Gerald Ott of Ankeny was a high school English teacher and for 30 years a school improvement consultant for the Iowa State Education Association.
I watched Governor Kim Reynolds’ Condition of the State message on YouTube on January 15, the day after she spoke to state legislators. I followed along with the text from her official webpage. If she left out a word, I missed the omission.
Every citizen should scrutinize the governor’s remarks to see if or how she speaks to you. If I seem cynical, I feel justified.
I didn’t put a timer on it, but minutes devoted to hand clapping seemed to outnumber the actual minutes of speaking. Those packed in the “People’s House” no doubt came away with hands reddened and raw from clapping.
In her speech, Reynolds laid out a thin veneer of rationality disguising a cavern of unmentionables. But a hidden realty was of little relevance to her cheer squad in the House chambers. They seemed pleased.
I’m not sure there were any Democrats in the audience. Way too much applauding.
In his latest Bleeding Heartland post, Bruce Lear wrote that the governor left out more about education than she included in her Condition of the State message. Bruce is exactly right, and the same applies across the board.
In the first minute, the governor said, “We reduced taxes—saving Iowans more than $24 billion over 10 years.” It’s clear tax reductions are a higher priority than all else, especially the issues Bruce mentioned.
My complements, though, do go to her speech writers. They knew her audience, who seemed thrilled, which is the point, I guess. It was a nice touch to commend the community folks and first responders who had helped with the recovery after Greenfield’s huge tornado. They got a much-deserved standing ovation. A nicer touch was the moment of silence for former U.S. Representative Jim Leach and former Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey, who both passed away last year.
ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION. Iowa’s agriculture corporations have been given a free rein to pollute, with hardly any regulation. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recently added seven polluted river segments to Iowa’s list of impaired waters.
Donnelle Eller reported for the Des Moines Register in November: “The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said in November 2024 that the Iowa Department of Natural Resources should add seven segments (to impaired waters list) of the Cedar, Des Moines, Iowa, Raccoon and South Skunk rivers due to high levels of nitrate, a form of nitrogen that can be released into water from manure and commercial fertilizers.”
Federal regulators say more of Iowa’s rivers — including those that supply drinking water for Des Moines, Cedar Rapids and Iowa City — should be placed on the state’s impaired waters list.
The EPA has recognized the high nitrate concentrations across Iowa, including in Iowa’s major rivers,” said Michael Schmidt, the Iowa Environmental Council’s attorney. “These high nitrates threaten drinking water sources for hundreds of thousands of Iowans.”
If there’s a problem with our drinking water, Governor, please tell us. If we’re about to be overwhelmed with pig poop, tell us. That would be a more serious problem than a naughty book finding its way into a school library.
CLIMATE CHANGE DISASTERS. Fine to help clear up disasters and ask for federal relief, but the underlying causes are a warming planet that yields more storms with greater intensity, In addition to the 125 tornadoes in 2024, a rain deluge swamped northwest Iowa. What say you?
Wikipedia has a whole page devoted to the tornadoes in the U.S. in 2024. If you draw a line from San Antonio to Sioux Falls and through the Great Lakes over to Albany, New York, and down to Miami, and back through the Gulf to Texas, you’d catch all the fatality-causing tornadoes in the country in 2024. Iowa is well positioned on the map, which worries me a lot.
HOMELESSNESS. Many cities have removed encampments, but the tent dwellers don’t yet have warm, secure places to lay their heads. What say you, Governor? Affordable housing is a concern buried in that cavern of reality.
IMMIGRANTS. A front-page story in the Des Moines Register on January 16 announces that mass deportation will hamstring Iowa’s economy, especially the agriculture sector. Reynolds has endorsed using state law enforcement to assist the feds in the roundup.
Is it possible that Iowa and the governor’s red-state allies are on the wrong side of history here? Shouldn’t we be protecting the workforce? Workers are in such short supply in Iowa that thousands of jobs go unfilled. As more oldsters retire and die, there are fewer available workers, but you know that. Almost all of Iowa’s recent population growth came from foreign-born individuals.
TAXES. “We reduced taxes … by $24 billion over 10 years,” the governor proudly proclaimed to a cheering, clapping audience. As Bruce points out, there is a correlation between tax cuts and diminishing public services and unmet needs.
Is it your goal, Governor, to bleed the state’s coffers dry? Shifting your nest egg from our savings account to the day-to-day expenses does just that. The costs of your voucher program is staggering.
Do you hear the people groan? How does a so-transformed state “interact with citizens, businesses, and entrepreneurs— shrinking and aligning government so that our tax cuts are sustainable.” I found that line to be an unintelligible word salad.
OPPOSITION. Nearly half of our states’ voters have a different vision for the state than you. Will you acknowledge them and give them a seat at the table?
Before the 2022 election, your opponent attended your Condition of the State address. She remained seated as you praised the police force that had put down riots in Des Moines in the wake of George Floyd’s murder.
When you called for a standing ovation, your film crew caught your challenger sitting in defiance, not a popular decision in redneck Iowa, yet fodder for a hard hitting, likely racist, political ad.
HIGHER EDUCATION. I’m among Iowans who admit to being “woke.” Your long-term plan seems to make public universities un-woke training centers for job seekers. Okay, but the logic of removing DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) escapes me.
To parents, the fleeting state support for colleges and universities is a challenge that often requires borrowing money to pay for tuition and other costs. Have you ever thought that a country that wants to be globally competitive should make higher education affordable, if not free?
Tell me if I’m wrong, but under your policies, it seems our state universities will cease to be institutions of research, academic excellence, and of a “liberal democracy.” (For those unenlightened, a “liberal democracy” involves fundamental principles such as pluralism, tolerance of conflicting political viewpoints, a constitutional framework for resolving disputes, the rule of law, the separation of powers, and civil rights.)
You, Governor, are pulling the rug out from under professors. When you do so, they are belittled and learning is undervalued.
RATINGS. For the sake of clarity, please stop relying on spurious ratings that place Iowa, your administration, in an unmerited ethereal light.
We’re the #1 state for retirement, #1 for millennial home ownership, and for the third year in a row the #1 state for fiscal responsibility; second in cost of living, and third for opportunity.
None of that is true if, as you say, “Every case of cancer is a tragedy. And I’m concerned by the data showing that these tragedies disproportionately affect Iowans. Our state has ranked second (high) for new cancer cases two years running, and we’re one of just two states with rising rates.
Being third in “opportunity” is meaningless. What is opportunity? Were there only two states in the race? Is third good or bad, like standing alone on the square marked “highest in cancer.”
So, I’m announcing new partnership between Iowa HHS and the University of Iowa to establish a dedicated team of epidemiologists who will research the behavioral, genetic, and environmental factors that might be playing a role. And I’m asking the Legislature to appropriate $1 million to get their work started.
I’m not sure how far $1 million will go. Maybe the team can take some field trips to those “impaired waters” the EPA keeps talking about.
Speaking of cancer, First Gentleman Kevin Reynolds and Senate Majority Leader Jack Whitver were in the chamber for the governor’s speech. Both have had cancer diagnoses, and the governor recognized them for those battles.
HEALTH CARE PERSONNEL. As you say, Governor, “The state is having trouble attracting and keeping medical personnel.” That’s really bad for a state that forces women to give birth to children born of an unwanted or unplanned pregnancy. Your solution:
“I’m directing HHS to launch a program in partnership with Broadlawns and the University of Iowa,” the governor said, “to secure over $150 million in federal funds to create a projected 115 new residency slots each year at our 14 teaching hospitals.”
Maybe you haven’t heard, but the new president has asked Elon Musk and that can of fizz, Vivek Ramaswamy, to put a blow torch to “federal funds.”
There’s a lot that goes unsaid, reminiscent of the story about the Emperor’s New Clothes, especially when you consider the worm-brained Robert Kennedy, Jr., is at the controls.
The governor closed by reminding that she’d been to India, I guess to see if they wanted to buy corn and beans. And that her big, new plan is to entice industry from Illinois to come here for low taxes, little regulation, and a friendly governor. Best keep those EPA concerns to yourself.
So, we’ll see.