| It's a day late for my return from vacation, but enjoy this cartoon from Ellis Rosen. Speaking of threats of violence, who's been listening to country singer Jason Aldean's "Try That in a Small Town," which columnist Paul Waldman calls "an exercise in belligerent rural hostility"? The song lists urban crimes or acts of disrespect and dares perpetrators to try them locally, where you can "see how far you make it down the road." "Heart Like a Truck" this is not. A Post arts story offers additional context on the music video for Aldean's single — shot at the site where a Black teenager was lynched in 1927. Naturally, the song is a hit, with multiple GOP presidential candidates playing it at rallies, especially after the woke mob magicked Country Music Television network into removing the video from its rotation. Paul is dismayed, but not surprised. As he writes, "There will always be a market for the idea that you can be the hero of your own violent drama of retribution." City slickers, specifically LGBTQ+ ones, are under fire in the House, too, where Republicans struck from an earmark-stuffed Transportation, Housing and Urban Development appropriations bill the only three clauses that gave assistance to queer people. Columnist Dana Milbank chronicles how Appropriations Committee member Andy Harris (R) took things even further, reviving the false "grooming" accusations that so endanger gay people. Democratic Rep. Mark Pocan, who was once beaten unconscious with a baseball bat upon leaving a gay bar, tried to explain — but, Dana writes, committee Republicans stood by Harris and "planted themselves firmly on the side of prejudice." Elsewhere in Dana's jumbo-size column: More bigotry — from a fake Democrat! Bigotry — from a real Democrat! And, what else, Hunter Biden's private parts, which Marjorie Taylor Greene would be more than happy to show you. An offer you can't refuse Do you know who's actually to blame for the plight of working artists in Hollywood? It's … you. Think about Spotify, the example columnist Megan McArdle raises in her piece explaining the market forces driving creatives' discontent and thus the WGA/SAG-AFTRA strike. If you clicked to stream "Heart Like a Truck" up above, even if you clicked twice, poor Lainey Wilson got no more than a penny! Back in the day, you'd have had to purchase her CD for $18.99 at Media Play, but now you're getting it for "peanuts," Megan writes, on Spotify. The same goes for TV and movie streaming, which has overtaken the much more lucrative DVD industry. "The internet's tendency," Megan says, is "to take big chunks of corporate revenue and transform them not into profits but into consumer surplus." So don't think the studio bosses are pocketing (all) the money. They're greedy, sure — but so are you. | 
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