A short video clip from Senator Claire McCaskill today:

Claire took over the front desk for part of the day to take calls directly from Missourians. She answered questions and addressed concerns on variety of issues from avoiding a possible #GovernmentShutdown, to how #Obamacare will improve access to affordable #healthcare.

Hi, this is Claire McCaskill, may I help you?

[….]

Hi, how are you?

[….]

Um, this is an open enrollment period. Um, how old are you? Um, hmm. And do you have a job? Um, hmm. Okay.

[….]

I am. I really am.

[….]

The Supreme Court said it was constitutional.

[….]

I appreciate you calling, sir. And I appreciate your faith.

I should have called.

Apropos the kill-Obamacare-or-shutdown-the-government frenzy on the Tea Party right, Michael Tomasky has some interesting insights on the new battle heating up in the Senate and spearheaded by Ted-Cruz’s (R-TX) faux filibuster* last night:

Many Republican senators have said in recent days or weeks that shutting down the government is unviable and defunding Obamacare is impossible. Well, if they think that, then logic dictates they ought to vote for the clean CR, right? But few will. So I say to you: Watch those numbers, because they’ll tell you the extent to which the extreme wing of the base is running the party right now.

Prominent among those senators who are made uncomfortable by the shutdown fervor of rabble-rousers like Cruz is Missouri’s Senator Roy Blunt. Although, as a member of the senate minority leadership team, Blunt  has been outspoken about his opposition to Cruz’s tactics, he’s also tried to obfuscate about his support of the general shutdown strategy, presenting a vote to move the House bill to the floor for debate as an endorsement of its non-starter provisions to defund Obamacare – a ruse many less strident GOPers have adopted in order to placate the nutters who sent them to Washington.

So Blunt’s covered his backside; he should be willng to vote for a clean Continuing Resolution with no Obamacare poison pill, right? After all, as Tomasky correctly observes, the Republicans in the Senate who have tried to sidle away from the Cruz craziness have all indicated that they believe that “defunding Obamacare at this time and in this way is absolutely the wrong thing to do. They want to save that fight for another day, and they don’t want any part of a government shutdown.”

Alas, it seems that the noxious right-wing fumes in the political mines have finally gotten to one of the ostensibly more moderate (in a relative sense) GOP canaries. The staid, corporatist Blunt has stated emphatically that he’ll “vote against any attempts by the Majority Leader to restore funding for Obamacare,” which means he is implicitly saying “Hello, government shutdown.”

What gives? Again Tomasky offers a plausible answer:

So why would so many people vote against their own position? First and foremost, of course, because it’s Reid’s position, and by extension Obama’s. Only a few of them have the stones to play with that fire. But second, they also know that giving Reid as few GOP votes as possible strengthens the hand of Boehner and the House Republicans to play games with the CR the Senate sends back to the House. Boehner can attach new conditions that are short of a full defunding but that might delay certain aspects of the law anyway. That’s also why Republican senators started saying on Tuesday afternoon that they want to get the bill back to the House as soon as they possibly can, so the House Republicans have more time to make mischief.

So they’re against a shutdown, these GOP senators, and they’re against trying to defund Obamacare in this way. But they, or most of them, are going to vote against their own stated position to help the rabid House Republicans throw more monkey wrenches into the gears. I’ll grant that this isn’t a filibuster. But neither is it governing. It’s the talk-radio position, Limbaugh legislating.

I wonder if Blunt is counting on few of us being able to remember which position he was taking and when he was taking it after we’re staggering away from a shutdown mess? No matter what, though, don’t let him sell you any of his equivocating mumbo-jumbo; when push comes to shove he will have told us by means of his vote on the Continuing Resolution whether or not he’s decided that, discretion being the better part of valor, it behoves him to kiss the ring on Rush Limbaugh’s hand and cede the Republican Party to big, bad Ted Cruz.

*See what Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill had to say about Cruz reading from Green Eggs and Ham during his very, very long, not-filibuster speech.

I wrote earlier about how Roy Blunt was making subtle signs that he didn’t really want to be associated with his party’s drive to shut down the government over Obamacare. Not so Rep. Ann Wagner (R-2) who seems determined to go full tilt toward the crazy. Her stance is perhaps a bit surprising to those of us who detected a bit of GOP relief in the belief that they had fielded an almost sane replacement for erstwhile Rep. Todd Akin; Wagner impressed many as a smooth operator who could put a more respectable face on a party that is rapidly rebranding itself as home sweet home for rightwing kooks. Evidently, though, Wagner, even more than Blunt, sees her interests best served as red meat for the base.

Below the fold I reproduce the text of an email I received from Wagner in response to comments I sent her on shutting down the government in order to fight off the dread (to GOPers) Obamacare. The money portion of her effort to justfy her vote largely echoes press releases on her Web page and presents one of the most flagrant examples of political double-talk that I have ever seen:

With the deadline approaching to prevent a government shutdown  – the American people want Congress to do two things:  keep the government open and stop ObamaCare from destroying our economy, lowering the quality of our care and putting the Federal Government between you and your doctor.  That is why I voted last Friday to keep the government open, while protecting the people of the 2nd District from the devastating consequences of ObamaCare.  Now it is up to Senators Ted Cruz and Mike Lee to answer the calls of the American people, and lead the fight in the Senate to defund ObamaCare and keep the government running.

Did you get that “I voted last Friday to keep the government open … “. Isn’t that like tellng frantic parents after you’ve kidnapped their children for a ransom too costly for them to pay, that you only took the kiddies to give the parents a chance to save them by paying up – ergo, you’re the one acting to keep the children well and safe. This is what I mean about trying to have your cake and eating it too – which we all know nobody can really manage to do.

And did you also get the note of seeming hero-worship Wagner directed toward toward Senators Ted Cruz and Mike Lee – the Senate hostage executioners who, according to Wagner’s reasoning, are also doing their best to keep the government operating by demanding a pound of bloody Obama flesh? Shouldn’t respectable, pearl-clutching “tradtionalist” Republicans shy away from nutjob demogogues?

Nothing, though, is actualy what it seems. Wagner’s shout-out to the chief Senate agitators on the topic may just be short-hand for “I did my part to impress the yahoos – now it’s your turn to bear the nasty load,” an indirect salvo in a “fight between House and the Senate — neither of whom want to be left holding the bag when this effort to defund Obamacare fails.” They all – and this where Wagner’s particularly cloying brand of cynicism manifests itself – want the savage Tea Partiers at home to think they did their best.

ADDENDUM: Here’s Ed Kilgore on the type of shutdown double-talk I reference above on the part of Ann Wagner:

What’s really bizarre is the effort (by Cruz at least) to pretend that Obama and/or congressional Democrats are responsible for risking a government shutdown or a debt default because they are (so far) refusing to make major concessions to the party that does not control the White House or the Senate. This cynical gambit needs to be mocked relentlessly. If Republicans evade total responsibility for the chaos currently gripping Washington, it will be a historic injustice. They lost the 2012 elections, and consequently their activists want to pitch a hissy fit and kick over as much furniture as possible. I wish someone could design a video game where they could work out their frustrations and recommit themselves to the imagined America of the distant past without ruining the neighborhood.

Wagner’s email missive – the survey link at the very bottom works if you want to let Wagner know what you think abou shutting down the  government:

Keeping the Government Open

Dear xxxxxx,

Do you remember when Nancy Pelosi said you had to pass ObamaCare to find out what’s in it?  Well – it didn’t take the American people long to find out what’s in ObamaCare: more taxes, fewer choices, skyrocketing premiums and unaffordable care.  

One of the main reasons I ran to be your Representative is because I believe ObamaCare needs to be repealed and replaced with free-market based solutions that expand access without destroying our economy and lowering the quality of our care.

As each day passes, more and more families are feeling the pain of Obamacare right here in the St. Louis region. Many of you might have heard a few days ago that BJC Healthcare can no longer afford to provide health insurance to its part-time employees. This is just another example of the coming economic disaster Obamacare poses when a large, highly respected healthcare company such as BJC Healthcare cannot afford healthcare for its own workers.

With the deadline approaching to prevent a government shutdown  – the American people want Congress to do two things:  keep the government open and stop ObamaCare from destroying our economy, lowering the quality of our care and putting the Federal Government between you and your doctor.  That is why I voted last Friday to keep the government open, while protecting the people of the 2nd District from the devastating consequences of ObamaCare.  Now it is up to Senators Ted Cruz and Mike Lee to answer the calls of the American people, and lead the fight in the Senate to defund ObamaCare and keep the government running. Bear in mind that Cruz is either so unhinged or so determined to emerge as the Teajadist leader that he has excited the contempt of most of his Senate GOP colleagues:

As always – it is truly an honor to serve the people of the 2nd District, and I look forward to speaking with you again soon.

Sincerely,

Ann Wagner

Member of Congress

P.S. Take My Survey

Do you think we should shut down the government if the Senate fails to defund ObamaCare?

Yes

No

Via Politico we learn that Claire McCaskill seems to be feeling her oats when it comes to the threatened GOP government shutdown over their OCD efforts to defund the Affordable Care Act (ACA):

I don’t think in America we should throw tantrums when we lose elections and threaten to shut down the government and refuse to pay the bills,” the Missouri Democrat said on “Fox News Sunday.” “The American people had a choice last November. They had a choice between someone who said repeal Obamacare, and President Obama.”

[. . .]

“I cannot believe that they are gonna throw a tantrum and throw the American people and our economic recovery under the bus,” she said of Republicans. “It is really gonna hurt real people. And this is just political point-making.”

McCaskill was feeling so empowered that she characterized the GOP shutdown antics as “Akin-itis.” (Well … duh! Did anyone ever really think that Todd Akin was an isolated phenomenon in the party of Galloping Old Poops?)

McCaskill’s GOP opposite number, though, Senator Roy Blunt, has a different take as you might expet. Nevertheless, there are plenty of hints that he’s a bit squeamish when it comes to the floor-kicking, full-out tantrum that folks like Ted Cruz are promising:

Blunt has given no indication of siding with a determined element promising every rules trick to keep the anti-heath law offensive alive. Before that moment comes, all Republicans can weigh in heartily on the new law.

“I’m no supporter of the president’s health care plan. I believe it won’t work, there’s evidence every day of that, and I’ll vote to not move forward with it,” he said in a Friday interview.

He added: “I don’t know where we’ll be in the middle of the week.”

What could account for McCaskill’s political vim and vigor and Blunt’s cautious and worried tone? Could it be, as Robert Kuttner points out, that an unpopular shutdown is a dangerous ploy for vulnerable Republicans:

This very high-profile mess, just a year before next mid-term election, could upend assumptions about 2014. Democrats need to pick up just 17 seats to take back the House. Most analysts put the number of at-risk Republican seats at between 20 and 25, meaning that Democrats would need to run most of the table. But a deeper look suggests that more Republican seats could be vulnerable. In 2012, Republicans won 41 seats with 55 percent of the vote or less. If Democrats hold their own seats and win back even half of those, they take back the Majority.

Of course, for Blunt the issue probably also threatens to have even more tellling blowback: the people who employ him, his corporate cronies, are aghast at the reckless abandon of his more extreme Tea Party congressional colleagues. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has urged the GOPers to act in a more fiscally responsible manner. Even Wall Street recognizes the foolishness for what it is. The big money folks will fund any kind of stupidity as long as it gets pols sympathetic to their money-making needs into power. Where they draw the line, though, is when the stupidity spills over into financial lunacy – a fact that is surely not lost on Blunt. After all, as Slate’s John Dickerson puts it:

House Republicans aren’t just courting disaster. They’re helping President Obama make the case that they were the problem all along.

No wonder McCaskill is energized and Blunt suitably subdued.