Iowa City ranks tenth on Livability.com’s second annual list of “100 Best Places to Live” among small to mid-sized cities in the U.S. Looking at 2,000 cities with populations between 20,000 and 350,000, researchers calculated each city’s “LivScore” using 40 data points falling under eight broad categories, explained in more detail here: amenities, demographics, economy, education, health care, housing, social and civic capital, and transportation. The website said of Iowa City,

Annual cultural events and a strong literary history with writers like John Irving and Flannery O’Connor have helped shape Iowa City, home to the University of Iowa. The college community offers a hardy arts and entertainment environment along with good health care for residents, highlighted by Mercy Hospital and the University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics.

Iowa City has previously been recognized as Iowa’s most walkable city.

Farther down the list of “Best Places to Live,” Iowa cities mentioned were Ames at number 30, West Des Moines at number 57, Cedar Rapids at number 65, and Des Moines at number 82.

Livability.com explained the methodology underlying the list here. The website tweaked the criteria they used last year to compile the first “Best Places to Live” list:

Specifically, we wanted to add some more variables about health care; look at the role of proximity to institutions like hospitals, colleges and universities; and create a better balance between our survey questions and the topics we were measuring. We created some new variables including a measure of racial and ethnic diversity and a rather unique look at the diversity of housing stock.

Those changes allowed Iowa City to move up from number 47 last year to this year’s top ten. Iowa’s highest-ranking city on Livability.com’s inaugural list was Cedar Rapids at number 30, followed by Ames at number 32. Des Moines was ranked number 70 and West Des Moines number 77 last year.

Former State Senator Staci Appel released her Congressional campaign’s fourth district-wide television commercial today. Whereas Appel’s first three spots had an entirely positive message (see here, here, and here), the new ad contrasts her background as a lifelong Iowa resident with Republican candidate David Young’s 20-year career as a “Washington insider.” In a press release today, Appel’s campaign manager Ben Miller commented, “There is a clear choice in this campaign between Staci Appel, who has lived in Iowa her entire life and worked in Iowa to cut government waste and balance budgets, and David Young, who has spent the last 20 years in Washington, D.C and is part of the problem.”

For his part, Young is campaigning on a promise to bring “a dose of Iowa reality to Washington.” His campaign has also highlighted work he’s done for Iowans as U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley’s chief of staff, as well as his record of listening to voters’ concerns.

I’ve posted the video and annotated transcript of the new Appel commercial after the jump. Any comments about the IA-03 race are welcome in this thread.

UPDATE: Young’s “good meal” commercial hasn’t gone over well with many Republicans, according to The Iowa Republican blogger Craig Robinson. I’ve enclosed an excerpt from his post below.

If campaign strategy is anything to go by, four-term U.S. Representative Dave Loebsack is a creature of habit. Loebsack’s debut television commercial launched late last week, and I’ve enclosed the video and transcript after the jump, with my initial thoughts about the message. The biographical information and visuals echo Loebsack’s opening commercial from his 2010 re-election campaign. The ad highlights the same public policy he led with in 2012. The same narrator performs the voice-over. The mid-September launch is precisely when he went up on the air in 2010 and 2012. (Loebsack’s not the greatest fundraiser in Congress, so he can’t afford to advertise district-wide for more than a couple of months.)

Several Bleeding Heartland readers have asked me about last week’s Loras College poll, showing Loebsack ahead of Miller-Meeks by 48.7 percent to 32.1 percent among 300 likely voters in the second Congressional district. I have a hard time believing those results, partly because Loras doesn’t have a long track record with polling. In addition, the statewide sample for the Loras poll includes too high a proportion of no-party voters for a mid-term election. Although a plurality of Iowa registered voters are independents, no-party voters comprised only about a quarter of the electorate in the last three Iowa midterm elections (click through for reports on turnout in 2010, 2006, and 2002). Perhaps most important, Loebsack defeated the less-credible challenger John Archer by a little more than 12 percent in 2012, a presidential election year. So I consider it unlikely he’s 16 points ahead of Miller-Meeks, who came fairly close to beating him in 2010.

By the same token, I don’t believe the Tarrance Group survey that the Miller-Meeks campaign hyped in mid-August, showing her trailing Loebsack by just 45 to 42 percent. Internal polls are always suspect, especially when the campaign releases almost no information about the sample demographics, question wording or question order.

Miller-Meeks and her suporters are optimistic because the district leans less Democratic than the one where Loebsack won his first three elections to Congress. The old IA-02 had a partisan voting index of D+7, whereas the current district is D+4. The latest figures from the Iowa Secretary of State’s Office indicate that the 24 counties in IA-02 contain 165,834 active registered Democrats, 139,034 Republicans, and 180,843 no-party voters. In contrast, Democrats had a voter registration advantage of nearly 48,000 in IA-02 going into the 2010 general election, when Loebsack defeated Miller-Meeks by about 11,500 votes. Notably, Loebsack’s current district includes the Quad Cities area (Scott County), traditionally more Republican-leaning than the Cedar Rapids area (Linn County), which was part of his old district. Under the previous map, Bruce Braley narrowly lost Scott County to his GOP challenger Ben Lange in 2010.

That analysis overlooks a few salient points, though. Since Iowa lawmakers adopted the current map of political boundaries, Loebsack has had three and a half years to build up his name recognition and support in the Quad Cities. He’s attended hundreds of public events there. He’s gone to bat for the Rock Island Arsenal, a major local employer. Nor are the new IA-02 counties a natural base of support for Miller-Meeks, who has spent most of her career in the Ottumwa area. In fact, her woefully under-funded opponent Mark Lofgren carried Scott County and neighboring Clinton County, as well as his home base of Muscatine, in this year’s Republican primary to represent IA-02.

I suspect we would have seen a greater sense of urgency from Loebsack’s campaign and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee if Democratic polling indicated a close race here. The DCCC swooped in to rescue Loebsack in 2010, running a couple of negative spots against Miller-Meeks in the final weeks. I’ll believe Miller-Meeks has a real shot if we see more independent expenditures for both candidates than occurred in IA-02 during the Loebsack’s race against Archer. While the National Republican Congressional Committee placed Miller-Meeks on the top tier of their program for challengers, I have seen no sign that the NRCC plans to spend significant money on this race.

What’s on your mind this weekend, Bleeding Heartland readers? This is an open thread.

The weather is perfect in Indianola this afternoon for the roughly 5,000 people expected to attend Senator Tom Harkin’s final “Steak Fry” event. At least 200 journalists will be on hand, mostly to see Hillary Clinton’s first appearance in Iowa since the 2008 caucuses. If you see a lot of “Hillary doesn’t appear to have much of an Iowa problem” stories tonight and tomorrow, remember that you heard it here first, and repeatedly.

I stand by my prediction that Hillary Clinton will face only token Democratic opposition in Iowa and elsewhere if she runs for president again. But in case she doesn’t run, 2012 Harkin Steak Fry headliner Martin O’Malley is building up a lot of goodwill among Iowa Democrats. In addition to raising money for key Iowa Senate candidates this summer, the Maryland governor’s political action committee is funding staffers for the Iowa Democratic Party’s coordinated campaign, gubernatorial nominee Jack Hatch, and secretary of state candidate Brad Anderson. I still don’t see O’Malley running against Clinton in any scenario.

President Bill Clinton will speak today as well. That’s got to be a tough act to follow. No one can get a crowd of Democrats going like he can. I’ll update this post later with highlights from the event and news coverage. I hope other Bleeding Heartland readers will share their impressions. C-SPAN will carry the main speeches, starting at 2:00 pm. That will be on channel 95 in the Des Moines area.

People who choose a career in politics tend to fall into one of two groups: the “hacks” who work on campaigns, and the “wonks” who immerse themselves in public policy. Paulee Lipsman, who passed away on Thursday in Des Moines, was a rare person who excelled in both fields. She worked on many election campaigns and was a dedicated volunteer for the Iowa Democratic Party at all levels, from the Scott County Democrats all the way up to representing Iowa on the Democratic National Committee. Arguably, she had more influence on the state during more than 20 years of work on the Iowa House Democratic research staff (the later years as director). Staff rarely if ever receive public recognition for any legislation that comes out of the Iowa House or Senate, yet lawmakers could not do the job without them.

I didn’t know Paulee well, but when I talked with her, I was always impressed by her deep knowledge of state government and policy. She enjoyed spinning scenarios as much as the next political junkie, but her passion didn’t end with getting Democrats elected. She was driven to improve public policy, and her views were grounded in facts.

Over the past few days, Iowa Democrats have posted many tributes to Paulee on social media. I enclose some of those words below, along with excerpts from her obituary. Several staffers, lawmakers, or lobbyists expressed gratitude for how Paulee helped them learn the ropes when they were newbies at the State Capitol. She was a role model for women working at the statehouse and a strong supporter of Democratic women running for state office.

Phil Specht’s words in one thread rang especially true: “One of the things I loved about her was even though both of you knew she was smarter and knew more (about practically anything) she would never talk down to anyone.” Presidential candidates sought out Paulee Lipsman’s support–both John Kerry and Joe Biden bragged about her endorsement in press releases. But she wasn’t the type to drop names or pull rank on anyone.

Until I read the Des Moines Register’s piece on Paulee’s passing, I did not know that she had been raped or that she filed an influential lawsuit related to that case during the 1980s. Roxanne Conlin was one of Paulee’s closest friends and represented her in that lawsuit. I’ve enclosed some of her comments about the case below. Paulee retired from the Iowa House Democratic research staff in 2010 to work on Conlin’s campaign for U.S. Senate.

UPDATE: During a stop in Des Moines on September 17, Vice President Joe Biden said, “Paulee Lipsman was a remarkable, remarkable woman. She was not only a friend of mine, but she was a tireless advocate for fairness and equality. I know that she will be greatly missed.”

The Iowa legislature’s Cannabidiol Implementation Study Committee met Thursday to discuss problems related to the implementation of the new law intended to allow Iowans to use cannabis oil to treat seizure disorders. Although the law went into effect on July 1, families who lobbied for measure are not yet able to purchase the oil derived from marijuana plants, because of various legal hurdles. Ten lawmakers (five from each chamber and five from each political party) serve on the study committee: State Senators Joe Bolkcom (D), Bill Dotzler (D), Steve Sodders (D), Charles Schneider (R), and Mike Brietbach (R), and State Representatives Walt Rogers (R), Clel Baudler (R), Linda Miller (R), John Forbes (D), and Bob Kressig (D).

Tony Leys reported for the Des Moines Register that the committee voted 9-1 to recommend that the state reschedule marijuana from “a Schedule I drug, meaning its use for any reason is illegal,” to “a Schedule II drug, which could be used for medical purposes.” Rogers was the dissenting vote. The committee voted 6-4 for “a motion to recommend allowing the closely regulated production and distribution of medical marijuana for approved patients. The motion did not specify what type of marijuana, but it did say the state should not tax the products.” Baudler, at one time Iowa’s most vocal opponent of medical marijuana, joined the five Democrats on the committee to approve that motion. However, Leys noted that Baudler “strenuously opposes expanding the law to let people possess marijuana to treat other conditions, such as cancer or Crohn’s disease. The committee rejected a motion to recommend such an expansion.”

The committee’s recommendations are not binding on the Iowa House and Senate, which will go back into session next January.

Not to take anything away from the suffering of Iowans with seizure disorders, but I don’t understand why lawmakers would want to approve medical cannabis for those conditions only and not for a range of other chronic or life-threatening diseases, which affect thousands of people here. Other states have created workable programs limiting access to those with genuine medical needs, and a majority of Iowans support legalizing the medical use of marijuana. Oncologists have been quietly recommending cannabis to cancer patients for at least four decades.

Democrat Staci Appel and Republican David Young are holding their first debate in the third Congressional district race. Iowa Public Television will live-stream the Council Bluffs debate on the “Iowa Press” page. You can also watch on C-SPAN 2, which is channel 87 for Mediacom subscribers in Des Moines. I will be live-blogging the debate after the jump.

P.S.-I’ve also enclosed below the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s latest television commercial against Young. The format seems a little stale, and I wonder how many people even remember Young’s magic-themed ads before the Republican primary.

UPDATE: I didn’t realize the Appel campaign is also running a new ad. Scroll to the end to see that video and transcript.

FRIDAY UPDATE: Iowa Public Television has the debate video up on the “Iowa Press” page and will broadcast this debate tonight at 7 pm and Sunday morning.

I’ve added lots more below, including post-debate spin and Young’s second television commercial of the general election campaign, which started running on September 12. Young is presenting himself as a reasonable, moderate, experienced problem-solver. The theme of the Democratic communication is that Young spent the debate hiding from more radical positions he took as a Republican primary candidate for U.S. Senate and later for IA-03. That’s accurate, but the reality is that Young does not present as a wild-eyed extremist. Voters may conclude that he was just pandering to wingnuts during the primary campaign.

During prime-time last night, President Barack Obama spoke to the nation about the U.S. response to the terrorist group ISIS. You can read the full text of his remarks here. I don’t have a lot of confidence that airstrikes will weaken support for ISIS where they are powerful, nor do I know whether there are enough “forces fighting these terrorists on the ground” for our support to matter. At least the president isn’t sending massive numbers of ground troops back to Iraq.

After the jump I’ve posted comments from several members of Iowa’s Congressional delegation as well as candidates for federal office. I will update this post as needed later today. Feel free to share your own thoughts about the appropriate U.S. policy in the region.

UPDATE: Added more comments below. As of Thursday evening, I have not seen any public comment on the president’s speech from Senator Tom Harkin, Representative Bruce Braley (IA-01 and the Democratic nominee from U.S. Senate), IA-01 Democratic nominee Pat Murphy, his Republican opponent Rod Blum, IA-02 GOP nominee Mariannette Miller-Meeks, or Representative Steve King (IA-04). I would think anyone who represents or wants to represent Iowans in Congress would want to weigh in about this policy, at least on whether the president should be able to act without Congressional authorization.

I agree with State Senator Matt McCoy, who posted on Facebook, “The President did not make a credible case for sending 475 Americans into IRAQ. The bar should be set very high before a President takes action without Congressional authorization. This crisis needs more dialog and study.”

If you’ve been on Iowa country roads or bike trails lately, you’ve probably seen plenty of goldenrods in bloom. You may also have seen today’s featured wildflower, especially in prairies or prairie remnants. After the jump I’ve posted several photographs of Stiff goldenrod (Oligoneuron rigidum), a member of the aster family that is native to much of North America east of the Rocky Mountains.

I took most of these pictures during a recent visit to Iowa State University’s Reiman Gardens, well worth seeing if you’re in the Ames area. The facility is best known for its incredible butterfly enclosure, containing dozens of tropical plants and hundreds of insect species not native to Iowa. For that reason, I was surprised to see a strip of native plants growing near the front entrance.

This post is also a mid-week open thread: all topics welcome. I’ll put up a separate thread later tonight or tomorrow morning with Iowa reaction to President Barack Obama’s televised address about the U.S. response to ISIS.

In a case being watched by medical marijuana advocates across the country, cancer patient Benton Mackenzie received three years of probation rather than a prison term for his conviction in July on drug charges. Mackenzie had grown marijuana plants on his parents’ property in order to extract cannabis oil, and his wife and son also faced drug charges. At the trial, District Court Judge Henry Latham did not allow Mackenzie’s attorney to tell the jury that the defendant was trying to treat his angiosarcoma. Yesterday, the same judge sentenced both Mackenzie and his wife Loretta Mackenzie to probation, in line with the prosecutor’s recommendation in the case. After the jump I’ve posted excerpts from Brian Wellner’s report for the Quad-City Times and Grant Rodgers’ report for the Des Moines Register. Libertarian candidate for governor Lee Hieb, a medical doctor, attended yesterday’s hearing and afterward called for a change in public policy to give people “the right to choose our own cancer care.” Mackenzie expressed hope that he will be the “last person” to be prosecuted under similar circumstances.

The Mackenzie family wants to move to Oregon, where a doctor has approved Benton Mackenzie for participation in that state’s medical marijuana program. Probation officers in Iowa would have to sign off on the move before the family could leave the state. Mackenzie also plans to appeal “in an effort to get the Iowa Supreme Court to reconsider its decision in a 2005 case that bars Iowans from using claims of medical necessity as a defense to growing marijuana.”

I still think it was a waste of taxpayer money to prosecute a critically ill person for growing marijuana intended for personal use. Iowa lawmakers should make cannabis more accessible to people who can demonstrate a medical need for it.

LATE UPDATE: Judge Latham sentenced Benton Mackenzie’s close friend Stephen Bloomer to five years in prison for helping the cancer patient buy materials for growing marijuana. Bloomer is free on bond pending consideration of his appeal. Scroll to the end of this post for more details on that case. What a travesty.

State Senator Joe Seng underwent surgery yesterday to remove a brain tumor, the Quad-City Times reported. Seng’s operation took place in New York, but according to a statement released today, he will return to Davenport for radiation and chemotherapy treatments this fall. He plans to be ready for the beginning of the next legislative session in January 2015. I’m sure everyone in the Bleeding Heartland community wishes him a full and rapid recovery.

First elected to the Iowa Senate in 2002, Seng represents much of Daveport. He chairs the Senate Agriculture Committee and is vice chair of the Ways & Means Committee. Seeking a fourth term this year, he easily defeated a Democratic primary challenger in June and does not have a general election opponent in Iowa Senate district 45. In 2012, Seng challenged incumbent Dave Loebsack in the Democratic primary to represent Iowa’s second Congressional district.

Part of a series on GOTV in Iowa this year

Less than two weeks remain before county auditors start mailing absentee ballots to Iowa voters. On September 22, the Iowa Secretary of State’s Office will start releasing updates on absentee ballots requested and returned statewide and by Congressional district. As in 2012, Bleeding Heartland will post those totals daily.

Data from a few of the larger counties indicate that the Iowa Democratic Party’s head start on canvassing this summer has produced a clear advantage on absentee ballots requested. Iowa Republican blogger Craig Robinson is fretting about the GOP “getting out worked when it comes to early voting.” Former Iowa Senate GOP staffer Don McDowell is upset with conservatives who refuse to vote before election day. He has seen more than a few statehouse races lost narrowly after Republican candidates were crushed in the early vote.

However, it’s way too soon for Democrats to be over-confident about this year’s early vote lead, for three reasons.

Not being a football fan, I had never heard of Ray Rice until the Baltimore Ravens running back received a pathetic two-game suspension for beating up his fiancee Janay Palmer (now his wife) earlier this year. Rice finally lost his job yesterday, after a leaked video showed him punching Palmer in an elevator. But Louis Bien’s timeline of key events in the case underscores how many authority figures bent over backwards to help Rice avoid any serious repercussions.

For months, top management for the Ravens made clear they hoped Rice would continue to play football with minimal interruption. The team’s official twitter account promoted the idea that Palmer shared some responsibility for getting knocked out. Having given other players one-or two-game suspensions for domestic violence incidents, the National Football League didn’t ask the Atlantic City casino for video footage before deciding on an initial consequence for Rice. Unbelievably, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell interviewed Janay Rice about the incident in the presence of her husband. In a meaningless gesture, the NFL suspended Rice indefinitely yesterday–after the Ravens had ended his contract.

Instead of moving forward with aggravated assault charges, New Jersey prosecutors offered Rice a deal involving probation and anger management counseling rather than prison time. The “pretrial intervention” agreement means that Rice can avoid trial and even have the criminal charges expunged, as long as he complies with the program. I’m all for abusers getting counseling, in addition to facing legal consequences for their actions. Rice’s deal seems way too lenient, given the evidence prosecutors had on videotape. The Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office says Rice “received the same treatment in the court system that any first-time offender in similar circumstances has received,” which doesn’t inspire confidence in the court system.

Rice is lucky that he’ll probably never serve a day in prison for this assault, yet football legend Mike Ditka noted sympathetcally yesterday that Rice is “not a bad guy” who has seen his life “ruined” and his earning power “destroyed.” Right-wing media darling Ben Carson loves to talk about “personal responsibility.” But when asked about Rice yesterday, Carson said, “Let’s not all jump on the bandwagon of demonizing this guy. He obviously has some real problems. And his wife obviously knows that because she subsequently married him. […] let’s see if we can get some help for these people.” In what other context would a conservative show such sympathy for a man who had beaten someone unconscious? Yes, Rice has problems. Let him get help while he faces responsibility for his crimes.

By the way, Carson spent a few days in Iowa during the last week of August. The possible 2016 presidential candidate headlined fundraisers for the Polk County Republican Party and GOP Congressional candidates Rod Blum (IA-01) and Mariannette Miller-Meeks (IA-02). I hope that Blum, Miller-Meeks, and Polk County GOP Chair Will Rogers will repudiate Carson’s comments about Rice. Domestic violence is the most prevalent form of violent crime in Iowa, affecting tens of thousands of people every year.

UPDATE: Worth reading Vice President Joe Biden’s comments on Rice and our cultural attitudes toward violence. Biden was the lead author of the 1994 Violence Against Women Act.

Kathie Obradovich’s latest column for the Des Moines Register summarized conclusions from a research project by Chris Larimer, associate professor of political science at the University of Northern Iowa. According to Obradovich, after studying Iowa governors’ job approval ratings and interviewing 23 “politicos” from around the state, Larimer concluded that Iowa governors (other than Chet Culver) have been regularly re-elected because most of them met public expectations for a lot of personal contact with the governor. Governor Terry Branstad has visited every county every year. Governor Tom Vilsack did annual walks across Iowa.

I haven’t read Larimer’s draft, but I think he’s missing a few points. While it’s clearly a political asset for governors to be visible around the state, I doubt that is the biggest factor in Iowans’ tendency to re-elect our incumbents.

What’s on your mind this weekend, Bleeding Heartland readers? This is an open thread.

I’ve been reading about the recent convictions of former Virginia Governor Robert McDonnell and his wife Maureen McDonnell on federal corruption charges. Both are likely to do prison time for accepting money and favors for personal benefit. Incidentally, McDonnell refused a deal that would have required him to plead guilty to just one charge, sparing his wife from prosecution. Iowa’s own former State Senator Kent Sorenson showed more chivalry–or was it wisdom, for once?–when he agreed to plead guilty on corruption charges, protecting his own wife from prosecution in connection with illegal payments.

While I have no problem with prosecuting greedy politicians, it occurs to me that the McDonnells’ outrageous actions (such as letting a wealthy businessman cater their daughter’s wedding) were less damaging to the public welfare than many more prevalent forms of “legal corruption.” No governor will be prosecuted for appointing wealthy donors to powerful state positions, where they may promote their own businesses or interfere with those they see threatening their industry. No governor will ever be prosecuted for giving interest groups undue influence on public policy, either covertly or openly. In the August 31 Sunday Des Moines Register, Richard Doak wrote an excellent piece on how Governor Terry Branstad has “put state government at the service of one segment of the people: the business community.” I’ve posted excerpts after the jump. Doak’s not talking about criminal activity, but he cites policies that have harmed Iowa more than any luxury vacation for the McDonnells could ever harm Virginia.

On a related note, the Brennan Center for Justice recently published a disturbing report on trends in federal campaign spending:

In recent cases like Citizens United and McCutcheon, the Supreme Court has been narrowing what counts as corruption in campaign finance cases to mere quid pro quo corruption. Quid pro quo is Latin meaning “this for that.” In other words only explicit exchanges of gifts for votes or campaign cash for official acts will count as corruption for the Roberts Supreme Court. But a new study entitled, “The New Soft Money” from Professor Daniel Tokaji and Renata Strause calls this narrow read of corruption into question.  

Speaking of “dark money,” Iowa’s third Congressional district was among thirteen tossup U.S. House races examined in a separate Brennan Center report on outside political spending. A growing trend (not yet seen in IA-03) is for a super-PAC to be formed supporting a single Congressional candidate, giving “big donors a way of evading federal contribution limits.”

UPDATE: Over at the Center for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington’s blog, Adam Rappaport illustrates another example of legalized corruption: “issue ads” funded by dark money, which are clearly intended to influence elections. Although the “tax code plainly says section 501(c)(4) organizations must be ‘exclusively’ engaged in non-political activity,” the IRS interpretation allows dark money groups to fund blatant electioneering communications.  

Yesterday the National Republican Congressional Committee launched its first television commercial in Iowa this year. After the jump I’ve posted the video and transcript of the 30-second spot attacking Democratic candidate Staci Appel over spending votes she cast in the Iowa Senate. Bleeding Heartland provided background here on one of the points, which was a staple of Iowa Republican campaign rhetoric in 2010. Short version: money was never spent on those “decorative flowerpots,” because Governor Chet Culver line-item vetoed the allocation. But in any case, they were not intended purely for decoration around the State Capitol grounds. Rather, they were similar to heavy planters commonly seen around federal government buildings, as much a security measure as a decorative one.

I’ve also enclosed below background on the historic musical instrument for which Appel and other state lawmakers allocated restoration funds. UPDATE: It turns out that GOP candidate David Young’s boss, Senator Chuck Grassley, went to bat for federal funding to restore the same organ. Scroll down for details.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is running its first television commercial attacking Republican nominee David Young in Iowa’s third Congressional district. I don’t know exactly when the ad went up on the air, because I haven’t seen any official announcement from the DCCC, nor is the video on their YouTube channel yet. I saw it for the first time today during the lunchtime newscast on a Des Moines-based station. Bleeding Heartland readers in southwest Iowa, please let me know if you’ve seen the spot on an Omaha/Council Bluffs station.

Since I didn’t catch the ad on video yet, I don’t have an exact transcript. The gist was that David Young is a Washington insider who will “never work for you,” only for special interests that want to do bad things like eliminate the Department of Education. When possible, I’ll update this post with the ad and its script. It was very cookie-cutter in style.

Ater the jump, I’ve posted a statement the DCCC released today, mocking Young’s new television ad for promising to bring “Iowa reality” to Washington.

The National Republican Congressional Committee has reserved television time in IA-03, but to my knowledge, they are not on the air yet against Democratic nominee Staci Appel. CORRECTION: The NRCC started running its first tv spot against Appel on September 4. Click here for details.

UPDATE: Added the video and transcript below.

After record rainfall during August in some parts of Iowa, it’s a banner year for mushrooms. Naturalist and photographer Eileen Miller has been taking spectacular pictures of fungi in the Raccoon River watershed. So this week, Bleeding Heartland is taking a break from wildflowers to focus native Iowa fungi. Eileen contributed a dozen photos and some commentary, which I’ve enclosed below. To my knowledge, I had never seen most of those mushroom species before.

This post is also a mid-week open thread: all topics welcome.

Republican Congressional candidate David Young has launched his first television commercial of the general election campaign. I’ve posted the video and transcript to “Good Meal” after the jump. Echoing his opponent Staci Appel’s promise to “bring Iowa common sense to Washington,” Young’s new ad vows to “bring a dose of Iowa reality to Washington.” Speaking to the camera, Young separates himself from beltway insiders who are mismanaging the government: “I get it, and you get it. Why can’t they?”

Campaigning against Washington is standard practice, but this rhetoric is real chutzpah coming from a guy who has spent most of his adult life as a Congressional staffer based in the capital. The fundraising e-mail that accompanied today’s ad release glossed over Young’s professional background, asserting, “Washington needs David,” and urging supporters to “Help send David to Washington,” as if Young hadn’t spent the better part of two decades there.

Any comments about the race in IA-03 are welcome in this thread.

P.S.- While many voters would probably agree with Young’s claim that the federal government “overspends” and “overtaxes,” Young is smart enough to know better. Fact is, the federal tax burden on most American households is at historically low levels, whether you look at federal income taxes only or total federal taxes. By the same token, total federal government spending as a share of U.S. gross domestic product has “fallen dramatically” since the Great Recession ended, and the federal government “outside Social Security and Medicare is already significantly below its historical average size.”  

First in a series of posts on GOTV in Iowa this year

Air time for television advertising has become the most expensive line-item in many election campaigns. Outside groups have spent millions of dollars already on Iowa commercials targeting U.S. Senate candidates Bruce Braley and Joni Ernst, with millions more to be spent over the next 60 days. Nevertheless, I don’t know many people who believe attack ads will determine the outcome of close races like Iowa’s U.S. Senate battle. Barring some extraordinary campaign event (such as a meltdown in the debates), the winner will be the candidate whose side does a better job of identifying its supporters and turning them out to vote.

The number of Iowans who voted in each of the last two midterm elections was about a third lower than the number who had voted in the most recent presidential election. If that trend holds, approximately 1.1 million Iowans will cast ballots in the 2014 general election. Braley and other Democrats can’t afford to have turnout resemble 2010, when only 56.5 percent of registered Iowa Democrats voted, as opposed to 69 percent of registered Republicans.

The Iowa Democratic Party has been crowing about its bigger and better “coordinated campaign,” an effort to build on the successful 2012 early voting program here. No question, Democrats got a big jump on the ground game while the Iowa GOP was mired in poor fundraising and a messy leadership transition. Democrats have had canvassers out every weekend for months, and so far have generated many more absentee ballot requests than Republicans. The Iowa GOP has stepped up its door-knocking over the past several weeks, and Governor Terry Branstad will spend part of his war chest to assist the early voting efforts.

Knocking on doors is one of the most valuable ways to volunteer for a campaign. For those willing to spend a few hours on a weeknight or a weekend afternoon, I’ve enclosed my best advice for canvassing after the jump. Please feel free to share your own experiences with canvassing (on either side of the door) in this thread. Six years ago, a guest diarist posted his top tips here.