and senior aides — it won’t end with a clean CR, or with a sprawling, 2011-style budget agreement. It’ll end with an offer — a relatively modest mid-October offer that concurrently connects a debt-limit extension, government funding, and a small, but strategically designed menu of conservative demands….

What I’m hearing: There will be a “mechanism” for revenue-neutral tax reform, ushered by Ryan and Michigan’s Dave Camp, that will encourage deeper congressional talks in the coming year. There will be entitlement-reform proposals, most likely chained CPI and means testing Medicare; there will also be some health-care provisions, such as a repeal of the medical-device tax, which has bipartisan support in both chambers. Boehner, sources say, is expected to go as far as he can with his offer. Anything too small will earn conservative ire; anything too big will turn off Democrats….

House leaders are also looking at how to include some energy demands, such as the Keystone pipeline, but tax reform and entitlements are looking to be the core of the offer, and the medical-device tax is seen as the rare health-care demand that’s viable as part of a deal.

You get the feeling Costa’s informants are really proud of themselves for being so very modest in their demands, albeit with some worry that it won’t be enough for the Tea Folk, some of whom would just as soon see a debt default anyway.

Nowhere in the piece, of course, is there any recognition that the president and Harry Reid might mean what they say in stating over and over again that they will not negotiate over a debt limit increase. And this whole strategy also moots the question of a deal over the CR, which would be rolled into the debt limit increase, which means “non-essential” federal employees can plan on cooling their heels for another two weeks.

Days ago, when things began to bubble up about Boehner’s decision to move toward a larger fiscal package, many House Republicans, even his close friends, thought he was maybe trying for a “grand bargain” — a broad deal that’d include some revenue and tax reform, among other policy fixes. But after Boehner brought that kind of deal up at the White House earlier this week, and Democratic leaders dismissed it, he appears to have retreated slightly — looking to go big, but not grand.

Mighty nice of him, eh?

House Democrats better start getting that discharge petition for a clean CR and a clean debt limit increase warmed up. Boehner and company seem to be living on a different planet than the rest of us.

In another fine item at Wonkblog today, Ezra Klein interviews University of Washington political scientist Christopher Parker, who’s done considerable research on the Tea Party, and particularly its attitudes towards racial and ethnic minorities. Parker has focused additionally on differentiating Tea Party conservatives from regular old-fashioned non-radicalized conservatives. And when Ezra objects to Parker’s characterization of Tea Folk as relatively more “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, and anti-Obama,” he replies:

What I do in these surveys and models is I account for desire for limited government. I account for ideology. I account for all these other things where people could say they’re just more conservative. There’s just this empirical connection between support for the tea party and antagonistic views toward quote-unquote marginalized groups, or, if you prefer, toward quote-unquote not real Americans…..

But however you feel about Parker’s general take on the Tea Folk, what’s most immediately gripping is his data on their attitudes about Obama and the danger he represents, as presented in a new book he wrote with Matt Barreto entitled Change They Can’t Believe In: The Tea Party and Reactionary Politics in America:

We also ask if people think Obama is destroying the country. We asked this question of all self-identified conservatives. If you look at all conservatives, 35 percent believe that. If you look at tea party conservatives and non-tea party conservatives, only six percent of non-tea party conservatives believe that vs. 71 percent of tea party conservatives.

71% think Obama is “destroying the country.” Wow. So is it any great surprise that these same people, and the House members who identify with them, are willing to go to dangerous lengths to mess up Obama’s signature policy achievement and force a significant change in the federal government’s direction? Who cares about the risk of destroying the economy if the destruction of the country itself is the current trajectory?

Fighting dystopia with dystopia!

Maybe it’s the shutdown news tedium, or the first travel-free weekend in a while, but I’ve got a really bad case of Friday Fever today. Can’t wait to get moving on doing little or nothing. But it makes me feel sorry for Weekend Workers, too, particularly those with second and third jobs—and also for the involuntarily idle.

Here are some midday snacks from the hamper:

* New York Times’ Adam Liptak has good summary of legal theories Obama could use to unilaterally boost debt limit.

* National Review urges conservatives to go small in fiscal negotiations, maybe evening offering Democrats a reprieve from sequestration.

* Emerging portrait of woman killed by Capitol Police after high-speed chase down Pennsylvania Avenue shows someone with history of mental illness. But as Josh Marshall notes, fear of car bomb may have dictated policy tactics.

* Josh Green argues Republicans have completely detached themselves from business interests in shutdown crisis.

* House Democrats plotting discharge petition strategy for “clean CR.” Hard to do, and would require at least 18 GOPers, but not impossible.

And in non-political news:

* A-Rod sues MLB for suspension, alleging “witch hunt.”

Can’t have Space Music without Bowie, so here’s David performing “Moonage Daydream” during the Ziggy Stardust tour with Mick Ronson on guitar. Make me know you really care/Make me jump into the air.

Back in a bit.

After days and days of MSM analysts blaming the government shutdown on “partisan gerrymandering” by Republicans that insulated their House members from public opinion, somebody had to point out the rampant confusion about what partisanship in redistricting involves, and TNR’s Nate Cohn was up to the task:

[T]he fact that gerrymandering boosted the total number of House Republicans does not mean that gerrymandering made the GOP more likely to support extreme positions or shutdown the government. In fact, partisan gerrymandering usually reduces the number of extremely red districts. Why? Because the point of partisan gerrymandering isn’t to try and maximize the number of safe districts. The goal is to maximize the number of districts that are merely safe enough by packing as many of your opponents’ voters as you can into a small number of extremely partisan districts while safely distributing the rest throughout your own districts. In this way, gerrymandering may actually increase the number of moderate Republicans.

While Nate’s basically right, there are, in fact, different kinds of “partisanship gerrymandering,” some done for the benefit of incumbents and some for the party as a whole. The bigger problem with blaming polarization on gerrymandering is that the evidence is at best mixed that Republicans in safer seats are more conservative than those in relatively competitive seats. In fact, competitive-seat Republicans sometimes have a very practical incentive to go wingnutty: it’s good for volunteer recruitment and small-donor fundraising.

In any event, polarization of the population, which reduces the number of “median voters” on which the ancient “median voter” theory of centripetal pressure on the parties is based, may be as big or bigger a factor as anything mechanical—or fixable—like gerrymandering in creating the kind of atmosphere we have in Washington today.

There may be deeper dynamics of the current fiscal fight that are eluding me or that only Politico-style digging in the dirt can expose. But Jonathan Chait sure seems to succinctly capture the basic obstacles to any sort of bipartisan resolution right now:

[T]he bigger problem here is that conservatives are not acknowledging the Democrats’ belief [that they can’t negotiate over the debt limit]. It’s not a pose. They genuinely think, regardless of the merits of the ransom demand, they can’t give in, both for the national long-term interest and on moral principle. Conservatives are acting like the problem here is that they asked for a bit too much to begin with, and want to start haggling down the price. The price isn’t the issue. If the conservative goal is to create the illusion of winning something for the debt ceiling, then they’ll come back next time to win more, and Democrats can’t allow that.

This gap in comprehension is reflected even more in John Boehner’s otherwise baffling simultaneous assertions that he won’t allow a debt default but intends to rally Republicans around a tough negotiating stance on the debt limit. The only way this makes any sense is if negotiations are a given, and the Speaker’s simply saying there are limits to how far he’ll go to win maximum concessions. In other words, he won’t demand an unreasonable price for increasing the debt limit. But if any price is unreasonable, where do Republicans go then? To a fantasy world where two plus two equals five?

It’s unusual that a sitting governor’s comments are so inappropriate that they fluster an interviewer, but clearly, PA Gov. Tom Corbett is himself unusual.

I’m beginning to understand why this guy’s looking so toasty for re-election. What a jerk.