Song of the Day 8/8: The Clash, “Police on My Back”

A song for the Democratic lawmakers who fled Texas for Illinois to prevent a mid-decade redraw of the state’s congressional districts. Texas Sen. John Cornyn, in danger of losing a primary to a more troglodytic MAGAt, called for their arrest by the FBI, and our bizarro-world J.Edgar Hoover, Kash Patel, quickly agreed to do so.

Oooo, sounds scary. But like a lot of MAGAtry, it’s a mixture of revenge fantasy and performative bluster. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, the billionaire who doesn’t act like one, called it grandstanding, which is another word for it. The Federal Bureau of Investigation has, as the name implies, federal jurisdiction. The legislators who ankled broke no laws at all; certainly no federal law applies (pending future Supreme Court confabulations).

For the time being the Lone Star Lamsters probably should lay low anyway, and certainly avoid any Home Depot parking lots – the Cro-Magnons at ICE can’t define “jurisdiction,” or spell it, either.

“Police on My Back” was first released in 1967 by the Equals, an multiracial London pop-soul band that had a number of UK hits in the late ’60s. It was written by their lead singer, Eddy Grant, who went on to “Electric Avenue” fame years later. The Clash included this cover on their 1980 triple LP “Sandinista!”

Here’s the original version as it appeared on the second Equals LP, “Explosion.”