The House of Representatives approved the DREAM Act on December 8 by a vote of 216 to 198. The bill would give some undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children a path to citizenship. Eligible people could obtain “conditional” status for six years provided they have no criminal record, have lived in the country for at least five years, and have graduated from high school or received a GED. To maintain legal status, people would have to pass a criminal background check and demonstrate that they have either attended college or served in the military for at least two years. Although 38 House Democrats opposed the DREAM Act yesterday, all three Iowa Democrats (Bruce Braley, Dave Loebsack and Leonard Boswell) voted for it. Only eight House Republicans crossed party lines to support this bill, and those did not include Tom Latham or Steve King. In recent weeks, King has slammed the DREAM Act as a “multi-billion dollar amnesty nightmare.”

The White House supports the DREAM Act, and the administration has mostly exempted students even as deportations of undocumented immigrants increased since President Barack Obama took office. However, Obama didn’t insist on passage of the DREAM Act as part of his tax cut deal with Congressional Republican leaders. The Senate is expected to vote on the House version of this bill next week. Although some Republicans support the DREAM Act, including Senator Richard Lugar of Indiana, I would be surprised if it passes during the lame duck session.

Incidentally, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee has supported legislation like the DREAM Act in the last, but last week he said he opposed current bill before Congress. He must be aware that if he runs for president again, he’ll need to win over GOP primary voters and caucus-goers who overwhelmingly oppose what conservatives call “amnesty.”

Also on December 8, the House voted on the Seniors Protection Act. According to a statement from Braley’s office, that bill “would have provided a one-time $250 payment to seniors on Social Security, Supplemental Security Income (SSI), railroad retirement, and veterans disability compensation or pension benefits due to the lack of a cost-of-living adjustment for 2011 (COLA).” The bill received 254 votes in favor and 153 votes against but still failed, because it was brought to the House floor under a suspension of the rules, which requires a two-thirds vote to pass. The Iowa delegation again split on party lines.

Meanwhile, the offices of Representatives Braley, Loebsack and Boswell still have not responded to my requests for comment on Obama’s tax deal with Republicans. On December 9 the House Democratic caucus reportedly voted against bringing the deal to the floor, but that was a non-binding resolution. The bill could still pass with a minority of Democratic votes and a majority of Republicans. On the Senate side, Republican Chuck Grassley says the deal is better than doing nothing. Democrat Tom Harkin says he is working behind the scenes to improve the deal and is inclined to vote no without some changes. However, even as he criticized Obama’s negotiating strategy, Harkin didn’t rule out supporting the deal until he sees the final package.

UPDATE: Braley released this noncommittal statement on December 9:

“As the tax cut package takes shape, I want to reiterate my support for a tax cut extension for every American family on incomes up to $250,000.  I continue to fight for an extension of unemployment benefits, especially during the holiday season.  I remain extremely concerned that extending Bush’s tax cuts to the wealthiest 2% of Americans will explode the deficit.”

“I continue to fight to cut taxes for Iowa’s families and I am working to ensure our future generations are not saddled with extreme debt.  I look forward to reading the legislative language produced on the bill before making a final decision on these important issues.”

SECOND UPDATE: Steve King talked to the Sioux City Journal’s Bret Hayworth:

King said he dislikes that the tax cuts are only extended for two years. He said he wouldn’t go to the mat to extend the tax cuts permanently, but that they should be at a minimum extended five years so people sitting on capital to invest will know their tax liabilities for a longer period.

Further, King doesn’t like the unemployment benefits extension, since he said that only encourages people to not work and continue to receive those dollars.

THIRD UPDATE: Loebsack’s office says he “has consistently supported extending the middle-class tax cuts. He is also pleased to see that an extension of emergency unemployment benefits and additional tax cuts for hard-working families are included, along with potential extensions of renewable energy tax credits.  He is actively working to improve the proposal as it develops in order to ensure that the best interests of Iowans are being served.”  

President Barack Obama announced the “framework” for his unilateral surrender betrayal of core principles deal with Republicans on extending the Bush tax cuts today. It’s worse than I expected, which is saying something. Republicans get tax cuts for all income levels extended for two full years (we’re supposed to believe Obama will stand up for letting them expire during a presidential election year). They agreed to extend some unemployment benefits, but only for 13 months. Although long-term unemployment is at historically high levels, the “99-ers” (people who have exhausted 99 weeks of unemployment benefits) will get nothing out of this framework. To sweeten the deal for Republicans, the estate tax will be reduced to 35 percent, and it will apply only to estates exceeding $5 million in assets. That’s very costly and not at all stimulative. To provide more disposable income for working people, the payroll tax on employees will be cut by two percentage points for a year. That’s good as long as it doesn’t become an excuse later to cut Social Security benefits. UPDATE: David Dayen reports that a senior administration official told him the payroll tax cut “would be paid for out of general revenue through a credit, and so would not impact Social Security and Medicare finances in any way.”

It astounds me that Obama could think he will gain politically from this bargain. How many videos like this one are floating around? October 30, 2008: “Why would we keep driving down this dead-end street? […] At a moment like this, the last thing we can afford is four more years of the tired old economic theory that says we should give more and more to billionaires and corporations and hope that prosperity trickles down on everybody else.”

After the jump I’ve posted some Iowa politicians’ reactions to the deal. I’ll update as more statements become available.

UPDATE: Late on Tuesday afternoon, the offices of Representatives Bruce Braley (D, IA-01), Dave Loebsack (D, IA-02) and Leonard Boswell (D, IA-03) have not responded to my requests for comment on the tax deal. How hard is it to express an opinion about the major decision of the lame-duck session? U.S. Senate conservadem Mary Landrieu of all people came out guns blazing today against the “moral corruptness” of the deal.

Republican filibusters on Saturday blocked two U.S. Senate attempts to vote on extending Bush tax cuts for all but the highest income levels. The first cloture attempt related to an amendment to permanently extend all tax cuts affecting the first $200,000 of income for individuals or $250,000 for families. It also would have extended unemployment benefits. It needed 60 votes to pass but received 53 yes votes and 36 no votes (roll call). Iowa’s Chuck Grassley joined all Republicans present and a handful of conservative Democrats to block this measure. All 11 senators who didn’t vote were Republicans. Perhaps they didn’t want to go on record voting against tax cuts.

The second cloture motion related to Senator Chuck Schumer’s amendment, which would have extended Bush tax cuts for all incomes below $1,000,000. The idea was to force Republicans to show that they would defend millionaires’ interests even if doing so torpedoed tax cuts for everyone else. But many Democrats objected to Schumer’s plan, because it would cost $400 billion over ten years and would tacitly redefine earners up to $1,000,000 per year as middle-class. The vote was 53-37, with 60 yes votes needed to invoke cloture. Iowa’s Tom Harkin was among the small group of Democrats who voted no, as did Grassley and the rest of the Republicans.

A deal that would have allowed votes today on two Republican-proposed amendments, extending all the Bush tax cuts permanently or for a limited time, “fell apart when a Republican objected to it at the last minute, leaving a surprised and embarrassed Mitch McConnell at the table empty-handed.” Click through for David Waldman’s explanation of the procedural issues and why a Republican would want to prevent those votes from happening during the lame-duck session.

Joan McCarter posted a revealing exchange between Schumer and Grassley during today’s Senate debate:

   Mr. Schumer: I thank my colleague. And through the chair, I’d simply like to ask my colleague this. I understand we have a different point of view here. We both care about deficit reduction. Could he please explain to me why it is okay to take $300 billion of tax cuts for those at the highest income levels, above a million, and not pay for it and yet we have to pay for unemployment insurance ex extension?

   Mr. Grassley: I thought I made that point very clear, because the taxpayers are smarter than we in Congress are. They know that they give another dollar to us to spend and it’s a license to spend $1.15. So it just increases the national debt. And when it comes to paying for unemployment compensation, we can pay for unemployment compensation because the stimulus bill was supposed to stimulate the economy and it’s not being spent. And if you put money from stimulus into unemployment, you don’t increase the deficit and you’ll also have the money spent right away.  

   Mr. Schumer: I would just say that the answer doesn’t deal with deficit reduction. If you care about deficit reduction, the two should be treated equally. A dollar of tax break for millionaire and a dollar of increased unemployment benefits increases the deficit the same amount. However, every economist — I saw we had a chart up about economists before — will tell you that a dollar into unemployment benefits stimulates the economy about four times as much as a dollar into tax decreases for millionaires. That’s pretty universal. Mark Zandy, John McCain’s economic advisor during his campaign, said that a dollar of tax breaks for millionaires stimulates the economy about 30 cents worth. A dollar of tax — a dollar of unemployment benefits increases the economy by about $1.62.

Grassley and the rest of the Republicans should stop pretending to care about the deficit.

If I were Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, I would ignore whatever deal President Obama is working out with Republicans and refuse to schedule a vote on extending all the Bush tax cuts. Republicans had their chance to keep lower tax rates for everyone on their first $250,000 of income, but they said no.

The U.S. Senate approved the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act today by a 73 to 25 vote. Tom Harkin and all other Senate Democrats voted for the bill, as did 15 Republicans including Iowa’s Chuck Grassley. Grassley also was among 14 Republicans who joined Democrats to support the cloture motion ending debate on the food safety bill yesterday.

Some details on the bill as well as its complicated path through the Senate are after the jump.  

Representative Steve King’s never had trouble calling attention to himself, even as a not very powerful member of the House minority. With Republicans in charge of the House beginning in January, King’s national profile will rise further as chairman of the House Judiciary Committee’s subcommittee on immigration. One of his top priorities will be moving a bill to restrict birthright citizenship.  

A majority of Iowa women voters backed Senator Chuck Grassley on November 2. Here’s how he repaid them two weeks later:

Senate Democrats didn’t muster enough votes today to overcome a Republican-led filibuster of the Paycheck Fairness Act, a bill that would have lifted the cap on damages in pay- discrimination lawsuits and restricted how employers can fight such complaints. The legislation would also have banned employers from penalizing workers who share salary information to find pay discrepancies.

Democrats pushed the measure, which would have strengthened remedies under the Equal Pay Act of 1963 for women, early in the Obama administration as part of a pro-labor agenda. It passed the House of Representatives in January 2009, along with the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. […]

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers and other business groups lobbied Republican senators to block the companion piece of legislation.

Yes, Grassley and every other Republican present (plus “Democrat” Ben Nelson of Nebraska) voted to block debate on the Paycheck Fairness Act. If you’re a working woman getting paid less than your male colleagues, Grassley wants to limit your ability to find evidence of discrimination as well as your compensation if you file a claim against your employer.

Grassley’s lack of concern for underpaid women is no surprise. He also voted against the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act several times.

Add the Paycheck Fairness Act filibuster to the list of reasons Democrats should take up Tom Harkin’s call for Senate reform. Yet again, 41 senators overruled 58 colleagues who supported moving a bill forward. Senators will be able to change the chamber’s procedural rules in January, when the newly elected Congress begins work. Democrats would be idiots not to do so.

Speaking of corporate influence over American politics, Bloomberg News reported yesterday that America’s Health Insurance Plans, a lobbying group representing health insurers, gave the U.S. Chamber of Commerce $86.2 million in 2009.

The spending on the Chamber exceeded the insurer group’s entire budget from a year earlier and accounted for 40 percent of the Chamber’s $214.6 million in 2009 expenditures. […]

The $86.2 million paid for advertisements, polling and grass roots events to drum up opposition to the [health care reform] bill, said Tom Collamore, a Chamber of Commerce spokesman. The Chamber said in a statement it used the funds to “advance a market-based health-care system and advocate for fundamental reform that would improve access to quality care while lowering costs.”

Senator Chuck Grassley will become ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee in January, Ed Tibbetts of the Quad-City Times reported on November 11. Grassley and Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama made a deal in May 2009 to let Sessions be ranking member on Judiciary temporarily. The position became open when Arlen Specter switched to the Democratic Party, but Grassley (who is senior to Sessions) wanted to remain the top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee through the end of 2010. Sessions is now expected to become ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee. The GOP Senate caucus term-limits its committee chairs and ranking members.

Speaking to Tibbetts on November 10, Grassley said,

“I would hope to be doing roughly the same things on health care in the Judiciary Committee as I did in the Finance Committee,” he said.

Grassley has been a tenacious investigator of the Food and Drug Administration and the pharmaceutical industry. He also said he would remain active overseeing nonprofits.

Grassley said fraud-related issues are squarely within the Judiciary Committee’s jurisdiction.

Also, the New Hartford Republican has a history of casting a wide net in his oversight activities. In the 1980s, Grassley targeted waste in the Pentagon budget while he sat on a subcommittee of Judiciary, not a Defense-related panel.

In his new role, Grassley will be a more prominent figure in battles over confirming President Barack Obama’s judicial nominees as well.

Over in the U.S. House, Steve King (IA-05) is set to become chairman of the Judiciary Committee’s subcommittee on immigration. He has been ranking member on that subcommittee since 2007. John Deeth notes that a Hispanic Republican group based in the southwest is objecting due to King’s use of “defamatory language that is extremely offensive to Hispanics.” Good luck getting the House Republican caucus to care, even if Latino voters did swing last week’s elections to Democrats in Colorado, Nevada and California.

Time for a new thread on the statewide election results. I haven’t dug into the county-level returns in the governor’s race yet, but Chet Culver didn’t even carry Polk County, which he won with a 21,000 vote margin in 2006. Culver did carry Johnson County, but by a much smaller margin than in 2006. What happened in your area, Bleeding Heartland readers?

UPDATE: Culver carried only eight counties: Black Hawk (Waterloo/Cedar Falls area), Linn (Cedar Rapids), Johnson (Iowa City), Dubuque, Des Moines (Burlington area), Lee (Ft. Madison/Keokuk), Story (Ames), and Jefferson (Fairfield). Culver almost carried Floyd County, where Republicans easily won House district 14. I guess Charles City loves I-JOBS! LATE UPDATE: The unofficial results indicate that Culver did carry Floyd County (barely), by fewer than 100 votes.

Branstad carried Wapello County (Ottumwa) for the first time. In his 1994 landslide victory, Bonnie Campbell carried only four counties: Story, Johnson, Des Moines and Wapello.

The down-ticket Democrats had a lot of ground to make up with Chuck Grassley winning the U.S. Senate race 64 percent to 33 percent and Terry Branstad winning 53 percent to 43 percent. Secretary of State Michael Mauro outperformed Culver, which he wasn’t able to do in 2006, but still fell short against Matt Schultz. It’s a shame to see such a competent public official lose in a wave election. Iowa will continue to benefit from his work to make voting more accessible and secure, with paper ballots. I expect the new legislature to act on Schultz’s top priority, photo ID requirements, and I wonder if they will also revoke same-day voter registration.

Iowa Republicans didn’t miss many targets, but I think they overlooked an opportunity by not investing in the state treasurer’s race. Michael Fitzgerald won his eighth term by an unusually narrow (for him) margin: just under 53 percent to 47 percent. A few hundred thousand dollars thrown toward Dave Jamison’s campaign could have won that race. Jamison didn’t have the resources to improve his name identification or make his case against Fitzgerald. Last year some conservative blogger, it may have been Krusty, said Christian Fong should have challenged Fitzgerald instead of running for governor as a 32-year-old. With his background in finance, his connections to major Republican fundraisers, and his roots in both eastern and western Iowa, Fong might have outperformed Jamison.

Tom Miller winning more than 55 percent of the vote was such a relief. The Republicans threw everything they had at him, and he ran a non-existent campaign until the final month, but he still defeated Brenna Findley convincingly. Miller even carried Woodbury County, where Republicans romped. Now he can get back to work on state attorneys’ coordinated investigation of foreclosure practices:

Mr. Miller’s status as a point man in the multistate investigation has been seen by many observers as a sign that the states will push for a sweeping settlement requiring lenders to implement mortgage modifications allowing homeowners to stay in their houses.

Mr. Miller, who has monitored mortgage-industry practices for years, had already begun discussions with some lenders, including Bank of America. In one meeting last week at Mr. Miller’s office, he and officials from other states told Bank of America executives and outside lawyers that state attorneys general would like additional aid to be offered to borrowers, such as further principal reductions on certain delinquent loans where people owe much more than what their homes are worth, according to people familiar with the meeting.

Doubt Findley would have been interested in seeking concessions from corporations to people underwater on their mortgages.

Environmentalists lost a few supporters in the Iowa Senate last night, but today many advocates are cheering the passage of the Iowa Water and Land Legacy trust fund amendment. I wouldn’t count on that fund being filled anytime soon, and I don’t support a regressive sales tax increase. However, it’s good to know that if Branstad follows through on plans to shift from income taxes to consumption taxes, he won’t be able to avoid allocating more money to soil and water conservation. The big margin of victory for this amendment (62.7 percent yes, 37.3 percent no) was also a blow to the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation’s prestige. Farm Bureau never opposed this amendment the two times state legislators passed it nearly unanimously, and a Farm Bureau representative was on the group that helped shape the amendment wording. For some reason, Farm Bureau decided late in the game to made a play to stop this amendment. In doing so, they disappointed some sympathetic legislators and enraged conservatives who backed a constitutional convention. The Farm Bureau’s messaging urged a no vote on the constitutional convention question as well as the soil and water trust fund.

Please share your thoughts about any of last night’s election results in your town, county or beyond. Iowa City voters upheld the 21-only bar ordinance, by the way.

Feel free to comment on races from outside Iowa that caught your eye. A few U.S. Senate seats haven’t been called, but the chamber seems likely to have 53 Democrats and 47 Republicans. Republicans will pick up between 60 and 70 House seats, meaning they will hold 240 to 250 seats in the new chamber (218 are needed for a majority). Republicans are on track to hold about 30 governorships, although several states have yet to be decided. Republicans swept Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania, assuring that they can replicate their successful gerrymanders of those states. Florida approved ballot measures that were designed to limit gerrymandering, but opponents may challenge those rules in court. Florida will still have a Republican governor and legislature, but if the ballot measures stand Democrats may make gains at the state level and in Congressional districts.

Democrats did better in some states (Connecticut, California, West Virginia) than in most others, but a common thread was Republican gains among independents, working-class whites and suburban voters. For instance, Joe Sestak fell just short in the Pennsylvania Senate race, losing to Pat Toomey 51 percent to 49 percent. He did as well in Philadelphia as Bob Casey did four years ago, but couldn’t match Casey’s performance in other parts of the state.

The Republican campaign for president will start winding up any day now, so get ready for more Iowa visitors. On that note, one person who has been touted as a presidential prospect, Mike Pence, may be laying the groundwork to run for governor of Indiana instead.

If the Des Moines Register’s new Iowa poll is accurate, Senator Chuck Grassley will cruise to re-election by a similar margin to his last four victories. However, Roxanne Conlin hasn’t thrown in the towel. She spent the final weekend campaigning around the state with Governor Chet Culver and other Democrats. Her schedule is packed for Monday too. Grassley hasn’t held many public events in the past week, but you can hardly turn on a television in Iowa without seeing one of his commercials.

As usual, most Iowa newspapers have endorsed Grassley for re-election, including the Des Moines Register, Cedar Rapids Gazette, Mason City Globe-Gazette, Sioux City Journal, Dubuque Telegraph-Herald and Quad-City Times. Rare exceptions include the Iowa City Press-Citizen (“Conlin can become the senator that Grassley should be by now”) and the Burlington Hawk-Eye (“Roxanne Conlin has not earned this endorsement so much as Grassley has turned his back on it”).

Bleeding Heartland discussed the Senate candidates’ only debate here. It looked like a tie to me, which is as good as a win for the candidate who’s ahead. Closing tv ads and campaign themes for Grassley and Conlin are after the jump.

The latest Iowa poll for the Des Moines Register finds Republicans leading the gubernatorial and U.S. Senate races and Iowa’s Supreme Court justices likely to be ousted. Selzer and Co sampled 805 likely Iowa voters between October 26 and 29.

Terry Branstad leads Governor Chet Culver 50 percent to 38 percent. That’s down from a 19-point lead in the Register’s September poll, but still a comfortable advantage. Culver’s campaign released an internal poll last week showing a much tighter race, with Branstad ahead 46-40. I had assumed Republican internal polling also showed Culver gaining, because the Cook Political Report just shifted its rating on the Iowa’s governor’s race from safe Republican to leaning Republican. I don’t think they would make that rating change if private polling showed Branstad at 50 percent with a double-digit lead.

Kathie Obradovich blogged tonight that Culver leads by 9 percent among respondents who had already voted, even though he trails by 12 percent among the whole sample. The Register’s other piece on the new poll refers to “the electorate’s conservative profile” but gives no details about the partisan breakdown of the sample. I will update this post if more details emerge about the poll’s demographics.

Selzer and Co found Senator Chuck Grassley leading Roxanne Conlin 61 percent to 30 percent, virtually the same margin as in the Register’s September Iowa poll.

The news for Iowa Supreme Court justices wasn’t much better:

A third of likely Iowa voters say they will vote to retain Chief Justice Marsha Ternus and Justices David Baker and Michael Streit. Thirty-seven percent say they will vote to remove all three. Ten percent plan to retain some. The rest either don’t plan to vote on judicial retention or haven’t made up their minds.

I thought it was foolish for the anti-retention groups to feature Representative Steve King in their radio commercials, but if voters throw out the judges, King will be able to take some credit.

Obradovich didn’t give poll numbers for the Congressional races but noted, “Mariannette Miller-Meeks appears to have the best chance of any of the GOP challengers to unseat an incumbent Democrat.” That would be quite an achievement, since Iowa’s second district has the strongest Democratic lean. However, Miller-Meeks has been campaigning hard, and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s latest commercial against her is atrocious. It wouldn’t surprise me if that ad drives more voters toward Miller-Meeks than toward incumbent Dave Loebsack.

Iowa Democrats need to get out the vote and hope the Register’s poll contains faulty assumptions about who will turn out on Tuesday.

UPDATE: One positive sign for Loebsack is the large lead Democrats have in early voting in the IA-02 counties (pdf file).

SECOND UPDATE: The best news in the poll: Tom Miller 45, Brenna Findley 34.

Findley, a 34-year-old Dexter lawyer and tea party favorite, has spent more on advertising than Miller, who was first elected in 1978. However, Miller leads Findley among independent voters by 20 percentage points and nets a larger share of support from Democrats than Findley receives from Republicans.

Senator Chuck Grassley and Democratic challenger Roxanne Conlin are debating at 7 pm tonight on WHO Radio in Des Moines. Iowa Public Television will broadcast the debate statewide at 9 pm.

I’ll update this post later with my thoughts about the debate. Meanwhile, I encourage Bleeding Heartland readers to weigh in on the debate or the Senate race in general.

LATE UPDATE: I forgot to post my notes on the debate, but they are now after the jump. The short version is, I think both candidates did fairly well and gave their supporters reasons to stick with them. Conlin kept Grassley on the defensive, but he seemed to have answers to most of her criticisms. Since she is behind in the race and needs to win over undecided voters and Grassley leaners, a tie in the debate is for all practical purposes a win for Grassley. I suspect being able to refer to notes during this debate helped him greatly improve on his performance during the candidates’ joint appearance on Iowa Public Television last month.

If you missed the debate, Kay Henderson’s write-up is worth a read.

With so many Democratic incumbents around the country endangered this year, U.S. Senate candidate Roxanne Conlin hasn’t received much campaign assistance from Democratic organizations outside Iowa or their allies. That changed this week when the advocacy groups Democracy for America and Progressive Campaign Change Committee started running a 60-second television commercial targeting Republican Senator Chuck Grassley.

Unfortunately, the ad fails to make a persuasive case against sending Grassley back to Washington.

Follow me after the jump to watch the new commercial, along with more Grassley and Conlin campaign ads.

Election news is keeping me busy, but several reports related to energy policy in Iowa caught my eye during the last week.

Links and excerpts are after the jump.  

Senator Chuck Grassley and Democratic challenger Roxanne Conlin both launched new television commercials today, their first in a couple of weeks.

Videos and transcripts are after the jump.

From time to time I enjoy pondering counterfactual history questions like “Should the Republicans have nominated Romney in 2008?” or “Could Clinton or Edwards have beaten Obama in Iowa?”

Since establishment Republicans suffered shocking losses last month in the Delaware and Alaska U.S. Senate primaries, another question has been on my mind. Could a primary challenger have taken out or seriously threatened Senator Chuck Grassley in Iowa?

Senator Chuck Grassley has a solid lead over Democrat Roxanne Conlin in the latest Iowa poll for the Des Moines Register. Among 550 likely voters Selzer and Co surveyed between September 19 and 22, 61 percent said they would vote for Grassley and just 30 percent for Conlin if the election were held today.  

More details from the poll, along with Grassley’s latest television commercials and other news from the race, can be found after the jump.

UPDATE: Scroll to the bottom for videos and transcripts of two new ads Grassley’s campaign released on September 27.

SEPTEMBER 28 UPDATE: The latest Iowa Senate poll by Republican pollster Rasmussen sees Grassley well ahead of Conlin, but by a 55 percent to 37 percent margin.

The House of Representatives approved the Small Business Jobs Act today by a vote of 237 to 187. Iowans Bruce Braley, Dave Loebsack and Leonard Boswell joined most House Democrats in supporting the bill; Tom Latham and Steve King joined all but one House Republican in voting no. CNN summarized the bill’s main provisions:

The Small Business Jobs Act authorizes the creation of a $30 billion fund run by the Treasury Department that would deliver ultra-cheap capital to banks with less than $10 billion in assets.

The idea is that community banks do the lion’s share of lending to small businesses, and pumping capital into them will get money in the hands of Main Street businesses.

Another provision aims to increase the flow of capital by providing $1.5 billion in grants to state lending programs that in turn support loans to small businesses. The state programs have proven themselves to be efficient, targeted and effective, but with many states struggling to balance their budgets, the programs are going broke.

The bill would also provide a slew of tax breaks that will cost $12 billion over a decade, according to a preliminary estimate from the Joint Committee on Taxation. The breaks aim to encourage small businesses to purchase new equipment, to incentivize venture capital firms to invest in small businesses, and to motivate entrepreneurs to start their own business.

When the Senate approved the same bill on a mostly party-line vote, Democrat Tom Harkin voted for it, while Republican Chuck Grassley voted against. Several House Republicans today characterized the lending fund as another “bailout”; Grassley used the same talking point last week. Republicans have supported similar small business tax breaks in the past, and the House Republicans’ new “Pledge to America” mentions small business many times.

In other news from Congress, a motion to start debate on new campaign finance regulations fell one vote short in the Senate. All 59 senators who caucus with Democrats voted for the DISCLOSE Act, but 60 votes are needed to pass a cloture motion. Grassley was among 39 Senate Republicans to voted against starting debate on this bill. Open Congress summarized the DISCLOSE Act as follows:

This is the Democrats’ response to the Supreme Courts’ recent Citizens United v. FEC ruling. It seeks to increase transparency of corporate and special-interest money in national political campaigns. It would require organizations involved in political campaigning to disclose the identity of the large donors, and to reveal their identities in any political ads they fund. It would also bar foreign corporations, government contractors and TARP recipients from making political expenditures. Notably, the bill would exempt all long-standing, non-profit organizations with more than 500,000 members from having to disclose their donor lists.

The DISCLOSE Act wouldn’t do nearly enough to reduce the influence of money in American politics, but it’s amazing to see Republicans united against even these modest disclosure rules and restrictions. Democratic Senate candidate Roxanne Conlin’s campaign sharply criticized Grassley’s vote:

“Senator Charles Grassley voted today to allow foreign interference in U.S. elections.  This vote means that BP and other foreign companies, the Iranian government and other foreign governments, are free to spend any amount of money to affect the outcome of U.S. elections,” said Conlin spokesperson Paulee Lipsman.

“In voting against debate on the federal DISCLOSE ACT, meant to provide Iowans with information on who is funding campaign attack ads, Senator Grassley also sided with the Wall Street bankers, insurance companies, corporations and other special interests who have filled his campaign war chest.  The Senator is protecting those who want to anonymously produce the ads filled with distortions and lies that are intended to influence voters.”

Grassley also voted against ending the filibuster on the DISCLOSE ACT on July 27.

Senators Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin are among 25 co-sponsors of a bill that would require utilities to produce more electricity from renewable sources, Andrew Restuccia reported at Iowa Independent today. Grassley became the fourth Senate Republican to co-sponsor the bill. Kate Sheppard described its main points earlier this week:

The renewable electricity standard (RES) measure represents the last, best hope for those pushing for action on climate and energy in the Senate this year.

The RES, from lead co-sponsors Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) and Sam Brownback (R-Kan.), hews closely to the standard passed in the Energy and Natural Resources Committee last year. Beginning in 2012, utilities will be required to draw 3 percent of their electricity from renewable sources. The percentage scales up to 15 percent by 2021, where it would remain through 2039.

Wind, solar, ocean, geothermal, biomass, new hydropower, and gas drawn from landfills would all qualify as renewable under the standard. States will also be allowed to meet a little more than a quarter of the requirement by improving efficiency at power plants. The definition is expanded somewhat from the version included in a larger energy package that Bingaman’s committee approved in June 2009.

A renewable electricity standard falls short of the comprehensive energy policy we need, but it would be better than passing a fake “climate change” bill that includes massive subsidies for fossil fuels. Although the standard proposed by Bingaman and Brownback isn’t ambitious enough, it’s an improvement on doing nothing. Good for Harkin and Grassley for getting behind the bill quickly.

Wind energy production in Iowa already exceeds the goals of the new federal proposal, but we could do more to increase small-scale wind, which would boost farmers’ income.

UPDATE: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid supports a renewable electricity standard but won’t schedule floor time until backers have filibuster-proof majority.

Back when George W. Bush was president, Republicans assailed any vote against any military funding bill as not supporting our troops on the battlefield. But the Republican caucus was united yesterday as the Senate voted 56-43 to block debate on this year’s Defense Authorization Act. The bill included a compromise likely to lead to lifting the ban on gays openly serving in the military. Even Republican Susan Collins of Maine, who says she’s for repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, stuck with her caucus over complaints about Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s restrictions on amendments during debate over the bill. One amendment Reid had planned to allow would have added the DREAM Act to the defense authorization bill. The DREAM Act “would allow undocumented students brought to America as children to earn a path to citizenship through completion of higher education or military service.”

Only two Democrats sided with Republicans to block debate on this bill: Blanche Lincoln and Mark Pryor of Arkansas. (Reid switched his vote to “no” at the last minute for procedural reasons, so he would be able to bring it up again later this year.) Lincoln’s excuse was the same as Collins’: she claimed to be for the DREAM Act and the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell compromise, but was angered by limits on amendments during the debate. Senate procedure is more important to these people than civil rights. At least Lincoln’s going to lose her re-election campaign anyway.

Although President Barack Obama has said he’s for repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, there’s no indication he or other White House officials lifted a finger to influence yesterday’s vote in the Senate. Nor did the president accuse those who blocked debate of undercutting soldiers at war, the way George Bush surely would have done in similar circumstances.

In Iowa, critics of Senator Chuck Grassley reacted quickly to his vote blocking debate on the defense bill. A statement from One Iowa accused him of compromising military readiness:

“Senator Grassley should stop playing politics with our national security,” said One Iowa Executive Director Carolyn Jenison. “Gay and lesbian servicemembers provide additional expertise and skills the military needs. Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell compromises the integrity of our armed sources and puts gay servicemembers at risk.”

Although Democratic Senate candidate Roxanne Conlin has long advocated civil equality for gays and lesbians, her campaign strangely sidestepped the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell angle in its statement yesterday:

“This is just one more inexcusable vote from Iowa’s senior Senator,” said Paulee Lipsman, spokesperson for the United States Senate campaign of Roxanne Conlin.  “His action denies a pay raise for the very men and women who are risking their lives for their country in the Middle East.  These families should not have to be on food stamps while a member of their family is off fighting in Afghanistan. Grassley’s vote denies better health care for those who are wounded.  It denies better equipment for those in combat.”

“Over the past two years, Senator Grassley has followed the advice of Senator Jim DeMint that Republicans block everything proposed by the Obama administration.  This partisanship is why Washington is broken.”

Key provisions of the bill include:

·         Authorize an across the board 1.4% pay raise for the military.

·         Improve the quality of life of the men and women of the all-volunteer force (active duty, National Guard and Reserves) and their families through fair pay, policies and benefits, including first rate health care, and address the needs of the wounded, ill, and injured service members and their families.

·         Provide our servicemen and women with the resources, training, technology, equipment (especially force protection) and authorities they need to succeed in combat and stability operations.

·         Enhance the capability of the Armed Forces to conduct counterinsurgency operations and apply the lessons of Iraq to Afghanistan, as appropriate.

I don’t think Grassley was proud of this vote. His Senate office put out several press releases yesterday, but nothing on the Defense Authorization Act.

Share any relevant thoughts in this thread.

UPDATE: During her September 22 meeting with the Sioux City Journal editorial board, Conlin called for Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell to be overturned:

Closeted gays ably serve in the military today, she said, but cited that 13,000 have left service at a time when the military needs positions filled by well-prepared Americans.

“We are granting waivers to convicted felons and we are throwing out people, experienced West Point graduates. It makes no sense,” Conlin said.

She continued: “It is not as though, right now, gay people are not serving. They are, they’re there, they’re fighting for us, they are dying for us. The only question is – can they do it without living a lie? The answer to that, in the United States of America, has to be ‘yes.’ “

One of the simplest ways to boost electricity production from renewable sources, rather than fossil fuels, would be to adopt a federal renewable electricity standard (RES). About 30 states, including Iowa, already have some form of RES, requiring utilities to produce a certain percentage of electricity from renewable sources. The demise of broad climate change legislation in the U.S. Senate in favor of a pathetically watered-down energy bill appeared to end hopes for the RES in this Congress. However, three Republicans and six Democrats today announced a new bill that, in their view, could gain support from enough senators to break a filibuster:

The RES, from lead co-sponsors Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) and Sam Brownback (R-Kan.), hews closely to the standard passed in the Energy and Natural Resources Committee last year. Beginning in 2012, utilities will be required to draw 3 percent of their electricity from renewable sources. The percentage scales up to 15 percent by 2021, where it would remain through 2039.

Wind, solar, ocean, geothermal, biomass, new hydropower, and gas drawn from landfills would all qualify as renewable under the standard. States will also be allowed to meet a little more than a quarter of the requirement by improving efficiency at power plants. The definition is expanded somewhat from the version included in a larger energy package that Bingaman’s committee approved in June 2009.

The Bingaman/Brownback proposal is a weaker RES than what the U.S. needs to reduce fossil fuel pollution, but passing it would be better than doing nothing. Kate Sheppard reports that the new bill has six Democratic supporters and three Republicans: Brownback, John Ensign of Nevada, and Susan Collins of Maine.

Senator Chuck Grassley has supported RES legislation in the past, but the Politico’s Josh Voorhees reported today,

Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley, who could be in play, also has yet to sign on to the effort. He told reporters last week that while he is a long-time supporter of an RES, he’s unwilling to join Democrats in voting for one unless a healthy number of his GOP colleagues do as well. “I’m not going to be a part of one or two Republicans, get 60 votes, so they can have a partisan victory,” he said in the Capitol.

For the moment let’s forget about the environmental benefits of generating more renewable electricity, and the health benefits of reducing our reliance on coal combustion. Iowa’s economy could benefit tremendously from federal law that requires utilities to invest more in renewables. Not only is Iowa the number two state for wind energy production, we have a growing number of people manufacturing equipment for wind turbines. Iowa also has good potential for solar power.

Grassley would turn his back on a bill that’s good for his constituents and the country as a whole, because he doesn’t want to be among a small group handing Senate Democrats “a partisan victory.”

Small-minded stuff for the senator whose campaign slogan is “Grassley works…for us.”

Iowans can contact Grassley’s offices in Washington (phone 202-224-3744, fax 202-224-6020) or in Des Moines (phone 515-288-1145, fax 515-288-5097) to urge him to co-sponsor the Bingaman/Brownback bill.

Democratic Senate candidate Roxanne Conlin supports a federal RES and other policies to increase renewable energy production.

UPDATE: Grassley confirmed on September 23 that he is co-sponsoring this bill. Good for him.

Senator Chuck Grassley remains a loud and proud voice for extending all the Bush tax cuts, as he and Democratic challenger Roxanne Conlin argue over who is the real advocate for small business interests.

That and other news from the U.S. Senate race is after the jump. You can also view Conlin’s second television commercial of the general election campaign, which introduces her as “one tough grandma.”

Democrat Roxanne Conlin launched her first television commercial in the U.S. Senate general election campaign yesterday, highlighting Chuck Grassley’s vote for the Wall Street bailout in 2008 and tax breaks for companies that move manufacturing overseas.

The ad, transcript and other thoughts about the Senate race are after the jump.

UPDATE: I’ve added the Conlin campaign’s response to one of Grassley’s new tv ads too.

Less than a week after his first general election television ads went on the air across Iowa, Senator Chuck Grassley launched two new commercials today.

The first ad is the most brazen image make-over I’ve seen in a while, casting Grassley as a brave warrior against drug companies. The other commercial touts the way Grassley uses new media to keep in touch with constituents.

Videos, transcripts, and more are after the jump.

UPDATE: I’ve also added the Conlin campaign’s response to one of these ads.

After watching this weekend’s “Iowa Press” program on Iowa Public Television, I’m not surprised Senator Chuck Grassley has been ducking debates with Democratic challenger Roxanne Conlin. You can view the 30-minute program or read the full transcript here. Conlin had Grassley on the defensive several times during the program, not only for refusing to debate her, but also for helping to create the federal deficit he now rails against:

This whole idea of tax cuts for the wealthy being the key to economic vibrancy is just plain wrong, we tried that, that’s what got us where we are.  We’ve got to solve the deficit problem that Senator Grassley, Senator Grassley as chair of the finance committee created a lot of the problem with the deficit, two tax cuts for the very wealthy. […]

Two tax cuts mostly benefiting the very wealthy passed by Senator Grassley, chair of the committee, not a dime paid for.  Two wars fought on the credit card.  Medicare Part D which includes that crazy provision that we can’t negotiate prices with the drug companies.  Those were under Senator Grassley’s finance committee and resulted in $1.3 trillion dollars a year of deficit.

Conlin also pointed out that Grassley used to support the individual health insurance mandate he now claims is unconstitutional. When he accused her of supporting amnesty for undocumented immigrants, she pointed out, “There’s only one person in this room who has voted for amnesty and that is Senator Grassley, not just once but twice.  In 1982 he introduced a bill for amnesty.”

Grassley tried to link Conlin to Senate Majority leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. He also claimed she supports regulations and tax increases that would kill jobs. As for his refusal to debate Conlin, he said he frequently takes questions on the issues from Iowa reporters and from members of the public.

I mostly agree with Kathie Obradovich, who wrote, “Conlin scored the deepest cuts on Grassley and got only scratches in return.”

Grassley’s most successful gambits against Conlin were on job creation. He accused her of supporting what he called job-destroying legislation such as cap and trade, ending the Bush tax cuts for people over $250,000 in income and shutting down offshore oil drilling.

But he lost his momentum when Conlin countered that Grassley, as Finance Committee chairman, contributed to the deficit by supporting the Bush tax cuts without an offsetting spending cut and spending for two wars. He scoffed that she must not know that the Finance Committee doesn’t appropriate money.

“Aren’t you a senator?” Conlin shot back. “Didn’t you vote?”

An unclear question led to an odd statement from Grassley. Asked whether President George. W. Bush was wrong on Iraq, Conlin said he was wrong to start the war. Grassley, however, responded: “I think the fact the president (Obama) declared victory two weeks ago and brought the troops home is evidence that it was not wrong.” It left me wondering how the war’s end could justify the beginning.

The 30-minute limit wasn’t kind to Grassley. It takes him longer than Conlin to make his points and he seemed to get frustrated when a reporter tried to cut him off. He came off as angry, while Conlin looked composed. Iowa Public Television offered to make the show an hour long, but Grassley declined. That was a mistake.

Grassley didn’t look at Conlin during the television program, nor did he mention her name. After the taping, Radio Iowa’s Kay Henderson asked him about that:

I was one of the reporters in the studio for the taping of today’s “Iowa Press” show, and during the news conference with Grassley I asked:  “Senator, I know Dean, Mike and I are very compelling figures, but you never once looked at Roxanne Conlin during the entirety of the show.  What were you signalling with that body language?”

“Nothing,” Grassley said in reply.

Lynn Campbell of IowaPolitics.com then asked another question.  “Senator, how confident are you about your reelection this November and how would you describe the challenge from Ms. Conlin versus the other five elections you’ve faced?”

Grassley said this to Campbell:  “I’ll have you repeat the question.”

Then Grassley directed his comments back to me:  “I wish you had told me because I would have been very happy to look at her.  She’s a very nice looking woman.  She’s very intelligent.  I have nothing against looking at her, but I thought I ought to concentrate on the people who were asking the questions because from your body language I learned a lot.”

The assembly of reporters laughed.

Grassley makes some really odd comments sometimes.

In other news this weekend, the “big game” between Iowa and Iowa State turned into a blowout. Congratulations to Hawkeyes and condolences to Cyclones in the Bleeding Heartland community.

This is an open thread. What’s on your mind?

Senator Chuck Grassley launched two new campaign advertisements on Tuesday, his first television commercials since a 30-second spot that aired shortly before the June primary. Like that first ad, both new commercials say nothing about conservative policy stands or opposing President Obama’s agenda. They don’t even mention his party affiliation. Instead, they depict the senator as a hard worker who has stayed connected to Iowa and works for all of his constituents.

Videos and more analysis are after the jump.

You come across the strangest things on Twitter sometimes:

Yes, it’s delusional to believe Politico is in the game to “protect” Barack Obama, but for now I’m more interested in Republican National Committeewoman Kim Lehman’s claim that the president is Muslim. Presumably she was responding to Tim Grieve’s August 19 report for Politico on the latest Pew survey about the president’s religion. Pew found that about 18 percent of American adults say Obama is Muslim, while about 34 percent say Obama is Christian. About 34 percent of those who identified themselves as conservative Republicans told Pew Obama was Muslim. Grieve’s report referred to “a dramatic spike in false views about the president’s religious faith.” Politico’s Josh Gerstein also reported on the Pew finding, as well as a Time magazine survey which (using different wording) found even higher numbers of Republicans believe the president is Muslim.

Neither Lehman nor anyone else would claim Republican gubernatorial candidate Terry Branstad’s not really a Christian because his mother was Jewish. Yet for some reason, it’s not enough for Lehman that Obama has been baptized, regularly attended Christian churches for many years and was sworn in on a Christian bible.

I wonder how many other prominent Iowa Republicans believe the urban legend about Obama being Muslim. Representative Steve King recently claimed Obama is a “Marxist” who “surely understands the Muslim culture.” What about Senator Chuck Grassley, Representative Tom Latham and Republican Congressional candidates Ben Lange, Mariannette Miller-Meeks and Brad Zaun?

State party chairman Matt Strawn and Steve Scheffler, head of the Iowa Christian Alliance, are Iowa’s other two representatives on the RNC. Do they and members of the Iowa GOP’s State Central Committee share Lehman’s view?

Branstad’s own interfaith family background makes him an ideal person to speak publicly about religion as a matter of faith and an individual’s spiritual journey, as opposed to a genetic inheritance. But I’m not holding my breath for Branstad to dispel false rumors about Obama. He generally avoids taking any position that would anger conservatives–when he’s not kowtowing to far-right sentiment, that is.

It’s been months since we’ve had new public nonpartisan polling of Iowa general election matchups, but three Republican polls have come out in the last ten days. None of them hold good news for Iowa Democrats.

After the jump I summarize results from statewide polls done by Rasmussen Reports and Voter/Consumer Research for The Iowa Republican blog, as well as a Victory Enterprises poll of Iowa’s third Congressional district race.

Yesterday the House of Representatives approved and President Barack Obama signed a $26.1 billion package to support state education and Medicaid budgets in the current fiscal year. The bill passed the House by a 247 to 161 vote. Iowa’s House delegation split on party lines, as with the 2009 federal stimulus bill and previous legislation designed to support public sector jobs in the states. Iowa will receive about $96.5 million of the $10 billion in education funding, enough to save an estimated 1,800 teachers’ jobs.

The bill also contains $16.1 billion in Federal Medical Assistance Percentage or FMAP funding, including about $128 million to support Iowa’s Medicaid budget in the 2011 fiscal year. Last week I read conflicting reports about how much Medicaid assistance Iowa would receive, but staffers for Representatives Bruce Braley and Dave Loebsack confirmed yesterday that $128 million is the correct figure. That’s a bit more than Iowa legislators were counting on for FMAP funding in the 2011 budget. Extra federal spending on Medicaid also “has an economic benefit for the state of Iowa far greater than the federal government’s initial investment,” according to Iowa State University economist Dave Swenson.

For the last several days, I have been searching for some comment on this legislation from Republican gubernatorial candidate Terry Branstad. I’ve found nothing in news clips, and his campaign has not issued a press release on the federal fiscal aid since the Senate approved the bill on August 4.

Branstad rails against “one-time sources” of funding to support the state budget, but he has nothing to say about $96.5 million for Iowa schools and $128 million for Iowans dependent on Medicaid services.

Branstad is happy to run false advertising about the number of teachers’ jobs supposedly lost in Iowa, but he has nothing to say when federal action saves a significant number of teachers’ jobs. The issue is a bit awkward for Branstad, because Republicans Tom Latham and Steve King voted against the fiscal aid bill in the House, just as Republican Chuck Grassley voted no in the Senate.

Perhaps Branstad lacks the courage to go beyond vague campaign rhetoric about excessive government spending. It’s easy to talk abstractly about “one-time” funding, but risky to slam government support for education and Medicaid. CNN’s latest nationwide poll, which was in the field from August 6 through August 10, asked respondents, “Do you favor or oppose a bill in which the federal government would provide 26 billion dollars to state governments to pay for Medicaid benefits and the salaries of public school teachers or other government workers?” 60 percent of respondents favored such a bill, while only 38 percent opposed it.

Speaking of conspicuous silence from Branstad, when will he tell us how he plans to keep his contradictory promises to cut state spending by 15 percent while having the state pay a larger share of mental health and school funding?

Share any relevant thoughts in this thread.

The U.S. Senate confirmed Elana Kagan as associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court today on a 63-37 vote. As he did on the Judiciary Committee, Senator Chuck Grassley voted against confirmation. He explained his reasoning in more detail this week, and I’ve posted his prepared floor statement after the jump. It amuses me to see Grassley question Kagan’s “commitment to the Constitution and rule of law” when he is open to revising the clear, unambiguous meaning of the 14th Amendment because of current Republican views on immigration.

Last summer Grassley voted against confirming President Obama’s first Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor. Before that, Grassley had never opposed confirming a president’s nominee for the high court.

Five Senate Republicans voted to confirm Kagan: Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Richard Lugar of Indiana and Judd Gregg of New Hampshire. Ben Nelson of Nebraska was the only Democrat to vote no. In fact, NPR reported that Nelson just became the first Democrat to vote against a Democratic president’s Supreme Court nominee since Lyndon Johnson nominated Thurgood Marshall in 1967.

UPDATE: Senator Tom Harkin’s statement on the Kagan confirmation is after the jump.

Good news: the U.S. Senate overcame an attempt to filibuster a bill containing $26.1 billion in fiscal aid to state governments today. About $10 billion will support state education budgets in order to save teaching jobs. The other $16.1 billion will support state Medicaid budgets according to the Federal Medical Assistance Percentage or FMAP formula, which was originally part of the 2009 stimulus package. The Senate’s final vote on this bill is set for August 5, and it will easily gain more than the 50 votes needed for passage. Speaker Nancy Pelosi plans to call the House of Representatives back from August recess in order to approve this bill next week.

Iowa’s Senator Tom Harkin was a co-sponsor of this bill. Senator Chuck Grassley joined Republicans who tried to block it from getting an up-or-down floor vote. I haven’t seen a statement from his office explaining why. The bill does not add to the deficit, because expenses are offset by revenue-raising measures:

Senate Democrats said the $26 billion bill would be paid in part by revenue raising changes in tax law. Senate Democrats said the modifications would curtail abuses of the U.S. foreign tax credit system. The bill would also end the Advanced Earned Income Tax Credit and would return in 2014 food stamp benefits to levels set before last year’s federal stimulus plan.

I’m not happy about cutting future food stamp benefits, but there may be opportunities to restore that funding in other bills. This federal fiscal aid is urgently needed to prevent teacher layoffs in the school year that’s about to begin.  

Republican gubernatorial nominee Terry Branstad has been touring Iowa this summer with a contradictory campaign message. On the one hand, he blasts education cuts that have eliminated some teaching positions (he exaggerates the number of teacher layoffs, but that’s a topic for another post). On the other hand, Branstad criticizes the use of “one-time money” from the federal government to support the state budget. He promises to veto any budget that would spend more than 99 percent of projected state revenues. Branstad has never explained what he would have cut to make up for the federal stimulus money, but other questions are on my mind today, namely:

1. Does Branstad think Grassley did the right thing in trying to stop this fiscal aid package from reaching Iowa and other states?

2. Iowa’s budget for fiscal year 2011 assumes about $120 million in additional Medicaid funding under the FMAP program. If elected governor, would Branstad try to return that money to the federal government?

3. Would Branstad reject federal education funding that is targeted for saving teachers’ jobs in the upcoming academic year?

Share any relevant thoughts in this thread.

UPDATE: A statement from Senator Harkin’s office says this bill would provide “at least $128 million in additional Medicaid funding” to Iowa in the current fiscal year. Harkin also said,

“This vote came down to one thing: priorities.  Today, a majority of Senators proved that our priority is helping those who are the backbone of this country, America’s teachers and our families, to weather the continuing effects of the great recession.  And we provide this funding without adding one dime to the deficit.

“This is a crisis of the first order.  Not since the Great Depression have our public schools faced the prospect of such massive layoffs.  With this fund, we will preserve tens of thousands of education jobs that states can use for retaining or hiring employees at the pre-K and K-12 levels.

“Also with the funding, we provide critical assistance to states, whose budgets are already stretched to the limit, to protect Medicaid.  This six month extension of federally-matched funding will allow states to continue health benefits for some of the nation’s most needy.”

SECOND UPDATE: Jennifer Jacobs reported somewhat different numbers for the Des Moines Register:

A federal spending plan that advanced in Congress Wednesday would route $83.1 million in extra money to help Iowa pay for children’s services and payments to hospitals and nursing homes.

But the Iowa Legislature banked on getting an $116 million in extra federal Medicaid money in the first six months of next year.

That means the state budget will be short $32.9 million – or short $116 million if the bill fails to pass Congress altogether, according to the non-partisan Legislative Services Agency. Medicaid is the government health insurance plan for the poor. […]

The measure would give states $16 billion to help cover their Medicaid budgets, and $10 billion to extend programs enacted in last year’s stimulus law to help preserve the jobs of teachers, police officers, firefighters and other public employees.

Iowa would get about $96.5 million in the jobs piece, which would protect about 1,500 jobs, said U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, a Democrat.

Keep in mind that Iowa’s budget for fiscal year 2011 has an ending balance of $182.6 million, providing a cushion in case some expected revenue doesn’t materialize. Also, state revenues for the first month of the current fiscal year exceeded projections. Falling short $32.9 million in federal Medicaid assistance isn’t ideal, but it is manageable and far better than falling $116 million short, as would happen if Grassley and other Republicans got their way.

THIRD UPDATE: The Senate gave final approval to this bill on August 5 by a 61-39 vote. Grassley voted no along with most of the Republican caucus.

The Americans with Disabilities Act became U.S. law 20 years ago this week. Senator Tom Harkin, the law’s key author and sponsor, will keynote an anniversary celebration in Iowa City on Saturday afternoon. Harkin told the Cedar Rapids Gazette,

“Before the ADA, life was very different for folks in Iowa and across the country,” Harkin said. “Discrimination was both commonplace and accepted.”

After 20 years with ADA, “we recognize that people with disabilities – like all people – have unique abilities, talents and aptitudes,” he said, “and America is better, fairer and richer when we make full use of those gifts.”

However, Harkin sees the need to do more to help people with disabilities live outside of institutions and to help them gain employment.

I remember when Congress was debating this law, and some Republicans warned that new regulations on businesses would wreck the economy and spark endless lawsuits. However, President George H. W. Bush’s administration ultimately decided not to go to war against this bill, and compromise language exempting small businesses from some requirements satisfied most Congressional Republicans. The final version of the ADA passed the Senate on a 91 to 6 vote in July 1990. Senator Chuck Grassley voted yes, as did all the Democrats present and most of the Republicans.

Bipartisan support for ADA continued when Harkin worked with Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah to “preserve the intent of the ADA after several court rulings weakened its standards.” The ADA amendments act of 2008 passed by voice vote in the House and unanimous consent in the Senate. Yesterday a Senate resolution recognizing the ADA’s 20th anniversary and celebrating “the advance of freedom and the opening of opportunity” this law made possible passed by a 100 to 0 vote.

Harkin became an advocate for people with disabilities in part because his brother Frank was deaf. Probably most Americans have at least one friend or relative who has directly benefited from the ADA. The accessibility guidelines for curbs, doors and entrances have allowed my wheelchair-bound friend to take her son to the park, to preschool or to a coffee shop. Before the ADA, a mother in her situation would have been unable to enjoy those things.

This thread is for any comments about the ADA or continuing barriers faced by people with disabilities.

UPDATE: tessajp expresses her gratitude at Mother Talkers:

Every time I have pushed my sleeping child up a ramp, rather than take them out and fold the stroller up; I have been grateful for the ADA.

Every time I have taken my five year old into the larger bathroom stall, so that I could help her without having to expose us to the world at large; I have been grateful for the ADA.

Every time I have been able to open a door by pushing a button rather than contorting myself into some sad imitation of Mr. Fantastic in order to open the door and pull the stroller through at the same time; I have been grateful for the ADA.

While I’m sure the 101st Congress had nobler effects in mind when it passed the bill, I, as a fully abled bodied American who has never faced obstacles to full participation in the world, came to appreciate at least a small part of the bill when I became a parent.  So, thanks Senator Harkin for introducing it, and to all those who voted for it.  

LATE UPDATE: Dave Swenson’s reflections on this law are worth a read.

There are countless other provisions, but the point is clearly made here: prior to the ADA passage, persons with disabilities could be systematically discriminated against in a wide array of situations.  They could be denied entry to firms because of narrow doorways or an onerous passage.  They could be made to work in conditions that aggravated an existing impairment.  They could be denied meaningful employment for not being able-bodied when in fact the job required no such status.  And they could be warehoused in schools and institutions for lack of services or simple attention to their needs.

But discrimination is too soft a word.  The disabled in large part were frequently treated with utter indifference.  Due to their situation, they were irrelevant in the market and an afterthought regarding their possible enjoyment of a vast swath of the public’s benefits others of us take for granted.

Granted, the ADA cost the private sector and the public sector plenty in the short run, but in the long run it enhanced the workforce and social well being of millions of Americans.  The most recent estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau tell us there are over 41 million persons over the age of 5 with a disability, and a substantial fraction has never known a time when there was no ADA.  Another substantial fraction though remembers and is fully aware of the difference between now and then.

It strikes me, as I ponder this milestone, that the likelihood of the ADA passing today given the current configuration of Congress would be a doubtful enterprise.  For one, as it would impose costs on businesses it would be massively opposed by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce (as it was then) as inhibiting the competitiveness of all businesses and therefore, in the main, bad for the economy. As it would require an increase in government spending and oversight, it would add to the deficit, something that apparently is more and more taboo in the current environs.  And lastly, it would interfere with the right and power of all employers to employ the kind of people they most desired.

President Obama is ready to sign a $34 billion bill to extend unemployment benefits to many out-of-work Americans after the U.S. Senate finally passed the bill last night and the House of Representatives followed suit today. Unemployment benefits for many Americans started running out in early June, but Senate Democrats failed in several attempts to overcome Republican filibusters of the measure. This week a cloture motion on the unemployment benefits bill finally passed 60-40, with Republicans Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine joining 58 Democrats to overcome a filibuster. (West Virginia now has a Democratic appointee filling Robert Byrd’s old seat; his long illness and death this summer had left Democrats one vote short of 60.)

Iowa’s Chuck Grassley joined the Republican filibuster again this week, and last night he voted no on the bill itself, which passed 59-39. Grassley’s office sent out this statement yesterday:

“There’s bipartisan consensus that Congress should extend unemployment insurance, but there’s no reason we can’t extend benefits and pay for it.  We’ve offered solutions, five separate times, on ways to pay, only to be rebuffed by the Democratic leadership.

“Iowans have told me time and time again that Congress must stop deficit spending, so I voted to extend unemployment insurance and pay for it.”

Give me a break. When we had a Republican president, Grassley never hesitated to vote for tax cuts for the wealthy, Medicare part D, or war supplemental funding bills that added to the deficit. In fact, under President George W. Bush the Republican-controlled Congress passed unemployment extensions without making sure the additional spending was “paid for.” Senator Tom Harkin got it right in his July 20 speech on the Senate floor:

“For far too long, the long-term unemployed have gone without the assistance they need because of political gamesmanship in the Senate.  Critics argue that we cannot help some of the most desperate workers in America if it adds a dime to the deficit, but in the next breath, they argue in favor of extending hundreds of billions of tax breaks for the most fortunate and privileged Americans was necessary.  Tell that to the working family in Iowa who, through no fault of their own, struggles with joblessness and cannot put food on the table.

“Some two and a half million unemployed Americans have seen their benefits terminated in recent weeks.  They are among the nearly 6.8 million Americans who have been out of work for more than half a year.  That’s the highest number of long-term unemployed we’ve had since we started keeping track in 1948.”  

The House approved the unemployment benefits extension by a vote of 272 to 152 (roll call). Iowa Democrats Bruce Braley, Dave Loebsack and Leonard Boswell all voted for the bill. Ten Democrats (mostly representing conservative districts) crossed the aisle to vote against the bill, and 31 House Republicans voted for it. That’s a surprisingly high number of Republicans going against their leadership. Iowa Republicans Tom Latham and Steve King stuck with the majority of their caucus. Not only do they lack compassion for some long-term unemployed Iowans whose benefits have run out, they apparently don’t understand that unemployment benefits are among the most stimulative forms of government spending.

It’s good news that benefits will be restored to millions of Americans in the coming weeks, but in other respects this bill falls short of what’s needed to address our long-term unemployment problem. Although the number of Americans out of work for at least six months is at its highest level in six decades, Congress still hasn’t done anything for people who have exhausted the full 99 weeks of eligibility for unemployment benefits. The House has approved more infrastructure spending and other measures that would create jobs, but for now the Senate seems unable to overcome GOP filibusters of further stimulus.

Chuck Grassley will vote no when the Senate Judiciary Committee takes up Elana Kagan’s nomination to the Supreme Court today, he announced today. In a statement, Grassley said Kagan “failed to answer directly” many questions asked during her confirmation hearings. Supreme Court nominees proposed by Republican presidents have likewise declined to answer certain questions in committee, but Grassley said “candid answers” were needed from Kagan because “she has no previous judicial experience.” I posted the full text of Grassley’s statement below. He also told Radio Iowa that Kagan won’t exercise “judicial restraint” and will “let her own private views enter in” as opposed to interpreting the law. (No word on whether he found Kagan to be “aggressive” or “obnoxious.”)

It’s rich to hear Republicans talk about judicial restraint when judicial activism has “become a defining feature of the Roberts Court’s unfolding legacy” (see also here).

Click here to watch a YouTube video of Grassley questioning Kagan during Judiciary Committee hearings in late June. Radio Iowa and Blog for Iowa summarized the exchanges between Grassley and Kagan, which covered guns rights and gay marriage, among other issues.

Grassley voted to confirm both of President Bill Clinton’s nominees for the Supreme Court as well as all judges nominated by Republican presidents Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush. Some Iowa conservatives have been grumbling about Grassley in recent years, so perhaps that explains his opposition to confirming Sonia Sotomayor last year and now Kagan.

UPDATE: Media Matters compiled a list of “45 myths and falsehoods” about Kagan’s nomination.

SECOND UPDATE: The Judiciary Committee voted 13-6 to confirm Kagan. All committee Democrats and Republican Lindsey Graham of South Carolina voted yes.

“No one spent more time trying to beat President Obama than I did, except maybe Senator McCain,” Mr. Graham said Tuesday, referring to the 2008 presidential election and Senator John McCain  of Arizona, Mr. Obama’s Republican rival. “I missed my own election – I voted absentee. But I understood: we lost, President Obama won. The Constitution, in my view, puts a requirement on me not to replace my judgment for his.”

Mr. Graham said there were “100 reasons” he could vote against Ms. Kagan if he based his vote on her philosophy, which is at odds with his. But he said she met a time-honored standard for judicial nominees: whether they are qualified and of good character.

As a senator, Mr. Obama adopted a different standard, saying it was permissible to vote against a nominee based on judicial philosophy, not just qualifications. Mr. Graham said that approach undermined the judicial confirmation process, by making it more partisan.

“Something’s changing when it comes to the advice and consent clause,” he said. “Senator Obama was part of the problem, not part of the solution.”

THIRD UPDATE: The reaction from Grassley’s Democratic challenger Roxanne Conlin is after the jump.

Democracy for America, the organization Howard Dean created after his unsuccessful presidential bid in 2004, has officially endorsed Democrat Roxanne Conlin in her campaign against U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley. Blog for Iowa’s Trish Nelson posted the e-mail blast DFA sent to its supporters. Excerpt:

We need to restore a civil political dialogue in Iowa and Roxanne Conlin is exactly what Iowa needs after 30 years of Chuck Grassley. She’s a fighter who will stand up for Iowans, like she did as Assistant Attorney General and U.S. Attorney. When an Iowa teacher was fired for being pregnant, she took that woman’s case all the way to the state Supreme Court – and won.

Roxanne will go the extra mile and it’s that work ethic that is going to earn her the votes to win in November. Now, we need to provide her with the resources to fight back against one of the Senate’s most entrenched Republicans.

Democracy for America has more than a million members, and as of Tuesday morning, the organization had already raised more than $14,000 for Conlin’s campaign. She can use the help, because Grassley has a big cash on hand advantage.

While looking around the DFA site I noticed a lot of support for Francis Thicke’s campaign for secretary of agriculture among DFA’s Iowa members. That network could become an important source of volunteer energy for the Thicke and Conlin campaigns.

Candidates for federal offices were required to submit Federal Election Commission reports on campaign fundraising and expenditures by July 15. Those reports covered money raised and spent between May 20 and June 30. “Pre-primary” reports, which were due in late May, covered the period from April 1 through May 19.

The second quarter numbers are particularly important for challengers, who need to show that they will have the resources to wage serious district-wide or statewide campaigns. Although candidates continue to raise money during the third quarter, they typically have less time for fundraising as they spend more time campaigning. Mike Glover of the Associated Press noted, “The cash-on-hand numbers are closely watched by strategists because candidates traditionally use the summer months to build up a cash reserve that they begin spending on television advertisements around Labor Day.”

Follow me after the jump for the second quarter numbers.  

The Senate passed the final version of new financial regulations yesterday. Senator Chuck Grassley voted against the cloture motion to allow the Restoring American Financial Stability Act of 2010 to come to the floor, and later voted against the bill itself, as did all Senate Republicans except for Scott Brown of Massachusetts and Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine. Senator Tom Harkin voted to overcome the Republican filibuster attempt and for the bill itself, as did all other Senate Democrats except Russ Feingold of Wisconsin.

Grassley had joined Snowe, Collins and Brown in voting for the Senate’s original financial reform bill in May. After the jump I’ve posted Grassley’s official statement explaining his reasons for opposing the bill that emerged from the House/Senate conference committee.

Statements from Harkin and Grassley’s Democratic opponent, Roxanne Conlin, are also posted below.

Alison Vekshin of Bloomberg News and Annie Lowrey of the Washington Independent briefly summarized the bill’s provisions; click here for the full text. On balance, passing this bill is better than doing nothing, but too many important reforms were excluded from the package or watered down in conference. I also agree with former Clinton cabinet official Robert Reich, who argued here that the bill is too narrow in scope:

The White House and Democratic leaders could have described the overarching goal as overhauling economic institutions that bestow outsize rewards on a relative few while imposing extraordinary costs and risks on almost everyone else. Instead, they have defined the goal narrowly: reducing risks to the financial system caused by particular practices on Wall Street. The solution has thereby shriveled to a set of technical fixes for how the Street should conduct its business.

Share any thoughts about financial reform in this thread. Conlin appears likely to bring this up repeatedly in her campaign against Grassley. One of her campaign’s statements released yesterday noted that so far in this election cycle, “Grassley has taken close to $900,000 in campaign contributions from Wall Street bankers and their PACs.”

UPDATE: House Democrat Barney Frank was one of the key architects of this bill. He discusses some of its high and low points here.

House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey, who is retiring this year, shared some of his parting thoughts with The Fiscal Times:

But I leave more discontented when I came here because of the terrible things that have been done to this economy by political leaders who allowed Wall Street to turn Wall Street banks into gambling casinos which damned near destroyed the economy.

I think the more important thing was what was my biggest failure. I think our biggest failure collectively has been our failure to stop the ripoff of the middle class by the economic elite of this country, and this is not just something that happened because of the forces of the market.

Jonathan Martin of the Politico made a splash in the blogosphere with this piece on former Iowa First Lady Christie Vilsack. She told Martin that she’s “really interested” in running for office someday:

She added: “I think I have all the ingredients, it’s really a matter of timing.”

When she’ll run-and what office she’ll pursue-is less certain, though Vilsack did drop some hints.

The former Iowa First Lady indicated she’d like to mount a campaign as soon as 2012.

“Everything will look different after this election when the state’s redistricted,” Vilsack said.

As for what she’ll run for, she suggested a congressional bid.

“I have more of a legislative personality,” she said.

Many central Iowa Democrats expect Vilsack to run for Congress in the redrawn third district in 2012. If Leonard Boswell wins an eighth term this November, he could easily retire before the next election. Democrats will certainly need a new candidate in IA-03 for the next cycle if Brad Zaun beats Boswell this year.

Ever since Vilsack became involved with the Iowa Initiative to Reduce Unintended Pregnancies (as opposed to Planned Parenthood, a more polarizing organization), I’ve assumed she would become a candidate someday. When Vilsack ruled out challenging Senator Chuck Grassley last fall, she indicated that she would consider a run for office.

Vilsack told Martin, “I want to make a wise choice because I’m very competitive. If I’m going to run, I’m not just going to run to run – I’m going to run to win.” She might not clear the field for a Democratic primary in IA-03, but she would have an excellent chance of winning the nomination. As first lady, she was quite popular, so her chances in a general election would probably be strong, depending on the makeup of the district. Few Iowa Democrats could go into their first campaign with her level of name recognition.

Some Democrats consider Vilsack a possible U.S. Senate candidate if Tom Harkin retires in 2014 or Grassley retires in 2016. My hunch is that Representative Bruce Braley or former Governor Tom Vilsack would be more likely Democratic candidates for a statewide race.

Share any relevant thoughts in this thread.

Lots of people have asked me this spring when EMILY’s List is going to get behind Roxanne Conlin’s campaign for U.S. Senate. Now we have our answer:

For Immediate Release

June 25, 2010

EMILY’s List Endorses Roxanne Conlin for United States Senate

WASHINGTON, D.C. – EMILY’s List, the nation’s largest financial resource for women candidates, today announced its endorsement of Roxanne Conlin in her campaign for the Unites States Senate.

“EMILY’s List is thrilled to announce our support for Roxanne Conlin in her campaign to be Iowa ‘s next United States Senator. Roxanne has proven time and again that she is a strong and determined advocate for the people of Iowa ,” said Stephanie Schriock , president of EMILY’s List. “This year, more than ever, is it crucial that we elect smart, effective and capable leaders to take on powerful special interests and those who put corporations over American families. Roxanne Conlin has been fighting for families her entire career. She is not afraid to take on big challenges and stand up for Iowans in the court room or on the Senate floor. EMILY’s List is proud to endorse Roxanne Conlin for the United States Senate.”

“Chuck Grassley has served in Congress for over three decades. Three decades of taking more money from PACs than he has from people.  Iowans don’t need a career politician concerned with his next election,” Schriock continued. “Roxanne is a former United States attorney, Democratic nominee for governor, the first woman president of the American Association for Justice, and a grandmother who is concerned about the next generation, who is poised to move this seat to the Democratic column in November.”

A lifelong champion for women’s rights, Conlin founded and was the first chair of the Iowa Women’s Political Caucus, the president of NOW’s Legal Defense and Education Fund and, while serving as Iowa ‘s assistant attorney general, she wrote the first law of its kind protecting rape victims. Conlin later served as United States Attorney for the Southern District of Iowa, where she worked with law enforcement, led major drug busts and cracked down on violent crime.

EMILY’s List is the nation’s largest resource for women candidates. In the 2007-2008 cycle, EMILY’s List raised more than $43 million to support its mission of recruiting and supporting women candidates, helping them build strong campaigns, and mobilizing women voters to turn out and vote. Since its founding in 1985, EMILY’s List has worked to elect 80 pro-choice Democratic women to the U.S. House, 15 to the U.S. Senate, nine governors, and hundreds of women to the state legislatures, state constitutional offices, and other key local offices.

For more information on EMILY’s List, please visit www.emilyslist.org.

This endorsement is bound to further raise Conlin’s profile on the national scene and bring in more donations from around the country.

This week the Cook Political Report moved its rating on this race from safe Republican to likely Republican. That’s where most other election forecasters, including Swing State Project, have had the race for some time.

Who else is watching the World Cup? I am surprised by how much my kids are enjoying the games, even though they don’t play soccer and it’s such a low-scoring sport. Des Moines business owner Tanya Keith and her husband have gone to every World Cup since 1994, and Tanya is blogging here about her family’s trip in South Africa. What I want to know is, how are her two young kids coping with the vuvuzela noise at the games? It sounds deafening even on tv.

I wasn’t around last weekend to write up the Iowa Democratic Party’s state convention in Des Moines. Radio Iowa’s blog covered most of the highlights here. Sue Dvorsky of Iowa City is the new IDP chair, replacing Michael Kiernan, who needs to have surgery on a tumor near his salivary gland. Iowa Democrats nominated Jon Murphy as our candidate against State Auditor David Vaudt. Read more about Murphy at Radio Iowa or at Iowa Independent. I am so glad we’re not giving Vaudt a pass.  

Convention delegates also voted to change party rules so that the gubernatorial nominee can choose the lieutenant governor candidate. The move was intended to undermine Barb Kalbach’s efforts to replace Lieutenant Governor Patty Judge on the Democratic ticket, and will make it impossible for an activist to do something similar in the future.

John Deeth has been pretty harsh on Kalbach, suggesting it’s a waste of time for her to run against Judge when her own Republican state representative and senator don’t have Democratic opponents. I see things differently. Kalbach said in announcing her candidacy, “I am taking this opportunity to represent the progressive, grassroots base of the Democratic Party who feels the issues that they have put forward have been ignored at the state level.” Kalbach wouldn’t have run if the Culver administration and Democratic legislative leaders had done anything to limit factory farm pollution during the past four years. She wouldn’t have run if the governor had done anything to advance the cause of local control (agricultural zoning), which he claimed to support during the 2006 campaign. Kalbach wouldn’t be able to draw attention to those failures as a candidate for the Iowa House or Senate in a conservative district. By the way, Culver would have an army of grassroots volunteers now if he had listened less to Patty Judge. He would also have a great campaign issue to use against Terry Branstad, on whose watch factory farm pollution became a much bigger problem in our state.

Moving to Iowa’s U.S. Senate race, while I was away a group called Americans United for Change started running this television commercial against Senator Chuck Grassley. The ad mentions campaign contributions Grassley has received from oil interests and draws a line between the catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico and Grassley’s vote for a “resolution of disapproval” that would have limited the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. It’s a poor ad, because as Grassley’s office noted, that particular vote had little to do with big oil or offshore drilling (click here for more background). In voting for the Murkowski amendment, Grassley was carrying water for big coal, utilities that rely on fossil fuels, corporate agriculture interests and major industrial polluters.

Grassley has done plenty throughout his career to represent corporate interests rather than the public interest. There’s no excuse for such a sloppy attack ad.

The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder interviewed Grassley’s opponent Roxanne Conlin yesterday, and the Cedar Rapids Gazette tried to make a big deal out of her misspeaking on when Grassley won his first election. Rasmussen’s latest Iowa poll of 500 likely voters on June 14 found Grassley ahead of Conlin by 54 percent to 37 percent. The previous Rasmussen survey, taken in late April, had Grassley leading Conlin 53-40. I would like to see other polling of this race. The Washington Post published a feature on Scott Rasmussen this week, including some criticism of his methods.

This thread is for anything on your mind this weekend. Also feel free to post any links to good reads. I am working my way through this article by a self-described Tea Party consultant.

The Senate version of a bill designed to create jobs, support state budgets and extend various tax credits and benefit programs failed to overcome a Republican filibuster yesterday. Tom Harkin was among 56 members of the Democratic caucus who voted for the cloture motion (which would end debate on the bill), but Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Joe Lieberman of Connecticut voted with all the Republicans present, including Chuck Grassley, to kill the bill (roll call here). Joan McCarter observed that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid

voted yes, without changing his vote, signaling that this iteration of the bill is indeed dead.

Reid followed the vote by attempting to pass the emergency provisions of the bill, the “doc fix,” unemployment benefits extension, and FMAP as well as the homebuyer tax credit, as separate bills under unanimous consent. McConnell objected to each, so we’re stuck in further limbo.

Extending unemployment benefits should be a no-brainer when the percentage of unemployed Americans who have been out of work for more than six months is higher “than at any time since the government began keeping track in 1948.” Without the “doc fix,” medical providers’ reimbursements for Medicare patients stand to drop about 20 percent. FMAP stands for Federal Medical Assistance Percentage funding, relating to federal government reimbursements for part of each state’s Medicaid spending. The 2009 stimulus bill temporarily raised FMAP payments for states during the recession, with larger increases going to states with higher unemployment rates. Failing to extend this provision will put state budgets under further strain for the 2011 and 2012 fiscal years.

Republicans who blocked this bill claim we should not be adding to the federal deficit. A spokesman for GOP enabler Ben Nelson laid out his views here. Ezra Klein pointed out a few glaring problems with the analysis: the federal budget can’t start approaching balance with unemployment at 9 percent, polls show Americans are much more concerned about jobs than the deficit, and the current rate of economic recovery is “far, far too slow to really dent unemployment.” Meanwhile, the same senators who claim to oppose adding to the deficit also oppose rolling back tax cuts or tax loopholes for the wealthy in order to pay for extending unemployed benefits, state fiscal aid and tax credits.

I share John Aravosis’ view that it was a terrible mistake for President Barack Obama to talk tough about reducing the deficit earlier this year. As Aravosis writes,

[T]he President didn’t want to blame Bush and the GOP for the deficit, and he didn’t want to sufficiently defend the stimulus and explain to people that they had a choice between a Great Depression and a bigger deficit. […] If the public understood that the deficit was a) mostly caused by Bush, and b) not nearly as important as staving off a Depression and creating jobs, the GOP would be facing far more pressure not to launch these filibusters at all.

Perhaps no jobs bill passed this week would alter the economy enough to affect the November elections, but if we accept current unemployment levels and don’t pass additional fiscal aid to the states, the economy may still be very weak leading up to the 2012 election.

Share any relevant thoughts in this thread. From where I’m sitting, the case for Harkin’s filibuster reform proposal has never looked stronger.