Well, we didn’t announce this two weeks ago as perhaps we should’ve, but Grinnell has been on Spring Break since then, and it has meant that our coverage is a little less than usual. (And, when I say “usual,” I’m basing it on our one week of good coverage.)
Still, here are some stories we’ll be watching as more of us get back to campus in the next day or two:
Iowans protest the terrible right-wing immigration bill in Washington and, more notably, in Marshalltown. The Marshalltown protest included 80 middle and high school students, which seems really cool. Less cool: “[Marshalltown Police Chief] Walker said he didn’t know what the signs said because they were in Spanish and he has no Spanish-speaking officers.” And if they do it again, it sounds like he’s going to arrest them.
According to President Bush in a speech in Des Moines, Iowa in 2003:
It makes no sense for people in the congressional disctrict ….[to] replace somebody on the Appropriations Committee with somebody who’s not. The Appropriations Committee is one of the most important committees there is in the United States Congress.
Apparently Andy McGuire, Democrat turned Republican, turned Democratic, turned Republican, turned Democrat, turned Republican…. turned Democratic Lt. Governor candidate…. didn’t feel that way when she donated money to Greg Ganske in 1994 to help him defeat 36 year incumbent democrat and very senior member said committee, Neal Smith.
That is real money in 1994, not the chump change IDP Humphrey Club membership it is now.
I guess Des Moines didn’t need the help since the Iowa Values Fund was on the way.
A monorail would have been cool though. Who knows? Maybe ethanol would be on a better track than it is now. The state universities would have sure as hell been a lot better off.
President Clinton sums it up best in 1994 campaigning for Smith:
Neal Smith led the fight in the Congress to approve the promotion of ethanol. (Applause.) The vote was close. In the United States Senate, it came down to a tie vote; and Al Gore broke the tie in favor of ethanol. (Applause.) We did it to make ourselves more independent of foreign oil. We did it to promote the cleanness of our environment. We did it to create new jobs for farm families. But if it had not been for Neal Smith — I want you to think about this Tuesday — if it had not been for Neal Smith, we would not have been able to do it. And he ought to be sent back to Congress to keep fighting for you.
The Register says Bush is going to do a fundraiser with Nussle in April. IDP Executive Director Mike Milligan sums it up fabulously:
“It is no surprise that President Bush and Jim Nussle are in cahoots,” said Mike Milligan, executive director of the Iowa Democratic Party.
“Nussle was President Bush’s rubber stamp in racking up the largest deficits in human history, so it is no surprise that Bush is now raising money for him.”
While Republicans close to Nussle told the Register that appearances with the president are great for their funds, it seems to me that associating oneself with record low poll numbers isn’t worth it.
According to the Register, Guiliani will be visiting Iowa in May to help candidates fundraise:
Giuliani plans to headline a fund-raiser in Davenport for presumptive GOP gubernatorial nominee Jim Nussle, a congressman from Manchester. Earlier that day, he is expected to appear at an event for the Republican Party of Iowa, possibly in Des Moines, although those plans were not firm.
Sounds like he’s interested in Iowa networking, and we all know what that means. It sounds pretty promising for him, too:
A Fox News national survey conducted last week showed Giuliani the choice for the GOP nomination of 29 percent of voters. Second was Arizona Sen. John McCain with 22 percent.
The article says McCain is also fundraising with Nussle next month.
Today’s Register has it that the wildly popular commander-in-grief is coming to Iowa to campaign for gubernatorial candidate Jim Nussle. Nussle, best known for helping make a projected 5.3 trillion dollar surplus into a projected 1.3 trillion dollar deficit as Chairman of the House Budget Committee (sure beats pulling a rabbit out of a hat), will be teaming up with Bush to laud their distinguished record together.
Has Nussle looked at a poll lately? Maybe he thinks this will energize his base, but I can’t see how reminding Iowans of his connection to a President this deep in the lurch can help much with the all important Iowa swing voter. Of course, we all know that Bush can bring in the dough, and Nussle might as well try to extract everything he can out of the anemic President before he hits Nixon territory. Let’s not forget, Nussle does need the money—what else is he going to do, run on his record?
I can’t help but think this is the kind of news that makes Chet Culver salivate. Sorry for that image.
According to the Waterloo Cedar-Falls Courier, this week doubleplusconservative Focus on the Family ran ads in Iowa newspapers claiming that Senate Democrats are preventing Iowans from voting on a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. The bill is currently deadlocked in committee. In typical Republican fashion, the ad didn’t have much to do with reality (coughcoughdannycarrollcoughcough):
Appearing under the headline, “Iraqis Have the Right to Vote, Why Don’t Iowans?” an ad in Monday’s Des Moines Register took aim at Gronstal, of Council Bluffs.
When it comes to marriage, the people of Iowa should be seen and not heard,” the ad reads. “At least that’s the way Sen. Mike Gronstal would have it, as he refuses to let the people of Iowa vote on the Iowa Marriage Amendment.”
The ad includes a black-and-white photo, apparently of an Iraqi woman, holding up a single, ink-stained index finger. The finger, which appears in color, has become synonymous with Iraqi suffrage.
To update an earlier post on the topic, an amendment to the Iowa constitution would have to be approved by 2 consecutive general assemblies and then go on the ballot in the next statewide election.
The Des Moines Register has reports on what several of the candidates for governor have to say about the TouchPlay ban. They interviewed the top three Democratic candidates and Nussle, the presumptive Republican nominee.
Two Democratic candidates, Mike Blouin and Ed Fallon, both say that they support the ban. Fallon, a State Rep., voted in favor of the ban on Tuesday. Blouin, however, cautions that Iowa may be held liable if the companies that have already invested an estimated $130 million in the machines decide to take legal action.
“It was a mistake to move into these. It’s a mistake to move out of them until we know what the financial consequences are for the state of Iowa,” Blouin told reporters. “We have some exposure here, and folks are kind of ignoring that issue. Do we get out of them? You bet. But we get out of it with knowledge as to what our responsibilities and liabilities are.”
Chet Culver, another Democrat, has taken a different stance. He says that that he would not sign the bill banning TouchPlay machines in Iowa, citing concern over the possibleimpact of the ban on small businesses . This makes him the only Democratic candidate who does not support the ban. He appears to be distancing himself from Gov. Vilsak, who says he will sign the bill.
The Register reports that Jim Nussle supports the TouchPlay ban.
On Thursday, the Iowa General Assembly honored Iowa native Norman Borlaug, the Sioux City Journal reports. Borlaug has spent his life developing techniques to help improve food production in developing nations, including India, Pakistan, and Mexico. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970.
The Senate said in its resolution that it “honors and expresses its thanks to Prof. Norman Borlaug, a Cresco, Iowa, native, who has made it his life’s work to feed the hungry and uplift the poor, and in doing so has made the 21st Century a time of hope for billions of people.”
Although Borlaug left Iowa at a young age, he credits his upbringing here as being crucial to his work.
“It was that black soil under my fingernails that led me in the worst of the Depression of the 1930s to seek a career in agriculture,” he said.
It is nice to know that we get to take credit for the work of all those famous people that were born in Iowa–and then high-tailed it out of here as soon as possible. Nice work, Borlaug, Herbert Hoover, and John Wayne.
Radio Iowa reports that today an expert from the Center for Women Policy Studies urged Iowa legislators to add a law to the books making human trafficking illegal. Currently only the federal government may prosecute cases in Iowa, and adding a statute would enable local law enforcement to help.
The federal government has prosecuted one case of human trafficking in Cedar Rapids.
She says local lawmakers don’t want to wait for a federal case to unfold here. Federal prosecutors are stretched very thin, she says, advising that Iowans won’t want to wait for them to track down cases, “because then you will know that you have a bigger problem.”
For every one federal prosecuted, she says that’s just the tip of a huge iceberg, and there are dozens of people locked away you won’t know about. Wolf says women in poor countries are promised jobs in other countries but wind up working in prostitution, or laboring in sweatshops, in farm fields, or as housekeepers in private homes.
Well, first it was this story about an Osceola, IA, woman who was involved in a high-tech kiddie porn ring:
In this case he says investigators think they were distributing “child molestation on demand.” Instead of selling videotapes or e-mailing photos, the investigators charge people were committing acts of child molestation and streaming the video live to viewers as it happened. Patrons would request certain acts be performed, and “get it on demand,” what Counts describes as “pretty sick stuff.”
Daniel Dean Duello, 34, of Mount Auburn, was charged with sexual exploitation by a school employee after a two-year investigation, police said.
Duello is accused of having a sexual relationship with a female student from June through December 2004 while he was head varsity football coach and assistant varsity girls’ basketball coach at Vinton-Shellsburg High School. Duello resigned after the allegations surfaced in 2005.
And then another one! Hull, IA, teachers’ aide Kelly Jean Cuperus, 38, had a relationship with a 15-year-old student (which continued on after his 16th birthday):
Sioux County Attorney Melissa O’Rourke said the sex abuse and lascivious conduct counts are connected to two incidents in which sexual conduct took place last summer, when the boy was 15 years old. Iowa’s age of consent is 16, she said.
The count of sexual exploitation by a school employee alleges that the pair also engaged in sexual conduct several times during the current school year, O’Rourke said.
Anyone think that Iowa has a problem? This Register article describes the second two cases together and reveals that the Duello case went unresolved for over a year!
Vinton Police Chief Jeff Tilson said the student, who has since graduated, was a member of the varsity girls basketball team, of which Duello was the assistant head coach.
Tilson said he was notified of the alleged sexual conduct in Sept. 2004. He said the investigation concluded after about 1 1/2 years after the police department was able to “track down witnesses – current and former students.”
He still has his teaching license, although that’s finally under review, too.
