THE MORALITY OF BUDGET CHOICES.... House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) raised an interesting rhetorical point in Tennessee over the weekend, which is worth considering in more detail.

In a speech Sunday night to the annual National Religious Broadcasters convention, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) will frame the current debate on federal spending as a moral question, not just an economic one.

"We have a moral responsibility to address the problems we face," Boehner says in his prepared remarks. "That means working together to cut spending and rein in government - not shutting it down." [...]

Boehner also will cast the problem of America's $14.1 trillion national debt in moral terms, arguing that Congress has "a moral responsibility to deal with this threat to freedom and liberate our economy from the shackles of debt and unrestrained government."

"Yes, this debt is a mortal threat to our country; it is also a moral threat," Boehner says in the prepared speech. "It is immoral to bind our children to as leeching and destructive a force as debt. It is immoral to rob our children's future and make them beholden to China. No society is worthy that treats its children so shabbily."

Now, at face value, I'll gladly endorse the idea that there's a moral component to policymakers' decisions, and I'm perfectly comfortable with Boehner talking about "moral threats" and "moral responsibilities." Indeed, I'm actually glad to hear him framing the process in those terms.

But I'd love to hear more from the Speaker about the extent of his moral commitments. Do we have a moral responsibility to address the needs of children? Boehner doesn't seem to think so -- he wants to gut funding for nutritional aid for pregnant women and women with young children, as well as education. Do we have a moral responsibility to tend to those hurt while wearing the uniform? Boehner doesn't seem to think so -- he wants to take money out of veterans' care.

Indeed, as long as the Speaker brought it up, what does he consider our collective moral responsibilities in the 21st century? Do they include environmental protections, which he's trying to eliminate, or health care coverage, which he's trying to destroy? Do they include job training, which he's sought to eliminate, or consumer protections like food safety, which Boehner has voted to dramatically scale back?

If none of these areas of public life count as "moral responsibilities," what would Boehner consider worthy?

As for the importance of not treating our "children so shabbily," I'd also remind the Speaker that he's already fought -- and continues to fight -- to cut Head Start, student loans, Title I grants (which help schools with kids who live in poverty), and nutritional aid for pregnant women and women with young children. This, in the mind of the nation's most powerful Republican, will help make children's futures brighter. (I suspect most families would prefer "shabbily" to this.)

And as long we're on the subject, I'm curious when, exactly, Boehner discovered that "this debt is a moral threat to our country." Was a $6 trillion debt a moral threat? How about an $8 trillion debt? The answer matters because it was none other than John Boehner who enthusiastically supported Bush-era policies that roughly doubled the national debt in just eight years, and handed Democrats a $1.3 trillion deficit and a $10 trillion debt to clean up.

Boehner never saw any of this as a "moral threat" until after he'd made the mess he's now whining about. I wonder why that is?

ANTI-UNION ARGUMENTS FAIL TO PERSUADE AMERICAN MAINSTREAM.... The main thrust of the Republican Party's union-busting efforts, in Wisconsin and elsewhere, is to undermine the Democratic Party electorally, while cutting one of the few remaining champions of working families off at the knees.

To help make that happen, some in the GOP hope to convince the American mainstream that public employees and collective-bargaining rights are some kind of national blight. How's that effort working out? According to a New York Times/CBS News poll released last night, not at all well.

Americans oppose weakening the bargaining rights of public employee unions by a margin of nearly two to one: 60 percent to 33 percent. While a slim majority of Republicans favored taking away some bargaining rights, they were outnumbered by large majorities of Democrats and independents who said they opposed weakening them.

Those surveyed said they opposed, 56 percent to 37 percent, cutting the pay or benefits of public employees to reduce deficits, breaking down along similar party lines. A majority of respondents who have no union members living in their households opposed both cuts in pay or benefits and taking away the collective bargaining rights of public employees.

Governors in both parties have been making the case that public workers are either overpaid or have overly generous health and pension benefits. But 61 percent of those polled -- including just over half of Republicans -- said they thought the salaries and benefits of most public employees were either "about right" or "too low" for the work they do.

The poll closely mirrors the results from Gallup last week, but offers more details about public attitudes. In this case, nearly all of those details suggest the arguments from the right are failing badly.

Indeed, one result in particular may cause heart palpitations in some GOP circles: "Asked how they would choose to reduce their state's deficits, those polled preferred tax increases over benefit cuts for state workers by nearly two to one."

That's probably not what Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) wanted to hear.

What's more, people in every income group oppose compensation and benefit cuts for public employees. Cuts had the most support from those making more than $100,000 a year, and even within this group, a plurality opposed cutting pay or benefits.

If Walker and his allies assumed Americans would rally behind them, these Republicans badly misread public attitudes.

Postscript: And in case that weren't quite enough, a new survey from the Pew Research Center found Americans siding with workers over Wisconsin's Walker, 42% to 31%.

MONDAY'S MINI-REPORT.... Today's edition of quick hits:

* Libya: "Colonel Muammar el-Qaddafi's forces struck back on three fronts on Monday, using fighter jets, special forces units and regular army troops in an escalation of hostilities that brought Libya closer to civil war."

* The Pentagon has "begun repositioning Navy warships to support possible action against Libya," at least as part of a "range of options." Also, President Obama used an executive order to freeze of $30 billion in Libyan assets, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the U.S. stands ready to offer "any type of assistance" to Libyans seeking to oust Moammar Gadhafi.

* For his part, Gadhafi talked to ABC's Christiane Amanpour today and, with a straight face, denied there were demonstrations against him anywhere in Libya. "My people love me. They would die for me," he said.

* Speaking to the nation's governors, President Obama today urged them not to vilify public workers. "I believe that everybody should be prepared to give up something to solve our budget challenges," Obama said. "In fact, many public employees in your respective states have already agreed to cuts. But let me also say this: I don't think it does anybody any good when public employees are denigrated or vilified or when their rights are infringed upon."

* In Wisconsin, a moderate Republican state senator considered a compromise with unions and Senate Democrats. In response, his GOP caucus considered expelling him from the Republican Party.

* If you want to make the job market even worse, pass the Republicans' Medicaid block-grant proposal.

* Hmm: "A group of six senators hashing out a bipartisan plan on deficit and debt reduction will meet for 'very important' discussions on Tuesday, Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) said Monday."

* Is the high-speed rail project in Florida officially dead? Not quite yet.

* We can add the "Arab youth movements" in the Middle East to the list of things neocons don't fully understand.

* The next time you hear some hacks talking about a presidential "apology tour," remember, they're lying.

* Over the weekend, there was a brief flurry of talk about Roger Ailes getting indicted. It's still possible, I suppose, but the story behind the story is extremely thin.

* Best wishes to Andrew Sullivan as he makes the transition from The Atlantic to The Daily Beast.

* Speaking of online media, Salon.com is on the market, but merger talks with Newser.com have reportedly collapsed.

* I've given up on Rasmussen polls.

* And despite what you may have seen on some far-right sites today, Greg Sargent does not actually advocate violence at the hands of union thugs. Only someone with no familiarity with sarcasm could think otherwise.

Anything to add? Consider this an open thread.

MORE BUREAUCRATS, PLEASE, CONT'D.... Earlier today, we linked to a new story in the print edition of the Washington Monthly, arguing that the Republicans' desired cuts to the federal workforce would, counter-intuitively, only drive government spending further through the roof. A big part of that argument rests on the government's history with outside contractors in recent years. Contractors can be very useful and efficient; but it's not as if you can simply replace X amount of in-house labor with X amount of contract labor and then call it a day. The very complex job of coordinating and overseeing contractors is one of the least appreciated and most overburdened functions in government today, thanks to major staffing cutbacks in the 1990s. The result: we spend way more than we need to on contracts.

The Monthly story provides a wealth of recent historical examples on this front. But a fresh trove of new evidence came out today in a report (pdf) from the bipartisan Congressional Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan. The commission estimates that "tens of billions of dollars have failed to achieve their intended use in Iraq and Afghanistan," in large part because of "federal failure to control the acquisition process." And a lot of this has to do with undermanned offices that oversee contracts.

"For many years the government has abdicated its contracting responsibilities -- too often using contractors as the default mechanism," the report says, "without consideration for the resources needed to manage them." In Iraq and Afghanistan, the number of government contractors in the field has often surpassed the number of people in uniform, while the workforce of "acquisitions" professionals -- the technical term for people who manage contracts -- has remained puny. "War by its nature entails waste. But the scale of the problems in Iraq and Afghanistan also reflects the toxic interplay of huge sums of money pumped into relatively small economies and an unprecedented reliance on contractors. This interplay is aggravated by a decimated federal acquisition workforce."

The result is a river of red ink: "When government agencies lack experienced and qualified workers to provide oversight, the potential for waste, fraud, and abuse in contract performance increases exponentially." And so to save money and tamp down security risks, what does the commission recommend? Adding more acquisitions staff.

The idea of hiring more workers to save money may sound counter-intuitive, but it isn't surprising at all to many people who actually know the state of our government today.

LEAVE THE VEGETABLES ALONE.... One of the sadder political articles of the weekend ran in the L.A. Times, covering the right's anger over Michelle Obama's desire to combat childhood obesity.

Former First Ladies Barbara and Laura Bush worked to end illiteracy. Nancy Reagan famously took on teenage drug use. Lady Bird Johnson planted flowers. But none of them have been seared for something as seemingly benign as calling for kids to eat more vegetables, as Michelle Obama has.

Just about everyone will agree that the nation's children are getting fatter and that obesity is a serious health problem. But the first lady's push for healthier meals and more exercise, which marked its first anniversary this month, has provoked a backlash from the right, who complain that the only thing here that's supersized is Big Brother.

The piece included all kinds of attacks against the First Lady, from the likes of Limbaugh, Bachmann, Romney, and Palin, among others.

Myra Gutin, an expert on first ladies and politics at Rider University in New Jersey, said, "Some of the criticism [of Obama], quite frankly, has really shocked me," Gutin said. "There is a certain line with first ladies. You can take a shot, but I don't think people like it a lot. We're not talking about the war; we're not talking about the economy. At some level it begins to sound peevish and almost inappropriate."

You think?

Kevin Drum's response to this rang true:

So that's where we are. A first lady campaigning against obesity and in favor of breast feeding is now the target of all-out war from the right. I imagine that if she were taking on illiteracy, teenage drug use, or planting flowers, the Republican Party would suddenly find itself opposed to reading, defending Mexican drug cartels, and in favor of vacant lots. And yet we're supposed to take these people seriously.

Yeah, I don't understand it, either.

THE PRESSURE STARTS TO GET TO ORRIN HATCH.... Sen. Orrin Hatch (R) of Utah is no doubt worried about facing a credible primary challenge next year, and is eager -- perhaps a little too eager -- to pander to the GOP's far-right base.

But it appears some handle this kind of pressure better than others. Hatch is starting to crack.

GOP Sen. Orrin Hatch (Utah) reportedly directed a few profane insults toward President Obama's healthcare law in a speech late last week.

During at an appearance at an event sponsored by the Utah State University College Republicans, Hatch was asked whether he thought the nation's healthcare system needs serious reforms. He acknowledged that states have different problems when it comes to healthcare, but called the federal law Democrats passed last year a "dumb-ass program" that will not solve them.

"Every state has different demographics, every state has different problems," Hatch said, according to a Utah Statesman report published Monday. "It's good to allow them to work out their own problems rather than a one-size-fits-all federal government, dumb-ass program. It really is an awful piece of crap."

As a substantive matter, Hatch probably doesn't realize states will be able to craft their own policies if they decide to come up with an alternative to the Affordable Care Act.

Indeed, Hatch doesn't realize a lot of things. Very few senators were as confused as Hatch over policy details during the debate over health care reform, and the senator routinely repeated pure gibberish on national television, at one point even descending into Beck-like conspiracy theories.

But as a rhetorical matter, is Hatch really comfortable with phrases like "dumb-ass program" and "awful piece of crap"? He was speaking in Utah, after all.

Orrin Hatch, as far to the right as he is, has generally tried to maintain a certain degree of stature and respect. As his party becomes even more hysterical, and the senator feels the need to score cheap points with right-wing activists, Hatch is apparently willing to trade some dignity for some primary votes.

It's kind of sad to watch.

Update: An alert reader reminds me of the point, in late 2009, when Hatch was asked about pro-reform activists who appeared at a district office, urging him to support Democratic efforts. Hatch told a national television audience he was inclined to kick his concerned constituents "in the teeth." Like I said, he doesn't appear to respond to pressure well.

MITCH DANIELS HAS A 'SO BE IT' MOMENT.... Earlier this month, House Speaker John Boehner conceded thousands of Americans would lose their jobs as a result of Republican spending cuts, adding, "So be it." Asked exactly how many American workers would be left unemployed as a result of the GOP plan, Boehner said he didn't know. Apparently, he didn't care, either.

As it turns out, the Speaker isn't the only Republican leader thinking along these lines. Today, NPR's Steve Inskeep asked Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) a worthwhile question.

INSKEEP: I want to ask something that a lot of people are confronting right now, as they deal with the federal deficit as well as state and local deficits that need to be closed. Are budget cuts -- government budget cuts -- worth it, even if they end up seriously costing a lot of jobs right now?

DANIELS: The answer is yes.

I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around the state of the debate on this. We now have three separate independent analyses of the Republican proposal, all of which say the same thing: if approved, the GOP plan would hurt the economy and make unemployment worse. We now have two prominent Republican -- one is currently the nation's most powerful GOP official, the other hopes to be -- conceding publicly that the party's spending-cut priorities would force more Americans out of work.

How are we even having this conversation? I'd genuinely love to know exactly how many American voters are thinking, "You know, maybe what we need is higher unemployment, lower wages, and slower growth -- it's a good thing Republicans are working on this."

For his part, the perpetually-confused House Majority Leader, Eric Cantor (R-Va.), said the latest analysis from Moody's Analytics economist Mark Zandi doesn't count. Zandi found that the GOP proposal would likely force 700,000 American workers into unemployment, but Cantor said we shouldn't believe him -- because Zandi backed the 2009 Recovery Act, which necessarily forfeits his credibility.

First, Cantor may not be able to understand this, but the stimulus was a success, and did exactly what it set out to do. Republican repetition about "failure" demonstrates tremendous message discipline, but also demonstrates striking ignorance about current events.

Second, before Cantor blows off Zandi, let's note that Zandi was an advisor to the McCain/Palin campaign in 2008. Besides, even if Republicans don't like the Zandi analysis, what's the response to the Goldman Sachs report from last week?

And third, if Cantor & Co. don't care for any of the independent analyses showing the GOP plan making unemployment worse, why don't they offer a competing analysis? They think 700,000 job losses is too high a number fine. Where does Cantor put the number? Can Republicans offer anything in the way of economic projections? Anything at all?

I can't remember the last time the political discourse made this little sense. We have Americans demanding action on job creation; we have congressional Republicans deliberately trying to make unemployment worse; and we have a media that prefers to pretend that the deficit matters more than the economy.

OBAMA CALLS GOP BLUFF ON HEALTH CARE, STATE FLEXIBILITY.... President Obama has endorsed minor tweaks to the Affordable Care Act since its passage -- most notably the "1099 problem" -- but today's announcement reflects an openness to a more significant kind of change.

Seeking to appease disgruntled governors, President Obama announced Monday that he supported amending the 2010 health care law to allow states to opt out of its most burdensome requirements three years earlier than currently permitted.

In remarks to the National Governors Association, Mr. Obama said he backed legislation that would enable states to request federal permission to withdraw from the law's mandates in 2014 rather than in 2017 as long as they could prove that they could find other ways to cover as many people as the original law would and at the same cost. The earlier date is when many of the act's central provisions take effect, including requirements that most individuals obtain health insurance and that employers of a certain size offer coverage to workers or pay a penalty.

Specifically referencing a proposal from Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Scott Brown (R-Mass.), the president endorsed the kind of flexibility Republicans say they want. "[I]f you can come up with a better system for your state to provide coverage of the same quality and affordability as the Affordable Care Act, you can take that route instead," Obama said, adding, "If your state can create a plan that covers as many people as affordably and comprehensively as the Affordable Care Act does, without increasing the deficit, you can implement that plan and we'll work with you to do it."

The White House has a fairly detailed fact-sheet on this, and Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius has a related post on the White House blog.

So, how big a deal is this? It marks a fairly significant departure from the administration's status quo, but at its root, what we're seeing is the White House call Republicans' bluff. The GOP is convinced it can offer comparable coverage at comparable prices using Republican-friendly policies. Today, in effect, the president said, "Be my guest." Why? Because Obama knows it'll take more than tort reform and HSAs to make the system work, and he sees a political upside to watching GOP officials scramble to actually craft their own plans, rather than bash his.

One thing to keep an eye on: how this might affect states that want ambitious, liberal health care systems, most notably Vermont, where a single-payer plan has the support of the newly-elected governor, Peter Shumlin (D). In theory, Vermont and perhaps Oregon would be the only states with a credible shot at making this work -- meeting the standards established by the Affordable Care Act, and reaching the same goals, but from a liberal direction, rather than a right-wing one.

FUN AT ROMNEY'S EXPENSE.... We'll get to the White House's announcement today on health care policy shortly, but before we do, let's take a moment to appreciate how much fun the president and his team are having at Mitt Romney's expense.

In a moment that Mitt Romney's future GOP opponents couldn't have scripted better themselves, President Obama Monday issued a full-throated embrace of the former Massachusetts governor's stance on health care.

"I know that many of you have asked for flexibility for your states under this law," Obama said during a speech to a governors meeting at the White House. "In fact, I agree with Mitt Romney, who recently said he's proud of what he accomplished on health care by giving states the power to determine their own health care solutions. He's right."

It's safe to assume the video of this quote will be turned into campaign ads in GOP presidential primaries. It's also safe to assume that was the point.

Indeed, just a month ago, David Axelrod also praised Romney for his work on health care policy during his gubernatorial tenure. "We got some good ideas from him," Axelrod said of the former governor.

And yesterday, Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick (D), Romney's successor and a close ally of the president, also heaped praise on Romney's health care work, saying his predecessor "deserves a lot of credit'' for the state law. "One of the best things he did was to be the coauthor of our health care reform, which has been a model for national health care reform,'' Patrick said.

Asked afterward whether politics had motivated the praise, Patrick scoffed. "It's just the truth,'' he said.

Needless to say, this is not the kind of praise Romney's looking for, but it's nevertheless an issue that will follow the GOP presidential hopeful for the foreseeable future.

THE GOP PLAN TO MAKE UNEMPLOYMENT MUCH WORSE.... The number one issue on the minds of most Americans is job creation. With that in mind, it seems rather important that congressional Republicans are pushing a plan that would make unemployment much worse, on purpose.

A Republican plan to sharply cut federal spending this year would destroy 700,000 jobs through 2012, according to an independent economic analysis set for release Monday.

The report, by Moody's Analytics chief economist Mark Zandi, offers fresh ammunition to Democrats seeking block the Republican plan, which would terminate dozens of programs and slash federal appropriations by $61 billion over the next seven months.

Zandi, an architect of the 2009 stimulus package who has advised both political parties, predicts that the GOP package would reduce economic growth by 0.5 percentage points this year, and by 0.2 percentage points in 2012, resulting in 700,000 fewer jobs by the end of next year.

Zandi also had bad news for liberal Democrats who are resisting sharp spending cuts: Bringing deficits down to sustainable levels will require more than a growing economy.

If this seems familiar, it's because it's not the first report to raise this point. The Washington Post's Dana Milbank, relying on data compiled by the Center for American Progress, found that the Republican budget plan would force roughly 975,000 Americans from their jobs. What's more, just last week, economists at Goldman Sachs estimated that the GOP proposal would reduce economic growth by as much as 2% of GDP, which would cause the unemployment rate to go up about a point.

How is it this isn't at the heart of the debate over the budget? How far off track is the public discourse when an entire chamber of Congress, in the midst of a jobs crisis, approves a plan to make the crisis much worse, and this is considered only tangentially relevant?

Greg Sargent, noting the Zandi and Goldman Sachs analyses, added:

Even if you disagree with these analyses, you'd think the fact that there are now two of them reaching similar conclusions would be newsworthy enough to break through the din of Beltway deficit-reduction fetishizing. The argument about budget cuts is too often framed solely as an argument between so-called deficit "hawks" and "doves," as a dispute between those who say steep cuts are necessary and those who say they're cruel and extreme. The fact that outside analysts think that budget cuts could actively hamper the recovery deserves to be part of the discussion.

I couldn't agree more. For weeks, the larger policy conversation has focused almost exclusively on spending cuts and deficit reduction, with a striking disregard for the consequences. The debate itself is so detached from reality, it's hard to even believe the extent to which we're stuck in the wrong conversation -- Republicans ran on a "where are the jobs" platform, got elected, and are aggressively pushing a plan that they know will make unemployment much worse.

We can have a debate about why the GOP is doing this -- irrational fear of inflation, politically-motivated economic sabotage, etc. -- but after multiple reports, the effects of the Republican plan themselves are no longer a mystery.

This deserves to be the lead story for every major news outlet covering the debate. There's no more important angle to the electorate that still says economic growth and job creation trump everything else.

I would, by the way, gladly note the Republicans' response to this, but as far as I can tell, the GOP doesn't have one. The House majority has seen these multiple projections, showing steep job losses, that Republicans have responded with nothing -- no projections, no competing sets of numbers, no hearings on the effects of their cuts, nothing.

If midterm voters aren't feeling some buyer's remorse right about now, they're just not paying attention.

Update: Also, don't forget that as far as Republicans are concerned, the ultimate attack on any policy is to call it "job-killing." If Dems don't start using this in the budget fight, they're missing an important opportunity.

MONDAY'S CAMPAIGN ROUND-UP.... Today's installment of campaign-related news items that wouldn't necessarily generate a post of their own, but may be of interest to political observers:

* In Texas, the Republican field for the open U.S. Senate seat got more interesting late Friday, when former Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert (R) launched his campaign. He joins former Texas Solicitor General Ted Cruz, former Texas Secretary of State Roger Williams, and Texas Railroad Commissioners Michael Williams and Elizabeth Ames Jones in the GOP field, and Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst (R) is expected to announce soon.

* Despite damaging questions about his mental health, Rep. David Wu (D) has filed for re-election in Oregon, and will seek another term next year.

* Florida Republicans insist they will not move their presidential primary date from January 31. As a result, Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad (R) is poised to move up the date of its caucuses, currently scheduled for February 6, which will in turn cause New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina to move up their contests.

* Disgraced former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R) will reportedly announce a presidential exploratory committee on March 8, which is a week from tomorrow.

* The DCCC had hoped to see former Rep. Betsy Markey (D) seek a rematch in 2012 against Rep. Cory Gardner (R), but over the weekend, Markey ruled out the possibility.

* In Hawaii, Sen. Daniel Inouye (D) will support Sen. Daniel Akaka's (D) re-election bid next year, but he's being surprisingly candid about Akaka's lackluster fundraising and commitment to the race. [fixed]

* Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick (D) ruled out any presidential ambitions in his future.

* A Tea Party Patriots gathering held a presidential straw poll over the weekend in Arizona. Oddly enough, Herman Cain, a former pizza company executive, won, followed by Tim Pawlenty and Ron Paul.

* Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.), one of Congress' more ridiculous members, has been in office for nearly two months, and has already said he'd consider a vice presidential nomination, were one offered.

MORE BUREAUCRATS, PLEASE....It is widely understood that a possible government shutdown could put hundreds of thousands of federal employees temporarily out of work. Less well known is the fact that congressional conservatives plan to make that state of affairs permanent.

The influential House Republican Study Committee, home to many Tea Party freshmen, has called for a long-term 15% cut in the federal workforce. Their ostensible aim is to reduce government spending and deficits. But as John Gravois makes clear in the upcoming March/April issue of the Washington Monthly, slashing the federal work force will likely have the opposite effect: it will drive spending and deficits further through the roof.

Looking back over the past 20 years, Gravois shows that major cuts to the federal bureaucracy in the 1990s led to many of the cost overruns and expensive disasters we've seen in recent memory. Again and again, federal agencies have seen their responsibilities increase as their workforces dwindle, resulting in breakdowns that cause a hemorrhage of red ink. As strange as it may sound, if we really want to save money, what we desperately need is a set of targeted increases in the federal workforce -- which hasn't really grown since the 1960s.

Read Gravois' story "More Bureaucrats, Please."

BARBOUR ISN'T DOING HIMSELF ANY FAVORS.... Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour (R), a very likely GOP presidential candidate, is aware of the criticism he's received lately, but has an explanation. As the governor sees it, "some people on the left" don't like "conservative Christian Republicans from the Deep South."

Just what we need, a corporate lobbyist with a persecution complex running for president.

Jon Chait argues, persuasively, that there's something to this as a political strategy: "If he is seen to be under attack from the left on spurious grounds, this makes him a right-wing racial martyr, a powerful source of attraction on the right. And that is indeed the angle Barbour pushes here: They're attacking me because they hate people like you -- white, Christian, Southern. Barbour is not the perpetrator but the victim of bigotry."

Of course, as a matter of reality, Barbour has come under fire, particularly on matters related to race, because of a genuinely horrendous record, as evidenced by his recent praise for White Citizens Councils -- known for touting "racial integrity" and fighting for segregation through economic coercion -- and his belief that the civil rights era in Mississippi just wasn't "that bad."

Over the weekend, that record got just a little worse.

Gov. Haley Barbour recalled hearing Martin Luther King Jr. speak at the old fairgrounds in his hometown of Yazoo City in 1962. "I was there with some of my friends," Barbour told the Weekly Standard. "We wanted to hear him speak."

Asked what King had said, Barbour replied, "I don't really remember. The truth is, we couldn't hear very well. We were sort of out there on the periphery. We just sat on our cars, watching the girls, talking, doing what boys do. We paid more attention to the girls than to King."

A search of the King Papers at the Martin Luther King Jr. Research and Education Institute and the papers of David Garrow, author of the definitive biography on King, Bearing the Cross, failed to find evidence King spoke in Yazoo City in 1962.

Former NAACP chairman Julian Bond responded, "Haley's history is as reliable as Glenn Beck's."

In fairness, the number of Americans from that era who falsely claim to have heard Dr. King speak is probably pretty high. Some may have even convinced themselves that they actually attended an event they did not.

But the context is particular importance as it relates to Barbour -- sensitive to allegations of racism, the far-right governor very likely claimed he "wanted to hear [MLK] speak" as a way of diffusing some of the allegations. If he'd grown up as a racist in the segregated South, the argument goes, then Barbour wouldn't have attended an event to hear King's remarks. Except, we now know he didn't.

What's more, this isn't a case in which Barbour said he heard King in 1962, but meant 1963 -- King never delivered a public speech in Yazoo City.

To be sure, on the controversy richter scale, this doesn't move the needle much, and it pales in comparison to Barbour's praise for Citizens Councils. That said, if the governor was hoping to use the King event as some kind of cover, this is an embarrassing revelation.

Update: Ben Smith reports that King did speak in Yazoo City in 1966, and that may be what Barbour was referring to. But I think this breezes past the details too quickly -- King did not make a public appearance at the time, and instead offered a private talk with civil-rights marchers. Barbour "was there" with some of his friends? His memory is way off.

WHY THE RIGHT MIGHT BALK AT A 'GRAND BARGAIN'.... There's been a fair amount of chatter this month about a "grand bargain" on the budget. Indeed, there have been ongoing, bipartisan talks between six senators who envision a sweeping compromise that tackle entitlements, tax reform, and deficit reduction, all at the same time.

The bargain, if one ever actually comes together, is very likely to be seen as ugly from the left, but negotiators at least seem to appreciate the fact that any serious deficit reduction plan has to include both sides of the ledger. Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) isn't exactly a moderate, but he conceded a few weeks ago that tax increases will have to "be a part of the mix."

Guess how that's playing out on the Hill.

Some [Senate Republicans] are concerned that a deficit reduction package being negotiated by Sens. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) and Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), two of the chamber's leading conservatives, could include hundreds of billions of dollars worth of tax hikes. [...]

Some conservatives in the Senate worry that Coburn, Crapo, and a third negotiator, Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), might endorse tax reforms that would increase the total amount the federal government collects in taxes.

"The Republicans involved in this are miscalculating the environment right now," said a GOP aide. "We're marching on with the House and Senate Republicans united over reducing government spending, shrinking the size of government.

"We have the wind at our backs," said the aide. "The best way to stop that momentum is have some Republicans and respected conservatives break off and talk about tax increases," said the aide.

And we're reminded once again why it's so difficult to take the right seriously on fiscal issues. We're on track to have a $1.5 trillion deficit this year, which conservatives believe threatens the very fabric of civilization. But told that some tax increases might be in the mix, these same conservatives are already balking.

The federal tax burden is already at the lowest levels we've seen in generations, and elimination of the Bush-era tax breaks could make a huge difference in bringing down the deficit in a hurry. But the right is already unhappy with talk of a "grand bargain," the details of which don't even exist yet. Any tax increase on anyone at any time is necessarily unacceptable.

This isn't going to turn out well.

PAWLENTY SAYS U.S. 'NEEDS' A GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN.... By all appearances, the federal government won't shut down this week, after a compromise measure came together late Friday. Former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R), the increasingly-silly presidential hopeful, is likely to be disappointed by the progress.

ThinkProgress caught up with Pawlenty following his speech this weekend at the Tea Party Patriots Policy Summit in Phoenix, Arizona. Pawlenty declared that shutting down the federal government is "an option I think Republicans have to consider."

The former Minnesota governor went further in the interview with ThinkProgress, declaring that the current shutdown showdown was a "line-in-the-sand moment," the likes of which "are what we need." Pawlenty called for a shutdown lasting a month or longer -- "a dramatic month," as he termed it -- in order to force Congress to make tough decisions.

Pawlenty may not care, but the most "dramatic" aspect of a shutdown would be the effect it has on the economy, veterans' benefits, and Social Security services.

As part of the same appearance, the former governor also lauded the right for "standing up to the ruling class." As Steve M. explained, "[T]he Koch brothers and BP and Rupert Murdoch aren't in this 'ruling class.' Teachers in Wisconsin are."

I almost feel sorry for Republican presidential candidates. The truly ridiculous things they're forced to say to pander to the unhinged right are just cringe-worthy.