The Post, dismayed about super PACs, reports “a rarefied group of millionaires and billionaires acting as kingmakers in the GOP contest, often helping to decide, with a simple transfer of money, which candidate might survive another day.” Kingmakers? Where’s the king?

If kingmaking refers to, say, Sheldon Adelson, the Las Vegas casino owner, keeping Newt Gingrich’s candidacy afloat with large infusions to the super PAC supporting Gingrich, then kingmaking isn’t what it used to be.

He also defends the constitutionality of campaign funding.

… The court’s unremarkable logic was that individuals do not forfeit their First Amendment speech rights when they come together in corporate entities or unions to speak collectively. What is the constitutional basis for saying otherwise?

… Actually, Citizens United has nothing to do with Adelson and others who are spending their own money, not any corporation’s. People have done this throughout the nation’s life, and doing so was affirmed as a constitutional right in the court’s 1976 Buckley v. Valeo decision.

And he defends the right of relative outsiders to influence the political process.

Critics of super PACs — critics who were remarkably reticent in 2004 when George Soros was lavishing his own money on liberal advocacy — often refer to them as “outside groups,” much as Southern sheriffs used to denounce civil rights workers as “outside agitators.”

Pray tell: Super PACs are outside of what? Is the political process a private club with the parties and candidates controlling membership?

It might be more wholesome for the speech-financing money that is flowing to super PACs to go instead to the parties and candidates’ campaigns. But the very liberals who are horrified by super PACs (other than Barack Obama’s) have celebrated the laws that place unreasonable restrictions on such giving.

The whole thing is worth reading and pondering.

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The Democratic Senate has not adopted a budget in three years. This is not only flagrantly irresponsible, it is a violation of federal law. Outgoing Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, who is retiring at the end of the year, apparently felt pangs of conscience, because he decided it was finally time for his committee to mark up a budget. He announced that the committee would do so, starting tomorrow.

A standard markup process begins with the committee chairman laying out a proposal, with the chairman and the ranking minority member giving opening statements. This is followed by an amendment process, in which amendments to the proposed legislation (here, the budget resolution) are offered and voted on. The markup process concludes with a committee vote on the bill or resolution as amended. In this case, Conrad assured ranking Republican Jeff Sessions that amendments would be allowed, and as recently as a few hours ago, Conrad’s and Sessions’s staffs were working out details of the amendment process.

Then, earlier this afternoon, Conrad gave a press conference in which he made the stunning announcement that there will be no budget markup after all. Instead, he will present a budget to the Budget Committee tomorrow. There will be no amendments and there will be no votes; not, at least, until after the election. Apparently Conrad had been proceeding on his own initiative, and at the 11th hour Harry Reid–supported by members of his caucus who do not want to have to go on record in favor of any budget–shut down the process.

Even though Republicans are more than happy to vote “on the record about” budgets, never fear. It’s Republican obstructionism and a “do nothing” Republican Congress that’s keeping Washington paralyzed.

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David Autor of MIT talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) program. SSDI has grown dramatically in recent years and now costs about $200 billion a year. Autor explains how the program works, why the growth has been so dramatic, and the consequences for the stability of the program in the future. This is an illuminated look at the interaction between politics and economics and reveals an activity of government that is relatively ignored today but will not be able to be ignored in the future.

Some interesting facts.

• Disability insurance includes both a monthly cash payment as well as access to Medicare.
• The disability rolls have more than doubled in in the last 13 years, from 1.2 million people to 2.9 million people.
• Divided by the number of U.S. households, we’re spending more than $1500 per U.S. household, on disability insurance.
• By law, the program is biased on favor of people making disability claims. It’s comparatively easy to get disability and very, very hard to prove that someone either no longer needs disability or that they made a fraudulent claim in the first place.
• Law firms helping people get disability are entitled to 25% of the disability back benefits. Each year, the Social Security Administration pays out more than $1 billion to these law firms.
• In 1984, SSDI consumed 5% of all Social Security revenues. In 2004, SSDI consumed 10% of all Social Security revenues. It now consumes all of the dedicated SSDI revenue and is cutting into the general Social Security revenue. At the current rate of expenditure, the SSDI trust fund will be exhausted within 5 years.

It looks like SSDI is something that we need to start thinking about reforming as well, as it grows increasingly more expensive to maintain.

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Because the budget is so far from being sustainable, budget rhetoric needs to be re-interpreted.

When their side refuses to cut spending because it would be “cruel,” they are ensuring that future spending cuts will be even crueler.

When our side refuses to raise taxes, we are ensuring that future tax increases will be higher.

Until the baseline is a sustainable budget, the rhetoric will be the opposite of reality.

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I do not love the ambience of Walmarts; by my standards they’re loud, cheerless, and tacky – and that describes a lot of their merchandise and their shoppers, too.

But my esthetic and aspirational standards are those of a comparatively wealthy person even in U.S. terms, let alone world terms. To the people who use Walmart and belong there, Walmart is a tremendous boon that stretches their purchasing power, enabling them to have things that don’t suck.

That’s why I love the idea of Walmart, and will defend it against its enemies.

This is my reason too. Even though I rarely shop at Walmart, I’m glad that it exists.

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To hear some folks tell it, budget cuts in Virginia over the past three to four years have been so savage it’s a miracle there’s any state government left. We long ago cut out all the fat and hacked through the muscle; now we’re sawing deep into bone. Localities are scared stiff that the state will stiff them come January. And it’s only going to get worse. Gov. Bob McDonnell has had state agencies prepare plans cutting 2 percent, 4 percent, and 6 percent from their budgets. The stories have grown numbingly familiar.

Still: The general fund has grown roughly $1 billion from last fiscal year to this one. That represents about a 6 percent hike. So why is the governor asking agencies to plan for cuts?

… For example: From fiscal 2008 to fiscal 2012, general-fund outlays for the Department of Medical Assistance Services (that’s the one responsible for administering Medicaid and the state’s Children’s Health Insurance Program) have grown 35 percent. General-fund revenue hasn’t grown anything like that, so the difference has to come from the pockets of other programs.

Huh. Maybe we really should talk about reforming Medicaid.

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Education used to make up a bigger share of state spending. When the association first began compiling the report in 1987, elementary and secondary education made up the biggest share of state spending, and higher education the second-biggest share. Medicaid surpassed higher education as the second-biggest state program in 1990, and in 2003 it became largest state program for the first time. Since then it has vied with schools for the biggest share of state spending, but for the past three years it has been in the lead, with an increasing margin.

Maybe it’s time to consider reforming Medicaid? Before it eats up state budgets completely? And maybe we could do it without demonizing the one party that’s willing to talk about it? (Hello, Congressman Paul Ryan.)

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All highways wear out over time, despite ongoing maintenance. Over the next 30 years, most of Wisconsin’s Interstate system will exceed its nominal 50-to 60-year design life and will need complete reconstruction. When that point is reached, it makes sense to update designs to current safety and operational standards, as was done recently in the reconstruction of the Marquette interchange. And in corridors where demand is projected to exceed capacity, resulting in heavy congestion, it makes sense to add lanes.

Wisconsin already has a $1 billion per year highway funding gap. The total $26.2 billion cost of this Interstate program is far beyond the ability of current transportation funding sources to handle. Federal and state fuel tax revenues, the largest source of transportation funding, are in long-term decline in real, or inflation-adjusted, terms, and a portion of Wisconsin’s vehicle registration fee revenue is now committed for several decades to paying debt service on transportation revenue bonds issued since2003 to cover funding shortfalls. General obligation bonds, with general fund debt service, were also issued to make up for recent diversion of transportation fund revenue to the state’s general fund. To rebuild the rural Interstate and southeastern freeway system in a timely manner will require an additional source of transportation revenue.

This study explores the feasibility of using toll revenue financing to pay for this $26.2 billion reconstruction and modernization program. Under the principle of value-added tolling, tolls would not be charged on a corridor until it was reconstructed and modernized. All toll revenues would be dedicated to the rural Interstate and southeastern freeway system corridors, as pure user fees. Based on a 30-year program of reconstruction and assuming moderate toll rates comparable to those on other toll road systems, the study estimates that the entire rural Interstate program could be financed by toll revenue bonds. For the southeastern freeway system, one option is to toll only the new lanes, operating them as express toll lanes. Doing so would produce enough revenue to cover about 17% of the cost of the entire freeway system reconstruction. Tolling would be all electronic, with no toll booths or toll plazas to impede traffic. If political support could be garnered to price all lanes on the southeastern freeway system instead, our analysis estimates that the revenues would cover 71% of the cost of reconstruction.

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For the Tea Party Republicans who make up a significant part of the House GOP caucus, Boehner’s proposal is a significant retreat from “Cut, Cap and Balance.” Those who support the Boehner proposal, which is formally known as the Budget Control Act, consider it a major compromise — something they are backing only after being convinced that their first choice could never pass the Senate.

… While Obama preaches the virtues of compromise, his Democratic allies and surrogates are bashing Republicans for rejecting what the White House characterizes as earnest, good-faith efforts to find common ground. “I hope that Speaker Boehner and [Minority] Leader McConnell will reconsider their intransigence,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said a few days ago. “Their unwillingness to compromise is pushing us to the brink of a default.” (At the same time, Reid has been issuing absolute, inflexible statements like, “I will not support any short-term agreement.”)

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I still support “Cut, Cap, and Balance” as the best long-term plan. While I’d love to see it enacted, I don’t see it happening with this Senate and this President. I’d initially been disposed to strongly dislike the McConnell plan. I actually changed my mind after reading his explanation. I now, reluctantly, support it as the best plan that we’re likely to get past this President and this Congress.

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