The U.S. House has approved a bill to limit private health insurance coverage of abortion services. All Iowa Democrats opposed the new restrictions, while Republicans supported them.

One of the most surprising Iowa House Republican winners from 2010 now has a Democratic challenger. Altoona City Council member Joe Riding announced yesterday that he will run against State Representative Kim Pearson in the new House district 30, a swing seat covering much of eastern Polk County.  

Iowa’s third and fourth Congressional districts are on track to have high-spending races in 2012, judging from the latest campaign finance reports.

Details from all the Federal Election Commission filings by Iowa Congressional candidates are after the jump. The big news comes from IA-03, where Republican Representative Tom Latham is building a huge money edge over Democratic Representative Leonard Boswell, and IA-04, where former First Lady Christie Vilsack out-raised Republican Steve King for the quarter.

Planned Parenthood Voters of Iowa published its scorecard of Iowa legislators and gave its “Champion Award” to two Iowa House Democrats: State Representatives Janet Petersen and Beth Wessel-Kroeschell.

Details from the 2011 legislative update are after the jump. Planned Parenthood of the Heartland President and CEO Jill June described this year as “the worst legislative session for women in my 25 years at Planned Parenthood.”

Conventional wisdom says President Barack Obama would love to run against an “extreme” Republican candidate, such as Representative Michele Bachmann. With unemployment up again and likely to rise further as Obama tries to outdo Republicans on government spending cuts, I’m not convinced that a big campaign war chest will be enough to get the president re-elected.

Watching Bachmann’s solid introductory television commercial and highlights from her recent Iowa tour, I challenge those who write her off as “unelectable,” especially in this economy. Ad video, transcipt, analysis and more Bachmann campaign news are after the jump.

The Iowa House and Senate finally passed a budget and got out of town yesterday with only about eight hours remaining before the end of the fiscal year.

Every legislative session has its own dynamic, and I’ve been thinking about what surprised me most about this year’s maneuvering in the capitol.  

The last day of fiscal year 2011 has arrived, and Iowa lawmakers still have not completed work on next year’s budget. Several pieces have cleared the Iowa House and Senate after backroom deals were reached on some contention issues. Notably, House Republicans and Senate Democrats reached a compromise on preschool and K-12 school funding. However, abortion language is still holding up the health and human services budget bill, covering a huge chunk of Iowa government spending.

More details about this week’s budget deal-making are after the jump. I will update this post throughout the day as news emerges from the Iowa House and Senate. Legislators plan to pass a one-month stopgap budget to keep state government funded while Governor Terry Branstad reviews the budget bills that reach his desk. (The governor has the power to item-veto certain appropriations.) As of this morning, the same abortion dispute blocking the health and human services bill is holding up passage of the stopgap budget.

Democratic and Republican negotiators gave up trying to find a compromise on property tax reform earlier this week. Both the Iowa House and Senate have passed property tax reform legislation, but the approaches differ vastly from one another and from Branstad’s preferred approach. If the governor calls a special legislative later this year, property taxes may come back on the agenda.

UPDATE: The last budget bills passed during the afternoon on June 30. The House approved the 30-day stopgap budget, 87 to 7. State representatives who voted no were Democrats Vicki Lensing, Mary Mascher, Mary Wolfe, Cindy Winckler and Beth Wessel-Kroeschell, and Republicans Tom Shaw and Kim Pearson.

The Health and Human Services budget conference committee report passed the Iowa House by a 61 to 33 vote. Most Republicans present voted yes, and most Democrats present voted no. Eight Democrats voted yes: Dennis Cohoon, Curt Hanson, Dan Muhlbauer, Brian Quirk, Andrew Wenthe, Chris Hall, Helen Miller, and Lisa Heddens. Four Republicans voted no: Kim Pearson, Glen Massie, Tom Shaw, and Jason Schultz. In other words, Republicans had the votes to pass the health and human services budget without any support from House Democrats.

The Iowa Senate approved the health and human services budget by a 27 to 18 vote. I don’t know yet who crossed party lines but will update once the Senate Journal containing roll call votes has been published.

After the jump I’ve added more details on the compromise Medicaid abortion coverage language. According to State Senator Jack Hatch, there will be “no change” to the circumstances in which Iowa women can receive Medicaid coverage for abortion costs.

Scroll to the end of this post for closing statements from House and Senate leaders of both political parties. Everyone sounds relieved to see the end of the third-longest session in Iowa legislature history.

Former U.S. Senator Rick Santorum is back in Iowa today, meeting and greeting potential caucus-goers in Denison before attending a “Trunk & Tusk” reception at a farm near Holstein later in the afternoon. Tonight he headlines an event for the Ida County Republican Party, and tomorrow he will join the Iowa Tea Party bus tour in Spencer.

Starting this week, Santorum will reach Iowa Republicans though the radio as well. His first commercial went up yesterday on nationwide satellite radio and hits the airwaves in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina later this week. The campaign didn’t release the size of the ad buy.

You can listen to Santorum’s 60-second spot at his presidential campaign website. I’ve posted my transcript after the jump, along with some analysis of the message and what’s notably absent from the message.

On a mostly party-line vote, the Iowa House passed the country’s most restrictive late-term abortion ban yesterday. The move put House Republicans on record opposing abortions after 20 weeks gestation, but in effect ends any chance that Omaha-based Dr. Leroy Carhart will face legal obstacles to opening a new abortion clinic in Iowa.

Details on yesterday’s House vote and the amended Senate File 534 are after the jump.  

With less than a month remaining until the start of the 2012 fiscal year, Iowa House Republican leaders have stepped up efforts this week to draft the two-year budget Governor Terry Branstad is demanding. Republicans have drafted an omnibus budget bill combining all the usual appropriations bills, plus a few other things on their legislative wish list. The omnibus bill includes two small gestures toward a compromise with Democrats who control the Iowa Senate. However, Senate Democrats don’t sound ready to accept this package as the final work on state spending for the next two years.

Details and early reaction to this week’s budget news are after the jump.  

On a party-line 26 to 23 vote, the Iowa Senate today approved a bill to restrict the locations of clinics where abortions are performed after 20 weeks gestation. Senators also rejected an attempt to bring up a broader ban on abortions after 20 weeks.

Follow me after the jump for background and details on the Senate debate, including the various amendments Republicans offered.

Yesterday the Iowa Senate Ways and Means Committee advanced a bill that would restrict where abortions after the 20th week of pregnancy can be performed in Iowa. The bill is aimed at stopping Dr. Leroy Carhart from opening a new clinic in Council Bluffs without adding new restrictions on a woman’s right to have a late-term abortion. However, Republican leaders in both chambers of the state legislature spoke out against that approach yesterday. Details and next steps in this controversy are after the jump.

UPDATE: Added comments from anti-choice Democratic State Senator Tom Hancock below.

Although no pro-choice Republicans currently serve in the Iowa legislature, an Iowa House vote yesterday demonstrated that the Republican Party is divided on how far to pursue anti-abortion policies. More than half the House Republican caucus, including the entire leadership team, rejected State Representative Kim Pearson’s attempt to force a vote on a “personhood” bill giving fetuses the full rights of U.S. citizens.

This vote will anger some conservative activists who oppose abortion rights and may become an issue in various Republican primaries next year. More background and details are after the jump.  

Iowa Senate Ways and Means Committee Chair Joe Bolkcom announced today that he will introduce new legislation designed to stop Omaha-based Dr. Leroy Carhart from opening an abortion clinic in Council Bluffs.

Follow me after the jump for background on Bolkcom’s new proposal and prospects for House File 657, the 20-week abortion ban the Iowa House approved earlier this year. Bolkcom has been assigned to floor-manage House File 657 if and when the upper chamber debates that bill.

UPDATE: Added comments from Governor Terry Branstad and Bolkcom below.

WEDNESDAY UPDATE: Bolkcom revealed further details on the new bill; his statement is at the end of this post.

This week Governor Terry Branstad declared April to be “Abortion Recovery Month” in Iowa. Anti-choice organizations and crisis pregnancy centers were invited to the proclamation signing, and women who regret their abortions spoke at a press conference. Human beings have complex reactions to significant life events, and I feel empathy for anyone who feels sad about important choices. However, it is inaccurate to suggest that all women who exercise their legal right to an abortion need to go through a “recovery” process. The American Psychological Association’s Task Force on Mental Health and Abortion concluded in a 2008 report that “among adult women who have an unplanned pregnancy the relative risk of mental health problems is no greater if they have a single elective first-trimester abortion than if they deliver that pregnancy. […] the TFMHA reviewed no evidence sufficient to support the claim that an observed association between abortion history and mental health was caused by the abortion per se, as opposed to other factors.” Some mental health professionals believe that “emotional issues, especially feelings of guilt, begin to rise along with anti-choice efforts to restrict abortion.”

The Iowa House approved a 20-week abortion ban at the end of March. The bill is modeled on a Nebraska statute and is intended to deter an Omaha-based doctor from opening a new abortion clinic in Council Bluffs. It has stalled in the Senate Government Oversight Committee. Committee Chairman Tom Courtney said in mid-April that it was too late in the legislative session to adequately review the bill this year, and he would prefer to take it up in 2012. Council Bluffs Mayor Tom Hanafan, a Democrat, recently urged the Senate to act on the bill before adjourning. The mayor does not want his city to become “home to a clinic that specializes in later term abortions.” Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, who represents the Council Bluffs area, has said he would not block the abortion bill from coming to a vote and is letting the normal committee process work.

Women who are pregnant and planning to stay pregnant should be aware that April is cesarean awareness month. At the request of Iowa chapters of the International Cesarean Awareness Network, Branstad issued a proclamation to that effect. The c-section rate in Iowa rose to 30.2 percent in 2009, the most recent year for which statistics are available. That is way above the optimal level, but the national average is even higher at 32.9 percent. The central Iowa chapter of the International Cesarean Awareness Network posted statistics for c-sections and vaginal births after cesareans (VBACs) in Iowa hospitals here. Unfortunately, more than three quarters of Iowa hospitals prohibit pregnant women from even attempting VBACs. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Healthy People 2010 initiative set a goal of reducing the cesarean birth rate for low-risk women to 15 percent for women giving birth for the first time and 72 percent for women who have had a prior cesarean birth. Having a doula present during labor has been proven to reduce the need for cesareans and other major interventions.

Whether or not they are able to become pregnant, all sexually active people should be aware that April is STD Awareness Month. The Centers for Disease Control has lots of relevant facts and figures here. Planned Parenthood of the Heartland clinics across Iowa are encouraging people to get themselves tested for sexually transmitted diseases.

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

UPDATE: State Representative Kurt Swaim is not running for re-election in the new House district 82, which covers Davis and Van Buren counties and most of Jefferson County, including Fairfield. Swaim and fellow Democrat Curt Hanson were both placed in that district, but most of the population lives on Hanson’s current turf. Swaim was one of four House Democrats to vote for the 20-week abortion ban, one of three House Democrats to vote for a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, and one of nine House Democrats to vote for a bill banning secret recordings on Iowa farms. Hanson voted against all of those bills.

The abortion issue magically transforms conservatives from people who want to keep bureaucrats from getting between you and your doctor into people eager to let the government limit pregnant women’s medical care. The Iowa House demonstrated that contradiction again yesterday, as representatives approved a ban on most abortions after 20 weeks gestation.

House File 657 is modeled on a Nebraska statute with the intent of stopping Omaha physician Leroy Carhart from opening an abortion clinic in Iowa. State representatives voted 60 to 39 to send the bill to the Senate. The yes votes included 56 Republicans and four Democrats: Dan Muhlbauer (district 51), Brian Quirk (district 15), Kurt Swaim (district 94) and Roger Thomas (district 24). Three first-term Republicans–Kim Pearson (district 42), Glen Massie (district 74) and Tom Shaw (district 8)–voted no, along with the rest of the House Democratic caucus. Those Republicans have argued against the bill because it would ban less than 1 percent of abortions in Iowa; their opposition forced House Republican leaders to pull the bill out of the House Human Resources Committee and send it to Government Oversight instead.

Excerpts from yesterday’s arguments for and against House File 657 are after the jump, along with thoughts about the bill’s prospects in the Iowa Senate.

Anti-abortion legislation that stalled earlier this year in an Iowa House committee appears likely to pass the lower chamber soon. House File 5 would ban abortions after the 20th week of pregnancy, using a “fetal pain” standard adapted from a similar bill in Nebraska. More than 30 House Republicans are co-sponsoring the bill, hoping to deter Omaha-based abortion provider Dr. Leroy Carhart from opening a clinic in Council Bluffs.

Recent news on House File 5 and a related “personhood” bill is after the jump.

Iowa Republicans vowed late last year to pass new abortion restrictions modeled on a Nebraska statute which in effect bans the procedure after the 20th week of gestation. Abortions are already illegal in Iowa after the sixth month of pregnancy except if a doctor believes the procedure could “preserve the life or health” of the pregnant woman. The new bill, House File 5, asserts that an “unborn child” can experience pain after the 20th week of gestation and bans abortions after that time unless “The pregnant woman has a condition which the physician deems a medical emergency” or “It is necessary to preserve the life of the unborn child.”

Very few abortions are performed in Iowa after the 20th week of pregnancy. In 2006 just nine out of more than 6,700 abortions occurred at the 21th week of gestation or later. Of the 5,829 abortions performed in Iowa in 2009, only six were induced after the 20th week. However, Republicans want to prevent Dr. LeRoy Carhart from opening a clinic in Council Bluffs to serve women seeking abortions after 20 weeks. Carhart had worked with Dr. George Tiller in Wichita, Kansas for more than a decade but moved to Omaha after Tiller’s assassination in 2009. The new Nebraska law prompted Carhart to close his Omaha clinic. Last month he began working at a Maryland clinic.

Iowa House Republican leaders have expressed confidence about passing new abortion restrictions. They have a 60 to 40 majority with no pro-choice members of their caucus. I believe this legislation could pass the Iowa Senate, because unlike the 1980s and 1990s, there are no longer any pro-choice Republicans to cancel out the votes of Democrats supporting more restrictions on reproductive rights. Governor Terry Branstad would be eager to sign any anti-choice bill.

However, Craig Robinson reported yesterday that House File 5 lacks the votes to clear the Iowa House Human Resources Committee. Two of the most conservative first-term GOP legislators, Kim Pearson and Glen Massie, serve on that committee and oppose the bill, presumably because it would not go far enough to restrict abortions. Without their support, Republicans can count on only 10 votes in the 21-member committee. According to Robinson, Iowa Right to Life, the Iowa Catholic Conference, and the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition all support House File 5. But the FAMiLY LEADER organization led by Bob Vander Plaats and others from the Iowa Family Policy Center oppose the bill.

Pearson and Massie will face tremendous pressure to change their position. I wouldn’t be surprised if they vote for House File 5 after all. But if they resist carrots or sticks Republican leaders wave at them, the bill could be dead for the 2011 session.

Speaking of reproductive rights, no one in the House Republican caucus seems to realize that the family planning spending cuts in House File 45, which passed the chamber on January 19, would likely increase the number of early abortions performed in Iowa. It’s sadly typical for anti-choice politicians to oppose effective means to prevent unintended pregnancies.

UPDATE: The Des Moines Register’s Jason Clayworth posted a good rundown on the GOP split over this bill.

The Iowa Board of Medicine has dismissed a complaint regarding Planned Parenthood of the Heartland‘s use of telemedecine to provide abortions:

The system, the first of its kind in the nation, allows a physician in Des Moines to deliver the pills to patients in remote clinics around the state. After speaking to a patient for a few minutes via videoconferencing, the doctor pushes a computer button that opens a drawer in front of the patient. The patient reaches in the drawer to retrieve the pills, then takes the first dose while the doctor watches. She then takes the rest of the pills at home, where she has an induced miscarriage.

The national anti-abortion group Operation Rescue complained to Iowa regulators that the system broke state law, which says abortions may only be performed by a physician. The group said the remote-control method did not meet the requirement. Planned Parenthood of the Heartland leaders said that the method was legal, and that Operation Rescue was looking for any excuse to limit women’s access to abortion services.

The Des Moines Register posted the letter from Iowa Board of Medicine Executive Director Mark Bowden to Operation Rescue. Excerpt:

After a thorough investigation and careful review of the investigative materials obtained in this matter, the Board voted to close the file Without taking disciplinary action against Dr. Haskell. Although this may not be the outcome you were seeking, you can be assured that your complaint was investigated and the Board reached its decision after full review of the investigative record. […]

The Board’s primary responsibility is to protect the public by ensuring that physicians provide appropriate medical care to patients. The Board takes seriously all complaints it receives.

Republican lawmakers have vowed to push legislation restricting abortion access during the Iowa legislature’s 2011 session, which started this week. One bill likely to pass the Iowa House will be modeled on a Nebraska statute that bans abortions after the 20th week of gestation. Some representatives also want to ban abortions via telemedecine, and Governor-elect Terry Branstad has said he wants that practice to be discontinued. That could force many Iowa women to travel great distances to a clinic providing surgical abortion or a drug that induces abortion.  

To no one’s surprise, Planned Parenthood of the Heartland’s political arm, called the Planned Parenthood Voters of Iowa PAC, endorsed Governor Chet Culver’s re-election bid today. Planned Parenthood’s PAC (at that time called the Freedom Fund) supported Culver during the 2006 Democratic gubernatorial primary and in that year’s general election against Jim Nussle, and the PAC’s statement issued today explains the decision to back him again:

“Governor Chet Culver has done more to reduce the need for abortion and increase access for women’s health care than his opponent ever will,” said Jill June, President and CEO of Planned Parenthood of the Heartland. “During the primary debates, Terry Branstad has made it clear that he would cut basic health care services to more than 50,000 Iowan women by choosing to cut Planned Parenthood as a service provider.”

PAC chair Phyllis Peters cited Governor Culver’s record. “Governor Culver has strongly supported the health care needs of women in many different ways. He has supported vaccine coverage for the HPV vaccine, the only vaccine to prevent cervical cancer; funded the state match to the Medicaid Family Planning Waiver to provide contraception to low income women; supported medically accurate sexuality education in our schools; and supported extending the age a woman can qualify for family planning services. Women in Iowa can count on Governor Culver to listen, understand and respond to the very real health needs of women.”

In the primary campaign candidate Terry Branstad indicated that he would support an Iowa law similar to one just passed in Oklahoma, which would require an invasive sonogram for women who seek abortions. Unlike sonograms currently used in Iowa, this would require a sonogram where a probe is inserted in the woman to show the image of the fetus, even for victims of rape and incest.

“Terry Branstad believes in using intimidation tactics to prevent women from their legal rights. That’s not what Iowan’s believe or want in our state,” said Jill June. “The Planned Parenthood Voters of Iowa PAC is speaking out against these tactics of discrimination and intimidation, as we show our support for Governor Culver.”

Branstad generally avoids mentioning Planned Parenthood by name, but this spring he repeatedly said Iowa “should not provide funding for organizations that provide abortion services.” That wording left the misleading impression that state funding pays for abortions, but no government money pays for any abortions at Planned Parenthood clinics. Most of the state funding to Planned Parenthood of the Heartland covers contraception and is matched on a 9:1 basis by the federal government through the Medicaid family planning program. (That is, every dollar from the state budget is matched by $9 from Medicaid.)

It’s outrageous that Branstad, the former president of a medical school, would support an Oklahoma abortion law that lets the government dictate how some doctors should care for their patients and even how they should talk to their patients. So much for government not getting between you and your doctor.

Culver slammed the Oklahoma approach in this statement his campaign released today:

“I am so pleased to receive the endorsement of Planned Parenthood Voters of Iowa PAC. I’ve worked very hard in my first term to maintain and improve family planning and women’s rights in the state of Iowa and I am proud to have their support in this election.  By contrast, Terry Branstad doesn’t trust the women of Iowa to make their own health care decisions.

“What’s ironic is that the women and men of Iowa cannot trust Branstad on health care. When he was at Des Moines University, he supported mandates. When he was campaigning  in the Republican primary, he opposed mandates. Iowans can only guess as to his position tomorrow. What is clear is that he thinks requirements such as allowing adult children to continue to be insured on their parents’ policy or prohibiting people from being denied insurance for pre-existing conditions is too intrusive but forcing victims to have invasive procedures is all right.

“Branstad even campaigned on enacting a law similar to the one passed in Oklahoma. The law requires a woman to have an invasive and expensive sonogram, for no medical reason, prior to receiving some services, forcing women who are victims of rape or incest to re-live these horrifying violent crimes. Well, I believe that is wrong.

“Terry Branstad is out of touch on this issue. He even refused to comment on the endorsement today because he knows that he’s on the wrong side of women’s issues.

“I have worked hard to invest in a woman’s right to make her own decisions about her health care and I will continue that investment.”

Click here for background on Branstad’s inconsistent stand regarding a proposed individual mandate to purchase health insurance.

No doubt we’ll hear more this fall about Branstad opposing reproductive rights, because it fits Culver’s message about Branstad pushing failed ideas of the past.

One day after Terry Branstad won the Republican nomination for governor, his accountability problem was back on display. Speaking to the Iowa Association of Business and Industry’s annual convention in Ames yesterday, Branstad told the audience, “I want to get rid of the present incumbent because he’s driven the state into the biggest budget deficit in history.”

In the psychological field, projection is “a defense mechanism that involves taking our own unacceptable qualities or feelings and ascribing them to other people.” I’m not qualified to offer any professional diagnosis, but Branstad’s the guy who really did keep two sets of books to hide illegal deficits. It’s incredible to hear him keep making that false claim about Governor Chet Culver’s administration. The governor and Iowa’s legislative leaders haven’t run up any budget deficit, let alone the largest deficit ever. If Culver were running deficits, Iowa wouldn’t have a top-level credit rating or be considered one of the states “least like California” in terms of fiscal problems.

How long will Branstad keep getting away with making stuff up about Culver’s record? Your guess is as good as mine.

In other news, Branstad promised the Association of Business and Industry crowd that if elected, he wouldn’t allow key priorities of organized labor like the prevailing wage or collective bargaining bills to become law. I doubt ABI has to worry about that, since Iowa Democrats haven’t delivered on those issues during the past four years.

Culver visited a Cedar Rapids preschool yesterday and blasted Branstad’s “20th Century thinking” on preschool funding:

“This is an investment we cannot afford to not make in the future,” Culver said about the preschool initiative. He said he budgeted $90 million this year for the program and $115 million next year. […]

“While we want to continue to fund preschool … Terry Branstad wants to take that away,” Culver said. […]

The fiscal 2011 funding will assist an additional 150 school districts and school district collaborations under the statewide voluntary preschool program, he said. It is projected that during the 2010-2011 school year about 21,354 four-year-olds will be served by the preschool program in 326 school districts across the state.

Many Iowa families could not afford early education for their children without the state program. Culver is right to pound Branstad for his screwed-up priorities. Culver also criticized the Republican for wanting to go backwards on state-funded stem cell research, women’s reproductive rights and flood recovery funding for the Cedar Rapids area. Like everyone else in the Iowa GOP, Branstad has criticized the I-JOBS infrastructure bonding initiative but not explained how he would have paid for the flood reconstruction and prevention projects Iowa needs.

Branstad told Todd Dorman of the Cedar Rapids Gazette that he would not try to repeal the I-JOBS bonding, but “also compared I-JOBS to the Greek debt crisis.” Give me a break. The professional investor community drove down the interest rate of the initial I-JOBS offering because of Iowa’s solid fiscal condition and plan for repaying the bonds. In fact, I-JOBS was one of the top 10 “deals of the year” in 2009 according to Bond Buyer, the daily newspaper of public finance.

Vice President Joe Biden headlines Governor Chet Culver’s re-election rally today in Cedar Rapids. If you are watching in person or online, please share your impressions in this thread. I will update the post later with more coverage of the event. Adam Sullivan is live-tweeting for Iowa Independent.

Yesterday the governor kicked off his campaign at Hoover High School in Des Moines, followed by stops in Ames, Marshalltown and Waterloo. Kathie Obradovich felt Culver’s speech “salvaged” the otherwise low-energy event in Des Moines. After the jump I’ve posted excerpts from Culver’s remarks, which his campaign released. He frames the race as a choice of going backwards “to policies that created this recession” or forward to continue the investments his administration has begun. Culver outlined some goals for the next five years, such as completing rebuilding efforts from the 2008 floods, “making quality pre-school available to every Iowa child whose parents want to take advantage of it,” pursuing stem cell research in Iowa, and “increasing the percentage of our energy production coming from alternative sources from 20% to at least 30%.” Culver chided Republicans who “just say no,” think corporate tax cuts are the answer for every problem and “continue to preach the failed doctrine of trickle down economics.”

In addition to the excerpts you’ll find below, the governor spoke up for protecting a woman’s right to make her own health-care decisions and against writing discrimination into the Iowa constitution. Later in Marshalltown, Culver noted that discrimination is “not the Iowa way […] We’ve always been at the front when it’s come to civil rights.”

Any comments about the governor’s race are welcome in this thread. Speaking of Republicans who want to take us backwards, Terry Branstad’s campaign started running a new ad today, which portrays the former governor as “the change we need now.” I’ll have more to say about Branstad’s campaign message in a different post, but for now I wonder whether he will get away with repeating his lie about Iowa running a “billion-dollar deficit.”

UPDATE: Um, what the heck? Someone get the governor a driver who won’t try to chase another driver down for a stupid reason.

John Deeth liveblogged the Biden event here. Kathie Obradovich tweeted here. Key points of Biden’s message: he’s known Chet Culver since he was seven years old and knows he has “the gumption to handle the job at this time.” Also, with Culver in charge “Iowa is better off than almost every other state in the nation … Iowa is still moving forward.” Biden praised Culver for being ahead of the curve in establishing the Power Fund in 2007:

“Government is not the answer but it can prime the pump and encourage the private sector.”

“45 out of [50] governors, Democrat and Republican, are sitting on their hands. Because of Chet’s leadership Iowa is better prepared.” […]

“What are Republicans FOR? Not a joke. Tell me one affirmative thing the Republican Party is for.”

Good question, Mr. Vice President. Biden also noted that the stimulus bill brought $3.3 billion to Iowa, and said Culver had used $4 billion in federal and state flood recovery money well. Biden said Iowa is on the upswing and has an unemployment rate well below the national average, which is “no accident, it’s because of Governor Chet Culver.”

SECOND UPDATE: Todd Dorman found Biden’s praise for Culver a bit over-the-top. Tom Beaumont’s story for the Des Moines Register is here. Kay Henderson’s liveblog for Radio Iowa is here. She’s captured more quotes from the vice president.

Remember last year when Republicans claimed health care reform would put government bureaucrats between patients and their doctors? It was a hypocritical talking point to begin with, given how often insurance companies overrule doctors’ orders, in some cases denying sick people access to life-saving medical care.

The hypocrisy is especially apparent now that Republicans are cheering two new laws passed in Oklahoma.

The Oklahoma Legislature voted Tuesday to override the governor’s vetoes of two abortion measures, one of which requires women to undergo an ultrasound and listen to a detailed description of the fetus before getting an abortion.

Though other states have passed similar measures requiring women to have ultrasounds, Oklahoma’s law goes further, mandating that a doctor or technician set up the monitor so the woman can see it and describe the heart, limbs and organs of the fetus. No exceptions are made for rape and incest victims.

A second measure passed into law on Tuesday prevents women who have had a disabled baby from suing a doctor for withholding information about birth defects while the child was in the womb.

To clarify: Republicans passed a law dictating the way doctors communicate with patients and how they must proceed with every woman seeking an abortion, regardless of her individual circumstances. According to the New York Times, the Center for Reproductive Rights has already filed suit to challenge the constitutionality of the ultrasound law, claiming it “violates the doctor’s freedom of speech, the woman’s right to equal protection and the woman’s right to privacy.”

The second law is in some ways more offensive, because the government is shielding doctors who deliberately do not level with their patients. I have close friends who have learned while pregnant that their future child has serious medical problems. To give doctors license to deceive women in that situation is unconscionable. Pregnant women must be able to make informed decisions regarding all medical care. Who’s to say that doctors will stop at “merely” hiding birth defects? Maybe some will decide it’s better not to tell women they have cancer or some other disease that might prompt them to terminate a pregnancy.

The new laws are similar to two anti-abortion laws the Oklahoma Supreme Court already struck down. Clearly Republicans won’t let a little thing like the state constitution get in the way of their desire to intimidate women and interfere with the information they receive from their doctors. I agree with Charles Lemos: this is a sign of how extreme today’s Republican Party has become.

Iowans who don’t take reproductive rights for granted may want to know that Arianna Huffington is coming to Des Moines next Tuesday to help raise money for Planned Parenthood of the Heartland (formerly Planned Parenthood of Greater Iowa). Click the link for event details.

Share any relevant thoughts in this thread. I recommend this post from the Ms. Magazine blog on the 10 worst myths about abortion in the United States.

It’s crunch time for health insurance reform, and Senator Tom Harkin and the three Iowa Democrats in the House “announced a major breakthrough today on the issue of Medicare payment reform in the final health care reform bill,” according to a joint press release. Excerpt:

[Representatives Dave] Loebsack, [Senator Tom] Harkin, [Leonard] Boswell and [Bruce] Braley have been outspoken advocates for changing the way Medicare pays health care providers for services, from its current fee-for-service system into a quality and value-based system.

Loebsack, Harkin, Boswell and Braley helped negotiate a compromise adding language to the health care reform bill that provides an immediate $800 million to address geographic disparities for both doctors and hospitals, as well as written guarantees from Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius for further action to reform Medicare reimbursement rates that do not qualify for reconciliation under the Byrd Rule. The Senate bill previously only provided a Medicare reimbursement fix for doctors.

The House reconciliation package maintained automatic implementation of a value index as part of the reimbursement structures for doctors, beginning in 2015.  This language was secured in the Senate bill with the help of Harkin and is based on Braley’s Medicare Payment Improvement Act, introduced in June 2009. Under the fixes secured in the Senate bill and the House reconciliation package, Iowa doctors will see five percent increases in current Medicare reimbursement rates in both 2010 and 2011.

I posted the whole press release, containing more details, after the jump. This deal appears to have secured the vote of Peter DeFazio (OR-04) as well. Yesterday he threatened to vote no because of language on the Medicare payments disparity.

President Barack Obama gave House Democrats a pep-talk today, and his speech (which wasn’t pre-written) got rave reviews from many Democrats. If only the Senate bill were as good as Obama made it sound. (UPDATE: I posted the White House transcript of Obama’s speech after the jump.)

House Democratic leaders have decided to ditch the “deem and pass” method for passing health insurance reform with a single vote, even though the legislative procedure isn’t as rare or controversial as Republicans would have you believe. Instead, the House will hold an hour of flood debate tomorrow on “the rule to allow reconcilation to get to the floor,” then House members will vote on the rule, then they will debate the Senate health insurance reform bill and vote on it. I assume this means that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is confident she has the 216 votes she needs.

Bart Stupak is now claiming only about half a dozen Democrats are willing to vote against the bill unless it contains major new restrictions on private insurance coverage of abortion. Stupak was supposed to hold a press conference this morning, but he cancelled it, so maybe that means he didn’t get the deal he was hoping for from Pelosi. David Dayen speculates on who is still in the Stupak bloc. David Waldman warns about the prospect that Stupak will use a “motion to recommit” to try to get his anti-abortion language into the reconciliation fix package.

Outside the Capitol, tea party protesters shouted racist insults and held signs threatening gun violence if health care reform passes. Congressional Republicans should disavow this reprehensible behavior, but of course they won’t.

Written by Amie Newman for RHRealityCheck.org – News, commentary and community for reproductive health and justice.

When anti-choice advocates dream up and manage to pass bills in the name of being “pro-life,” make no mistake – there is no question they know that these laws have the potential to ruin lives.

In the case of Christine Taylor, an Iowa mother of two girls and pregnant with her third child, a feticide law enacted in that state because of anti-choice efforts has wreaked havoc on her life.

It all started last month, according to Change.org:

Last month, after an upsetting phone conversation with her estranged husband, Ms. Taylor became light-headed and fell down a flight of stairs in her home. Paramedics rushed to the scene and ultimately declared her healthy. However, since she was pregnant with her third child at the time, Taylor thought it would be best to be seen at the local ER to make sure her fetus was unharmed.

The coming week will be busy at the state capitol, because February 12 is the first “funnel” date. All bills excluding appropriations bills that have not been approved by at least one committee by February 12 will be dead for the 2010 session, unless something extraordinary happens.

Also, Iowa House Republicans are expected to try to suspend the rules this week to force consideration of a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage. If last April’s events are any guide, they can expect help from two Iowa House Democrats: Geri Huser and Dolores Mertz. Meanwhile, Mertz is working with a group of Republicans on a constitutional amendment that would “recognize human eggs as persons worthy of legal protection.” Such an amendment would outlaw abortion and probably some forms of birth control as well.

With the compressed legislative calendar and severe budget restraints, there may be fewer bills passed in 2010 than in previous sessions. If you’re keeping your eye on any bill, let us know in this thread. I hope the Iowa Senate Labor and Business Relations Committee will pass Senate File 2112, introduced by Senator Pam Jochum, on “workplace accommodations for employees who express breast milk.” It’s already cleared the subcommittee. Last hear State Representative Ako Abdul-Samad introduced a similar measure in the Iowa House, and I think there’s a decent chance of getting this bill through the House Labor Committee. Employers also benefit from practices that make it easier for their employees to continue breastfeeding.

Jochum is an all-around outstanding legislator. If I lived in the first district, she would definitely have my vote for Congress whenever Bruce Braley decides to run for U.S. Senate.

This thread is for anything on your mind this weekend. Am I the only one out there who doesn’t care who wins the Superbowl?

After the jump I’ve posted details on other Iowa political events scheduled for this week.

After deliberating for less than an hour, a Kansas jury found anti-abortion fanatic Scott Roeder guilty of first degree murder for shooting Dr. George Tiller in church last May. Roeder admitted killing Tiller and will be sentenced in March. Prosecutors are seeking a 50-year sentence with no possibility for parole. If Roeder is sentenced to life in prison, he could be eligible for parole in 25 years. During the trial,

[Sedgwick County District Judge Warren] Wilbert had barred Roeder from using a so-called necessity defense, aiming for an acquittal by arguing that the killing was necessary to prevent a greater harm – killing babies. But the judge allowed Roeder to present evidence that he sincerely believed his actions were justified to save unborn children – a defense that could have led to a conviction on the lesser offense of voluntary manslaughter.

On Thursday afternoon, however, Wilbert ruled that he would not give jurors the option of considering a voluntary manslaughter conviction, because such a defense requires that a person must be stopping the imminent use of unlawful force.

Unfortunately, Roeder succeeded in shutting down Tiller’s clinic, one of very few facilities where women could receive late-term abortions. Contrary to the propaganda you may have heard from the anti-choice movement, women seeking care from Dr. Tiller didn’t just casually decide during the second or third trimester that they didn’t feel like having children.

Kansas state law allows abortions on viable fetuses after the 21st week only if carrying the pregnancy to term would endanger the mother’s life or cause a “substantial and irreversible impairment” of a major bodily function. Courts have interpreted a “major bodily function” to include mental health.

Amanda Marcotte wrote before Tiller was murdered,

The argument for attacking Tiller is that he performs late term abortions, which are supposedly worse than early term ones, even though anti-choicers claim that a fertilized egg is the same thing as a 5-year-old child, so that shows that their targeting of late term providers is cynical politicking on its face.  But if you actually bother to look at why women get late term abortions, the targeting Dr. Tiller becomes even more horrifying.  Generally speaking, you’re talking about women who really wanted to have a baby, but who can’t have this one, because something is wrong with her health or that of the fetus.  Because of the sensitive nature of the situation, Dr. Tiller’s office offers a great deal of counseling services to their patients, who are often suffering trauma because of what’s happening to them.  In addition to counseling, there are baptism and funerary services, as well as photographing and footprinting, for people who want to say goodbye to the baby that they expected to have but couldn’t.  The levels of hate projected at Dr. Tiller are directly proportional to the levels of care he shows for women during this rough period of their lives.

Although Roeder will spend a long time in prison, it’s hard to feel justice has been served when he accomplished his goal.

Following up on my review of news from the first half of last year, I’ve posted links to Bleeding Heartland’s coverage of Iowa politics from July through December 2009 after the jump.

Hot topics on this blog during the second half of the year included the governor’s race, the special election in Iowa House district 90, candidates announcing plans to run for the state legislature next year, the growing number of Republicans ready to challenge Representative Leonard Boswell, state budget constraints, and a scandal involving the tax credit for film-making.

It took me a week longer than I anticipated, but I finally finished compiling links to Bleeding Heartland’s coverage from last year. This post and part 2, coming later today, include stories on national politics, mostly relating to Congress and Barack Obama’s administration. Diaries reviewing Iowa politics in 2009 will come soon.

One thing struck me while compiling this post: on all of the House bills I covered here during 2009, Democrats Leonard Boswell, Bruce Braley and Dave Loebsack voted the same way. That was a big change from 2007 and 2008, when Blue Dog Boswell voted with Republicans and against the majority of the Democratic caucus on many key bills.

No federal policy issue inspired more posts last year than health care reform. Rereading my earlier, guardedly hopeful pieces was depressing in light of the mess the health care reform bill has become. I was never optimistic about getting a strong public health insurance option through Congress, but I thought we had a chance to pass a very good bill. If I had anticipated the magnitude of the Democratic sellout on so many aspects of reform in addition to the public option, I wouldn’t have spent so many hours writing about this issue. I can’t say I wasn’t warned (and warned), though.

Links to stories from January through June 2009 are after the jump. Any thoughts about last year’s political events are welcome in this thread.

Last night the U.S. Senate voted 60 to 40 to move forward with debate on the health insurance reform bill. All senators who caucus with Democrats voted for cloture, and all Republicans voted against. The breakthrough came on Saturday, when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid secured Senator Ben Nelson’s support with extra money for Medicaid in Nebraska and new language on abortion.

At Daily Kos mcjoan published a good summary of what’s in the latest version of the bill.

Reid reportedly promised Nelson a “limited conference” on this bill, meaning that very few changes will be made to the Senate version. However, it’s far from clear that the House of Representatives will approve the Senate’s compromise. About two dozen House Democrats plan to vote against health care reform no matter what, meaning that it will only take 15-20 more no votes to prevent supporters from reaching 218 in the House.

Bart Stupak, lead sponsor of the amendment restricting abortion coverage in the House bill, has been working with Republicans against the Senate’s abortion language. Meanwhile, the leaders of the House pro-choice caucus have suggested the Senate language may be unconstitutional.

Even before Reid struck the final deal with Nelson, Representative Bruce Braley told the Des Moines Register, “I think the real test is going to be at the conference committee and if it doesn’t improve significantly, I think health care reform is very remote based on what I’m hearing in the House.”

Senator Tom Harkin has done several media appearances in recent days defending the Senate compromise. He seems especially pleased with the Medicaid deal for Nebraska:

The federal government is paying for the entire Medicaid expansion through 2017 for every state.

“In 2017, as you know, when we have to start phasing back from 100 percent, and going down to 98 percent, they are going to say, ‘Wait, there is one state that stays at 100?’ And every governor in the country is going to say, ‘Why doesn’t our state stay there?’” Harkin said. “When you look at it, I thought well, god, good, it is going to be the impetus for all the states to stay at 100 percent. So he might have done all of us a favor.”

Ezra Klein has posted some amazing spin this morning about how the Senate bill is “not very close to the health-care bill most liberals want. But it is very close to the health-care bill that Barack Obama promised.” Sorry, no. Obama campaigned on a health care plan that would control costs and include a public insurance option, drug re-importation, and letting Medicare negotiate for lower drug prices. Obama campaigned against an individual mandate to purchase insurance and an excise tax on insurance benefits.

Those of you still making excuses for Obama should listen to what Senator Russ Feingold said yesterday:

“I’ve been fighting all year for a strong public option to compete with the insurance industry and bring health care spending down,” Feingold said Sunday in a statement. “Unfortunately, the lack of support from the administration made keeping the public option in the bill an uphill struggle.”

Republican Senator Olympia Snowe was about as unprincipled and two-faced during this process as White House officials were. She voted for the Senate Finance Committee’s bill in October and had suggested her main objection to Reid’s compromise was the inclusion of a public health insurance option. Yet Snowe remained opposed to the bill even after the public option was removed last week. Because of her stance, Reid cut the deal with Nelson. The supposedly pro-choice Snowe could have prevented the restrictions on abortion coverage from getting into the bill if she had signed on instead.

Speaking of Republicans, the Iowa Republican posted this rant by TEApublican: “Nebraska And Huckabee Respond To Ben ‘Benedict’ Nelson’s Christmas Senate Sellout.” If you click over, be prepared to encounter mixed metaphors and misunderstandings about what this “reform” does. Still, the rant is a good reminder of how Republicans will still scream about government takeovers even though corporate interests got everything they wanted out of the bill.

Last night a group of Senate Democrats reached some kind of compromise on the health care reform bill. Senator Tom Harkin “told reporters he didn’t like the agreement but would support it to the hilt” in order to get a bill through the Senate. Reports on the nature of the compromise varied, but Talking Points Memo seems to have the most details:

If this trade-off carries the day, the opt out public option is gone. […]

As has been widely reported, one of the trade-offs will be to extend a version of the Federal Employees Health Benefits Plan to consumers in the exchanges. Insurance companies will have the option of creating nationally-based non-profit insurance plans that would offered on the exchanges in every state. However, according to the aide, if insurance companies don’t step up to the plate to offer such plans, that will trigger a national public option.

Beyond that, the group agreed–contingent upon CBO analysis–to a Medicare buy in.

That buy-in option would initially be made available to uninsured people aged 55-64 in 2011, three years before the exchanges open. For the period between 2011 and 2014, when the exchanges do open, the Medicare option will not be subsidized–people will have to pay in without federal premium assistance–and so will likely be quite expensive, the aide noted. However, after the exchanges launch, the Medicare option would be offered in the exchanges, where people could pay into it with their subsidies.

It appears as if liberals lost out on a Medicaid expansion that would have opened the program up to everybody under 150 percent of the poverty line. That ceiling will likely remain at 133 percent, as is called for in the current bill.

In addition to the new insurance options, the group has tentatively agreed to new, and strengthened, insurance regulations, which the aide could not divulge at this time.

Those unspecified insurance regulations might refer to this:

Additionally, there was consensus support for a requirement long backed by Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., and other liberals for insurance companies to spend at least 90 percent of their premium income providing benefits, a step that supporters argue effectively limits their spending on advertising, salaries, promotional efforts and profits.

The health care bill approved by the House would require insurers to spend 85 percent of premium income on providing benefits. Upping that to 90 percent is even better; my concern is that if enforcement is left to state insurance commissioners, evasion will be widespread.

Chris Bowers is excited about three “meaningful concessions” Senate progressives received in exchange for dropping the (already weak) public option.

I’m off the bus, however, unless further details come to light about very good provisions buried in this compromise. This bill creates millions more customers for private insurers but doesn’t give Americans enough choices, doesn’t create a government plan to keep private insurers honest, and therefore is unlikely to reduce costs or solve the various problems of our current health care delivery system.

In the good news column, last night the Senate tabled (killed) Ben Nelson’s abortion amendment modeled on the Stupak language in the House health care bill. The vote was 54-45, with seven Democrats from conservative states voting with all but two Republicans (roll call here). Harkin voted to table this amendment, like most Democrats, while Chuck Grassley was on the other side.

UPDATE: Can any Obama fans defend this kind of action from his administration?

A proposal to enable the importation of cheaper prescription drugs could endanger the U.S. medicine supply and would be difficult to implement, the Food and Drug Administration said Tuesday. […]

But the Obama administration’s declaration on the eve of the vote could derail the amendment despite the fact that Obama co-sponsored Dorgan’s drug imports bill while a member of the Senate and that White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel was a vocal proponent of the House version of the bill when he served as a member of the lower chamber.

Feel the hope and change!

SECOND UDPATE: The compromise still may not be enough for Joe Lieberman. They shouldn’t have given up on using the budget reconciliation process to pass a better bill with 51 votes.

I’m looking forward to the Iowa Democratic Party’s Jefferson-Jackson dinner this weekend. It will be live-streamed for those who can’t be there in person. The Iowa branch of Organizing for America is having a grand opening on Saturday as well, right before the JJ dinner.

Details for those and other events are after the jump. Post a comment or send me an e-mail (desmoinesdem AT yahoo.com) if you know if something I’ve left out.

Linn County Dems: Don’t forget that November 24 is the special election in Iowa House district 33.

One more “save the date”: the Culver-Judge campaign’s holiday party will be on Saturday, December 5 at the Val-Air Ballroom in West Des Moines from 7:30 pm to 11:00 pm. Tickets are just $35 for an individual, $10 for students and $50 for a family. Call 515-244-5151 or go to www.chetculver.com for more information.

Health Care for America NOW and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees are running television ads this week thanking 20 Democrats in relatively tough districts who voted for the House health care reform bill last Saturday. If you live in the Des Moines viewing area, you may have seen this commercial about Congressman Leonard Boswell:

Corporate-funded conservative groups have targeted Boswell in negative ads this year because of his vote for the climate-change bill in June. Ads attacking the health care reform project (many funded by insurance industry fronts or the Chamber of Commerce) have been plentiful this summer and fall too. It makes sense for reform advocates to thank Boswell, as Iowa Republicans are gearing up to challenge him with State Senator Brad Zaun or some other well-known figure.  

In other health care reform news, Tom Harkin is among the Senate Democrats trying to keep the "Stupak amendment" language on abortion out of the Senate's version of health care reform. He's absolutely right that some people pushing amendments are trying to kill the bill rather than make it better. A lot of questions have been raised about whether defeating the bill was Representative Bart Stupak's main goal. Since 1992, Stupak has been involved with the fundamentalist Christian "Family" group and has lived in their house on C Street in Washington.  

Stupak claims that as many as 40 House Democrats would reject health care reform without his amendment, but yesterday House Whip James Clyburn said the Stupak amendment only gained 10 votes for the bill. Meanwhile, more than 40 House liberals are threatening to vote down the final bill out of conference if it contains the Stupak language.  

Final note: MyDD user Bruce Webb wrote an interesting piece about what he views as "the most important and overlooked sentence" in the House health care reform bill:  

Most of the criticism of HR3962 coming from the left revolves around the belief that the House bill has no premium and so no profit controls, that it in effect delivers millions of Americans into the hands of insurance companies who can continue to raise premiums at will while denying care by managing the risk pool in favor of those unlikely to make claims. This just is not true, not if the provision in this one sentence is properly implemented. In a stroke it guts the entire current business model of the insurance companies, based as it is on predation and selective coverage, and replaces it with a model where you can only make money by extending coverage to the widest range of customers and or delivering that coverage in a more efficient way.

 Like they say, go read the whole thing.
 

Bob Vander Plaats was the clear front-runner in the Republican field of gubernatorial candidates a few months ago. He’s been campaigning for the job longer and more actively than anyone else. He had contacts statewide from his 2006 campaign for lieutenant governor, and from Mike Huckabee’s presidential campaign. He also had several endorsements from state legislators and a big lead in a Republican poll taken in July.

During the past six months, various potential Republican candidates have ruled out a campaign for governor, including Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey and State Auditor David Vaudt. Efforts to recruit a business leader (like Mary Andringa) failed too. Some Iowa politicos believe that these people backed off not because they thought Governor Chet Culver was unbeatable, but because they couldn’t see a way to defeat Vander Plaats in the Republican primary.

Most people would now agree that Vander Plaats is an underdog. Branstad will have more money, more media coverage and more support from Republican power-brokers. He’ll be able to cite last week’s Research 2000 poll, showing Branstad narrowly ahead of Culver, but Vander Plaats way behind the incumbent.

Vander Plaats won’t give up without a fight, though. He has promised to stay in this race through the June primary, and he has some strong cards to play, as I’ll discuss after the jump.  

The Senate Finance Committee approved its health care reform bill on a 14-9 vote yesterday, with all Democrats and Republican Olympia Snowe of Maine voting in favor. Ranking Republican Chuck Grassley, a key member of the committee’s “gang of six” negotiators this summer, joined the rest of the Republicans in voting against the bill. Speaking to the Des Moines Register Grassley “said he has no regrets about working with majority Democrats on the committee, only to oppose the bill. Given more time, he might have struck a deal, he said.”

This guy is the perfect picture of a bad-faith negotiator. From the Register:

Grassley said he objects most to provisions in the bill that would require Americans to obtain health insurance. But Grassley also said the bill does too little to block federal money being spent to provide abortions and provide coverage for illegal immigrants.

“Those aren’t the only things, but I think they are the most controversial or the most difficult to deal with,” Grassley told The Des Moines Register.

As Jason Hancock reported for the Iowa Independent last week, Grassley publicly supported the idea of an individual mandate to purchase health insurance this summer. I agree that requiring individuals to purchase insurance is problematic if there is no broad-based public health insurance option (because then the government is just subsidizing private insurers), but of course Grassley opposed the public option too.

In addition, the “gang of six” made changes in the bill before markup to address groundless Republican claims about illegal immigrants. According to PolitiFact, the “Baucus plan explicitly states that no federal funds – whether through tax credits or cost-sharing credits – could be used to pay for abortions (again, except for rape, incest, or the life of the mother).”

Trying to cut deals with Grassley is a waste of time. For more on that point, check out the skipper’s recent diary.

Speaking of Grassley, Cityview’s Civic Skinny thinks he should be worried about a potential race against attorney Roxanne Conlin. When a reporter asked Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack whether his wife, Christie Vilsack, might run against Grassley, he replied, “You should ask her about that.” (UPDATE: Dave Price did ask her and wonders whether she is the mystery candidate.)

As for the health care bill, the Finance Committee and HELP Committee versions have to be merged before a floor vote. It’s imperative that a public option be included in the version sent to the floor, and HELP Committee representative Chris Dodd says he will fight for that. On the other hand, Snowe and a few Democrats, like Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, might vote against the bill on the floor if it contains a public option. Chris Bowers wrote more at Open Left about the merging process in the House and Senate.

UPDATE: Branstad did file papers to form an exploratory committee today.

The Iowa Republican blog reported today,

This morning, former Governor Terry Branstad will file paperwork with the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board (IECDB), essentially launching his campaign for governor.

All state candidates are required to file with the IECDB once they spend or raise more than $750.00. While some candidates have claimed that filing this paperwork is like opening an exploratory committee, there are no special distinctions allowed under Iowa law for such committees, meaning that when you file with the IECDB, you are announcing that you are a candidate.

Branstad announced this summer that he would decide in October whether to run for governor again. It’s been clear he was planning to be a candidate since the Draft Branstad PAC started raising big money and running statewide radio ads last month, so why wait? Some people think Branstad, now president of Des Moines University, wanted to make his decision known to that university’s Board of Trustees at this month’s scheduled meeting before announcing his candidacy.

I have been wondering whether Branstad wanted to remain outside the campaign during September so that the Des Moines Register’s Iowa poll by Selzer and Co. would measure his support at the highest possible level. After he formally enters the race, his record will face tougher scrutiny, and his favorability ratings are likely to go down. The Register’s poll (released on September 20 and 21) showed that 70 percent of Iowans approved of his performance as governor, but only 48 percent thought it would be a good idea for him to run again. That poll did not include a head to head matchup against Governor Chet Culver. Republican firm Rasmussen conducted a one-day poll on September 22, which showed Branstad leading Culver by 20 points.

In the coming months, rival Republican candidates are likely to open three main lines of attack on Branstad:

1. During his first three terms as governor, Branstad kept two sets of books in order to run illegal deficits. His fiscal mismanagement was the main factor driving support for then Congressman Fred Grandy during the 1994 Republican primary. State Representative Chris Rants has already started hitting Branstad on this front. Last week he asserted,

“Culver’s repeating the mistakes Branstad made in the 80’s. He moved money on paper and delayed payments from one fiscal year to another until it finally caught up to him and he raised the sales tax to square the books. He could only hide his deficits for so long. It’s these kinds of accounting gimmicks that caused the fallout between Auditor Johnson and Branstad.”

“We Republicans need to be better than that if we expect to earn the trust of Iowans,” added Rants.

Richard Johnson, state auditor during most of Branstad’s tenure, is now co-chairing Bob Vander Plaats’ campaign. Expect to hear more from him in the future.

2. During his four terms as governor, Branstad didn’t deliver on various issues of importance to conservatives. Branstad selected a pro-choice lieutenant governor and didn’t get an abortion ban through the legislature even when it was under Republican control during his final term. Vander Plaats has already promised not to balance his ticket with a moderate, and if Branstad announces a pro-choice running mate, a lot of the Republican rank and file will be furious.

Branstad campaigned every four years on a promise to reinstate the death penalty, but he never got it done as governor.

Last week Rants promised to press for an amendment on gun rights to the Iowa Constitution. Perhaps we’ll hear more in the future about Branstad’s failure to do enough on this front.

3. Branstad raised sales taxes, the gas tax, and favored other tax increases as well.

Tax hikes are never popular with the GOP base, and Rants and Vander Plaats are certain to educate primary voters about Branstad’s record. If Christian Fong decides to stay in the race, we’ll be hearing from him about this issue too. Ed Failor, head of Iowans for Tax Relief, is one of Fong’s key political backers and fundraisers.

The Iowa Democratic Party has already started responding to the Draft Branstad PAC’s revisionist history, and will continue to call attention to how Branstad governed. I’ve posted the Iowa Democratic Party’s response to the first pro-Branstad radio ad after the jump. The IDP has also created the entertaining Iowa Knows Better website, with information about all of the GOP candidates for governor. Here is the page on Branstad, with details on Branstad’s two sets of books, tax increases, use of state bonding, and failure to pay state employees what they had earned.

Branstad will have more money and institutional support than the other Republican candidates and will be heavily favored to win the primary. But I doubt public approval for his work as governor will still be at 70 percent six months from now.

UPDATE: Swing State Project is now calling the Iowa governor’s race a tossup.

WHO reporter Dave Price posted a good scoop at the Price of Politics blog about a flyer attacking Terry Branstad, which appeared on some cars in Des Moines on Saturday. The flyer says “Paid for by Iowans For Truth and Honest Government,” but it reads like the case that supporters of Bob Vander Plaats would make against Branstad in the Republican gubernatorial primary. The distributors seem to have wanted publicity, because they put the flyers on at least one car in the WHO-TV parking lot.

The line about the “pro-infanticide Lieutenant Governor” refers to Joy Corning, who is pro-choice and has criticized activists who make the abortion issue a “litmus test” for Republican candidates.

Attacking Branstad for saying nice things about Mitt Romney may reflect the fact that Branstad’s former top aide, Doug Gross, was Romney’s Iowa chairman before the 2008 caucuses. However, it should be noted that one of Vander Plaats’ campaign co-chairs is State Representative Jodi Tymeson, who also supported Romney for president.

If Branstad gets back into politics, most of the Republican establishment will support him, but a significant number of rank-and-file Republicans may be swayed by the arguments made in this flyer. It would be ironic for Branstad’s main obstacle to be the religious conservatives, who carried him to victory in the 1982 and 1994 GOP primaries.

Iowa Democratic Party chair Michael Kiernan released a memo on Friday making the case against Branstad from a different perspective. I’ll have more to say on that in a future post.

An assailant shot and killed Dr. George Tiller at a church in Wichita, Kansas this morning. Tiller has long been demonized by the anti-choice movement because he performs late-term abortions. He was shot in 1993 and has faced numerous threats, and his clinic has been bombed and vandalized. The Wichita Eagle has background here and is updating the story. (Note: police arrested a 51-year-old male suspect about three hours after the shooting.)

Daily Kos user wiscmass discusses other violent attacks against abortion providers here. As wiscmass notes, every murder or assault is a deterrent to medical professionals considering whether to provide abortion services. By intimidating doctors, anti-choice activists can restrict access to abortion where legal and political methods have failed. I would add that even non-violent methods of intimidation can be effective. For instance, the Sioux City medical community has made clear hospital privileges will be denied to any local doctor who performs abortions at Planned Parenthood of Greater Iowa’s clinic there.

Tiller was not only serving women in Kansas. Many states, including Iowa, lack any clinic where women with a compelling medical reason can get a late-term abortion. (Contrary to propaganda you may have heard, healthy women with healthy pregnancies can’t just walk into Tiller’s clinic and get an abortion in the third trimester.) I have no idea where these women will go now.

Incidentally, Tiller’s donations to Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius and her political action committee prompted 31 Senate Republicans to vote against confirming Sebelius as Health and Human Services secretary in April.

Cecile Richards, leader of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, told a story about Sebelius during a recent speech at Planned Parenthood of Greater Iowa’s 75th anniversary celebration. Richards recalled a noisy group of protesters with graphic signs outside a Planned Parenthood event in Kansas. Everyone who attended the event, including then-Governor Sebelius, had to walk through the group of protesters. During her speech that night, Sebelius said she was glad everyone had to face those protesters, because it gave them a sense of what women in Kansas go through every day just trying to access reproductive health care.

Unfortunately, Tiller’s murder reminds us that standing up for reproductive rights in this country sometimes means putting your life in danger. I echo wiscmass in urging pro-choice Americans to support the organizations that are on the front lines in this battle.

If all you knew about 2nd Circuit U.S. Appeals Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor came from conservative commentators, you would think Barack Obama had nominated a far-left reverse racist for the Supreme Court. A typically unhinged assessment by Iowa’s own Ted Sporer, chairman of the Polk County Republican Party, is titled “The Supreme Court pick: Justice denied, racism and sexism exalted.” Like most conservatives who are freaking out, Sporer is reacting to one quotation from a speech Sotomayor gave in 2001:

“I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.”

Conservative commentator Rod Dreher read the whole speech and concluded on Wednesday, “seeing her controversial comment in its larger context makes it look a lot less provocative and troubling.” However, the right-wing noise machine continues to sound the alarm about Sotomayor’s alleged radical, racist agenda.

You won’t be surprised to learn that people who have examined her judicial record (as opposed to one sentence from one speech) have reached substantially different conclusions. Some reality-based links are after the jump.

State Auditor David Vaudt’s a pretty good bean-counter, but he did not read the fine print of the stimulus bill Congress recently passed. (In fairness, the document was more than 1,000 pages long.) Vaudt told the Iowa Political Alert blog that

the state should consider the nearly $1.9 billion expected to flow to Iowa through the package in cafeteria style – taking millions here but potentially leaving money on the table elsewhere if he thinks the short-term gain would give birth to unwieldy bureaucracy down the road.

“I would sort through each piece of the stimulus package and try and say ‘where does it fit Iowa the most,’” he said.

(Hat tip to Iowa Independent.)

But Senator Charles Schumer of New York has bad news for Republican governors (or in this case a would-be governor) advocating an a la carte approach to the stimulus:

As you know, Section 1607(a) of the economic recovery legislation provides that the Governor of each state must certify a request for stimulus funds before any money can flow. No language in this provision, however, permits the governor to selectively adopt some components of the bill while rejecting others. To allow such picking and choosing would, in effect, empower the governors with a line-item veto authority that President Obama himself did not possess at the time he signed the legislation. It would also undermine the overall success of the bill, as the components most singled out for criticism by these governors are among the most productive measures in terms of stimulating the economy.

Vaudt may run for governor in 2010, but I don’t give him much chance of winning a Republican primary. A few days ago he dared to suggest that Iowans may have to pay higher gas taxes in order to adequately fund road projects. That will rile up the base in the wrong way.

Speaking to Iowa Political Alert, Vaudt acknowledged that he hasn’t focused much on social issues in the past. He added that on abortion he’s a “pro-life person” who would make exceptions in the case of rape or when the mother’s life is in danger.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think Republican Congressional candidate Mariannette Miller-Meeks had exactly the same stance on abortion and was consequently attacked by Iowa Right to Life. Amazingly, the State Central Committee of the Republican Party of Iowa barely had the votes to censure RNC committeewoman Kim Lehman for failing to support Miller-Meeks during her campaign against Congressman Dave Loebsack last fall.

I don’t think Vaudt will satisfy the social conservatives who dominate GOP primaries in Iowa unless several candidates of the Bob Vander Plaats variety split those votes.