Jason Benell lives in Des Moines with his wife and two children. He is a combat veteran, former city council candidate, and president of Iowa Atheists and Freethinkers.

For many, the current political climate seems to have taken a distinct turn. The media has been ablaze with U.S. Supreme Court decisions concerning the rights of kings—I mean presidents—in regard to the rule of law, as well as sweeping changes to how policy can be interpreted by different branches. The high court has also determined that prosecuting people for being homeless is not “cruel and unusual.”

Closer to home, the Iowa Supreme Court ruled that people with uteruses are not full citizens, and after six weeks of pregnancy no longer have the same rights that non-uterus-having folks still maintain to control their own bodies.

This may seem like an onslaught of bad news, or at least noteworthy and worth paying some attention to. For the first time, many are becoming a bit more carefully tuned-in to the goings on and the headlines now that democracy and basic human rights are at a serious risk of being eroded away. Yes, democracy is under threat and yes we should all be paying attention.

However, for those of us who are tuned in to what the political Right has wanted since its existence as a pro-monarchist political realm, it is so clearly not new, it was a long time coming, and it is genuinely and utterly at the feet of the Republican Party and those who support them.  

It’s been a year since President Barack Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (better known as the stimulus bill) into law. I didn’t like the early concessions Obama made to Republicans in a fruitless effort to win their support for the stimulus. I was even more upset with later compromises made to appease Senate conservadems and Republican moderates. They reduced spending in several areas that had real stimulative value (school construction funds, extra money for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, aid to state governments) in order to include tax cuts that have much less stimulus “bang for the buck.” Senator Tom Harkin was right to question why 9 percent of the stimulus bill’s cost went toward fixing the alternative minimum tax, for instance.

Still, I supported passage of the stimulus bill. In late 2008 and early 2009 the U.S. economy was losing 600,000 to 700,000 jobs per month. Something had to be done. On balance, the stimulus did much more good than bad. Economists agree it has saved or created a lot of jobs:

Just look at the outside evaluations of the stimulus. Perhaps the best-known economic research firms are IHS Global Insight, Macroeconomic Advisers and Moody’s Economy.com. They all estimate that the bill has added 1.6 million to 1.8 million jobs so far and that its ultimate impact will be roughly 2.5 million jobs. The Congressional Budget Office, an independent agency, considers these estimates to be conservative.

Two and a half million jobs isn’t enough to compensate for the 8 million jobs lost since this recession began, but it’s a start.

Not only did the stimulus create jobs, it greatly increased spending on programs that will have collateral benefits. Incentives to make homes more energy efficient will reduce greenhouse gas emissions and save consumers money that they can spend elsewhere. Money for sewer improvements will provide lasting gains in water quality (inadequate sewers and septic systems are a huge problem in Iowa). The stimulus included $8 billion for high-speed rail. It wasn’t nearly enough, of course; we could have spent ten or twenty times that amount on improving our rail networks. But that $8 billion pot drew $102 billion in grant applications from 40 states and Washington, DC. The massive demand for high-speed rail stimulus funding increases the chance that Congress will allocate more funds for rail transportation in the future.

Unfortunately, most Americans don’t believe the stimulus bill created jobs. That’s largely because unemployment remains at a historically high level of 10 percent nationwide. Also, inflation-adjusted average weekly earnings have gone down during the past year. In addition, Republicans have stayed on message about the worthlessness of the stimulus bill, even though scores of them have hailed stimulus spending in their own states and districts.

Democrats on the House Labor and Education Committee released an ad that lists various popular stimulus bill provisions, such as increasing Pell Grants and teacher pay. The ad uses the tag line, “There’s an act for that,” naming the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act at the end. I don’t think it’s effective, because the ad doesn’t include the word “stimulus.” Few people will realize that the ARRA refers to the stimulus bill.

Bleeding Heartland readers, how do you view the stimulus one year later?

Crossposted from Hillbilly Report.

The compromise in the House is not real Healthcare reform. Although our country desperately needs Healthcare reform just supporting any bill offered is not progress. After Corporate Democrats and Republicans have gotten a hold of the bills in the House and Senate they are so watered down that they will not be anything that will do much good.

Join the discussion for Rural Progressives on our issues, challenges, and candidates for 2010 at Hillbilly Report. City Slickers are more than welcome too!!

When one thinks about children in poverty in many regions of the country one normally thinks about children living in urban societies. While much child poverty exists in urban conditions the fact is that rural Americans face even a greater challenge uplifting their children from poverty. New statistics are very disturbing for those of us raising children in rural areas of the country.

As Barack Obama assembles his cabinet and key White House advisers, he’s choosing a lot more people from the “centrist” or corporate-friendly wing of the Democratic Party than movement progressives. He is leaving George Bush’s Defense Secretary, Robert Gates, in place. He has also made some symbolic moves that angered a lot of progressives, in particular selecting Rick Warren to give the invocation at his inauguration.

I understand the political arguments in favor of Obama’s strategy, and opinion polls support some of them. When asked whether they approve of Obama or how he is handling the transition (different pollsters ask the question differently), anywhere from 65 percent to 75 percent of Americans are saying they approve.

I’ve been wondering how much Obama’s conciliatory gestures have been helping him with Republicans and conservatives of the wingnut variety. I’m not talking about Jim Leach Republicans, I’m talking about the kind of person who really believed Obama was a “socialist.”

For example, one of my friends told me last month that her mother’s best friend believes changing the American flag will be “the first order of business” when Obama takes office. I am not kidding.

In the next ten days, many of us will attend holiday parties and family reunions. I don’t recommend that you bring up politics at these events if that would make people uncomfortable. However, if you come from a family where politics are often discussed when folks get together, I would like to hear from you.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to find out whether your conservative friends and relatives have abandoned some of their more paranoid beliefs about Obama since he was elected. In other words, how well have Obama’s conciliatory gestures allayed conservative fears about his intentions? Is he likely to get more of a honeymoon than Bill Clinton did in 1993?

Feel free to post your own diary or a comment in this thread.

Many conservative pundits were not impressed by John McCain’s selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate, since her glaring lack of experience undercuts McCain’s main message against Barack Obama.

On the plus side for McCain, just about everyone agreed that putting an anti-abortion mother-of-five on the ticket would delight the evangelical Christians who were so crucial to George Bush’s re-election.

Although the “pro-family” interest groups applauded McCain’s choice, I had a hunch that Palin wouldn’t be unanimously embraced by the evangelical rank and file.

I lurk and occasionally comment at a few “mommy blogs” written by religious conservatives. Checking in on some popular sites in the evangelical Christian blogosphere over the weekend, I did find some commentaries that praised Palin for her views and for continuing a pregnancy while carrying a child with Down syndrome.

However, if you join me after the jump, you’ll see that plenty of evangelicals are far from “fired up and ready to go” for this Republican ticket.  

It is probably still an inconvenient or touchy time to be talking about this with all of the truly disastrous flooding coming to an end in Iowa and the cleanup just beginning.  But it has to be said: we weren’t truly prepared for this kind of disaster and we have to take steps to prevent it from happening in the future.

Brad Johnson, a research associate at the Center for American Progress and a blogger at their Wonk Room policy blog, brought my attention to a couple of his posts on the terrible flooding and storms in the Midwest this summer, particularly in Iowa.  And in those posts he makes a couple of fascinating points.

First, he notes Sen. Chuck Grassley’s hypocrisy in calling attention to the complacency over severe weather (speaking on the Senate floor about the deadly Parkersburg tornado) yet voted to filibuster the Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act.

Second, he notes an unfortunate quote from Gov. Chet Culver about our inability to “anticipate or prepare for” these types of events.  The facts are that reports since at least 2000 have been forecasting the types of weather patterns Iowa has been experiencing over the last couple of years.  See the link above for more information at Johnson’s post.

It seems clear that leadership on both sides of the political spectrum in Iowa have failed us.  They are not considering the big picture when it comes to environmental concerns in the state of Iowa.  And statewide environmental groups aren’t putting the pressure on local and state officials to keep them accountable either.

We need better and bolder leadership on the broad issues of global climate change and environmental issues in Iowa.  Whether or not you want to attribute the cause of these terrible weather patterns to global climate change, call them a natural aberration, or simply just call them normal, our leaders should be considering some important things when moving forward with reconstruction.  Bill Becker at Climate Progress offers more details, but here is his list which he deems lessons from an angry planet:

1. We need to put unprecedented pressure on our national leaders to get serious about mitigation and adaptation.
2. It’s past time to rethink national flood control and water management strategy.
3. When we repair and rebuild disaster-damaged buildings and infrastructure, we should do so with cutting-edge mitigation and adaptation in mind.

Groups like the Iowa Global Warming Campaign, the Iowa Chapter of the Sierra Club, the Iowa Environmental Council, and any other group committed to protecting and defending Iowa’s environment should be tackling issues like this.  Granted, there are concerns about hog lots, Iowa’s waterways, and coal power plants to be concerned about as well.  Heck, even 1000 Friends of Iowa should be concerned about future development that not only is environmentally-friendly but that protects families and businesses on or near flood plains.

The state needs leadership on these pressing issues.  We call events like these “100 year floods” and “500 year floods” for a reason.  The frequency with which they occur is not what is implied, but the the likelihood that they will.  In just a 15 year period of time, we’ve experienced drastic periods of extreme drought and extreme precipitation.  You can even go back to periods in the 1980s (particularly around 1984) and see the same type of patterns, but with less severity.  We are certainly experiencing more severity with more frequency.  This is a result of global climate change.  We aren’t taking the threats seriously and we aren’t preparing ourselves for the future–either by accommodating the tragic effects that are likely or by acting to stop these events from happening in the first place.

The big debate in Iowa that is now emerging as the flood waters head downstream and leave the state is how to pay for all of the destruction and prepare for the reconstruction.  Some want to use the state’s rainy-day fund and others are looking at incurring state debt as an option.  In the end, the debate will be politically charged about fiscal issues and not the bigger picture.  Democrats and Progressives in Iowa have to think big picture or our meager political gains (and the state itself) will be washed away, no pun intended.

There seem to be two distinct ideas emerging for financing the massive reconstruction project Iowa will have to enact to deal with the tragic and disastrous floods we’ve experienced this spring (on a quick side note, I sure hope that summer fares us better).  The first is to tap into the state’s so-called “rainy day” fund (no pun was intended, I’m sure) and the other is to borrow money and essentially create debt.  Both are the logical responses to a natural disaster of this magnitude.  I think it was a Johnson County emergency management official who said this was “our own Katrina.”  Whether he meant that in terms of sheer destruction or bad planning or reactions to the event, I’m not sure.  But the statement still leaves an impact.

Once we get beyond the human and emotional costs of the flooding, we will ultimately have to deal with the political ramifications of financing the reconstruction.  Governor Culver seems to prefer using the state’s rainy day fund.  Senate Majority Leader Gronstal says he’s open to incurring debt.  So what are we to do?

At first glance, Gov. Culver’s idea would seem to the most politically feasible and publicly attractive option on the table.  The state and taxpayers won’t have to incur debt or use their taxes to pay off the bills because they’ll just use the extra money they have right now to reconstruct Iowa.  But I think there should be serious consideration of incurring debt to finance the reconstruction.

To me, the root of the problem is whether we want to rebuild or reconstruct what has been destroyed.  Those mean different things.  Rebuilding implies we’ll bring things back to the status quo, maybe with some minor improvements.  Reconstruction implies a step forward and desire to plan and implement improvements and to change the way we do things.  Iowa needs the investment in the future and needs to show that the state has the ability and capability to plan effectively, plan efficiently, and act with speed to solve problems and fix what has broken.

Incurring debt isn’t such a bad thing, as David Yepsen told us yesterday.  There are reasons to consider it.  Tapping into the rainy day fund isn’t a bad idea either.  But will either one be enough?

The special legislative session to deal with this issue is going to happen; it has to.  But the debate will be a lengthy one.  And it will result in tough decisions.  Contrary to what others argue, waiting to see what the federal government will pay for is not an option.  If this truly is “our Katrina” then we all know that federal disaster response is horrid.  The state must act soon.

Well, the results coming in have been surprising so far, at least on the Democratic side of things.  Clinton up with a quarter of the vote in.  Was there anyone predicting that?

You can track live results here from CNN.com.  Jerome Armstrong’s got an interesting discussion going here saying that with Clinton making the contest this close in NH that we’ve still got a tough race going on to February 5th…and even beyond.

So, what’re your thoughts?  How fluid are things?  What’s next?

Cross-posted at Political Forecast.

Maybe I’ve missed something in my absences from blogging over the past few months, but has the Register ever really done a serious news or feature piece on Iowa’s bloggers and citizen journalists?  I mean, I know we threaten their credibility and their readership by getting scoops, insight, and news out faster sometimes–not to mention that our commentary is sometimes more consistent and better written than their columnists’–but it almost seems like there is an intent to ignore the contributions that bloggers in Iowa have had both before the caucuses and in previous elections or issues.  Today, in their features section, they profile one citizen journalist who has been vlogging for PurpleStates.tv (she had to audition to get the gig) and one guy who has been doing it for MTV.  Don’t get me wrong, their efforts are valuable…but what about the folks who do this on their own time and don’t necessarily live off of it?

The folks at Iowa Independent have been doing regular news and political reporting since May, and other bloggers on both sides of the aisle have been part of the debate and policy discussion in Iowa politics for a few years now.  Other papers across the state, as well as national papers and news magazines, have highlighted our growth and commented on our contributions.

Simply put, why can’t Iowa’s paper of record recognize or examine the Iowa online community for what it is and report back to the people of Iowa on it?  I don’t want the media attention, the scrutiny, the interviews, the publicity; I just think that some of us deserve the recognition for the contributions we make.  Two of my former colleagues at Iowa Independent have already talked a bit about this subject (see Chase Martyn’s initial post here and read Ben Weyl’s abbreviated response here) and I think it is one worth further discussion as we continue to build Iowa’s blogosphere.

I can’t say I’m going to miss his racist remarks about immigrants and his fear-mongering.  From the Des Moines Register:

“Republican presidential candidate Tom Tancredo has scheduled a 2 p.m. press conference on Thursday to make a “major announcement.”

Tancredo, a Colorado congressman, has no other campaign events scheduled in Iowa after tomorrow’s announcement, said Alan Moore, Tancredo’s press secretary.”

My bet is that he drops out.  Good riddance.

Continuing my series of putting odds to things, I thought I'd look at the Republician presidential race. It only seems fair to speculate on the enemy's position while we work on our own…

Again, the scenario I envision is one in which one of the current top three candidates wins the nomination: Giuliani, Romney, or Huckabee. A further stipulation is that whoever wins will not pick any of the other members of the Big Three. So no Rudy/Romney tickets, folks. I had considered Huckabee a top VP candidate, but I'm taking him out of the running since he's sharpening his attacks and becoming a serious contender.

3-1 Fred Thompson The consummate good 'ol boy, Fred is the perfect southern comfort for Guliani or Romney's Yankee personalities. Plus, while Thompson's been slinging a little mud, he hasn't seemed to make any serious enemies yet. His only caveat is that Huckabee doesn't need another down-home southerner on his ticket. Goes best with: Giuliani, Romney

5-1 Charlie Crist Three words. Florida. Florida. Florida. This guy might represent the single biggest “known unknown” in politics today. If he is Veeped, Florida becomes much, much, much harder for a Democrat to win. Yet, the guy is a total enigma–and refuses to tip his hat to any one candidate. Goes best with: Guliani, Romney, Huckabee

7-1 Tim Pawlenty He's the popular Governor of Minnesota and a handsome, young Republican face. He may even deliver Minnesota and put Iowa and Wisconsin in play for the Republicans. However, he has little name recognition as it stands now, and the I-35 collapse happened on his watch–a potential target. Goes best with: Giuliani, Romeny, Huckabee

7-1 Duncan Hunter Strong on immigration, tough on defense. From the sunny state of Cully-for-neea, Hunter would lend credibility to a candidate lacking on these issues. Not to name any names, *cough* Romney *cough*. Plus, “Hunter” would look really good on those signs. Still, he's going nowhere fast in his own race. Goes best with: Giuliani, Romney, Huckabee

10-1 John Boehner He's a fresh face from a swing state. Also, he's been unfailingly loyal to the administration, and Republicans reward loyalty above all else. However, he got a little bit burned on the Foley and Abramoff scandals. Goes best with: Giuliani, Romney

10-1 John McCain War hero. Experienced. Moderate. McCain certainly deserves some recognition from the party after all these years. But his “radical” immigration stance and his “weak” anti-torture stance might turn off key components of the base. Not to mention that he would be the oldest VP ever elected. Goes best with: Huckabee

20-1 John Roberts He's the squeaky clean, likeable and popular Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Going from the Court to the White House is a stretch, but it's not impossible. He just might be the out-of-the-box candidate the party needs. Of course, it is somewhat of a suicide choice. If the ticket would win, they could appoint another moderate republican to the court. If they lose, they lose the White House, the Congress, and the Supreme Court in one year. A big gamble for sure. Goes best with: Giuliani, Romney, Huckabee

1,000,000-1 Ron Paul Ron Paul would never agree to be any of these guys' VP. But if I include him, I can tag this diary “Ron Paul” and maybe someone will read it for a change.

[First, a cheap plug for my blog Senate 2008 Guru: Following the Races.]

Does it seem like there’s a new Republican scandal in the news every single week?  Well, that may be because there is.

That seems like an awful lot of corruption, scandal, hypocrisy, impropriety, and jail-worthy crime, huh?  A lot of corruption.  One might say an entire Culture of Corruption.

UPDATE (6:44 PM Central Time): So here’s the deal.  A December caucus date is seeming a bit less likely.  At least that’s according to the calculations that Chris Bowers over at Open Left has provided to readers.  His calendar shapes out like this:

• Friday, January 4th: Iowa caucuses
• Saturday, January 12th: New Hampshire primary
Saturday, January 19th: Nevada Democratic caucus, South Carolina Republican primary
• Tuesday, January 29th: Florida primary, South Carolina Democratic primary
• Tuesday, February 5th: Super Tuesday

His reasoning, again, is here and worth a read.

And one more thing.  Gov. Culver talked with Kay Henderson and others today emphasizing his support for Iowa as first-in-the-nation state.  And he says that Iowa will be first, no matter what.

– – – – – – – – – –

Oh holy hell.  I really wish I could confirm with any ease the exact date of the Iowa Caucuses but it seems likely not to count on January 14th, 2008, anymore.

First, I’ll let you read what my friend John Deeth reported: That the South Carolina GOP Chair will announce in New Hampshire that he’s moving his primary date earlier than their scheduled February 2nd, 2008, primary.

Now, according to Marc Ambinder and others, it looks like the South Carolina GOP will announce in NH that they’re moving their primary to January 19th, a full three days before the NH primary.  By announcing the move in NH, it seems likely that the NH Secretary of State will move his state’s primary up to Monday, January 7th, or Tuesday, January 9th.  That would almost guarantee an Iowa Caucus date in December of 2007, unless both the IDP and the RPI decide to hold the Iowa Caucuses on Friday, January 4th.  That doesn’t seem likely as its right after the new year.

Other complications still exist.  On August 25th, the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee will meet to decide whether or not to sanction Florida Democrats because their state’s primary is now on January 29th (thanks to a Republican Florida legislature and governor).  Florida Democrats are seeking an exemption, but it is likely that Iowa Democrats will fight hard for sanctions to Florida’s delegation to the Democratic National Convention next summer in Denver.  The outcome of the Rules and Bylaws meeting is still quite up in the air.

Also, South Carolina Democrats are still planning their primary for January 29th, which means they’ll still actually be on schedule.

Michigan is still considering moving its primary to January 29th as well, but Gov. Jennifer Granholm is facing pressure not to sign a bill that would move the primary earlier (but also faces pressure from in-state Democrats like Sen. Carl Levin to move the date earlier–as a sidenote, Levin is crybaby who is just pissed that Nevada and South Carolina were the states that the DNC picked to insert into the IA-NH domination).

Summary: If you’re planning to caucus, keep the months of December and January open.

And if you want to keep track of the best news on the primary/caucus schedule, try Ballot Access News.

The folks over at IowaPolitics.com have launched another contest to reach out to online readers and bloggers with their Ames Straw Poll Contest.

Mike Schramm, the news editor at IowaPolitics.com, says “Whoever guesses closest to the actual finishing order wins a free year of our subscription service.”  To be honest, I’m not a subscriber to their service but I know some folks who are subscribers and appreciate the work they do.

Anyway, entries need to be submitted by Friday afternoon (because Saturday is the actual straw poll).  So go fill out the form and take a chance!

And yes, I realize that we’re all mostly Democrats and progressives here but this is at least a good way to have some fun and test your Republican political prowess.

The final vote was 52 in favor of cloture and 47 opposed (Reid switched to “No” at the end so that he could bring a motion to reconsider at a later date–a procedural move).  Dems picked up one new Republican waverer in the form of Sen. Susan Collins of Maine.

Greg Sargent’s got the best write-up of the GOP blockage here.  As he says:

What this means in a nutshell is this: While a majority of the U.S. Senate favors withdrawal from Iraq, the Senate can’t vote on a measure that would accomplish this — because the GOP Senate leadership won’t allow it.

Repeat that line to everyone you know.  Senate Republicans are blocking a true change of course in Iraq.

And in response, Senate Maj. Leader Harry Reid has pulled the Defense Authorization bill and it appears that he won’t bring it back to the floor until he can be guaranteed an up-or-down vote on the Levin-Reed Amendment and three others that will be offered (Warner-Lugar, Salazar ISG, and Landrieu).  Talk about playing hardball.

As many in the progressive blogosphere are already  aware, the Senate has been debating the National Defense Authorization Act,  which will set military policy for the coming fiscal year.  My Democratic  colleagues and I – as well as a few but growing number of Republicans – are  determined to take this opportunity to demand fairer treatment of our troops and  force President Bush to listen to the will of the American people and change  course in the war in Iraq.

Yesterday, the first amendment to the defense bill was  authored by Senator Jim Webb of Virginia.  Senator Webb’s troop-protection  amendment would have required that active-duty troops receive as much time at  home – recuperating and retraining – as they spend in combat, while giving the  president the authority to waive these requirements if additional troops are  needed in an emergency.

I was proud to co-sponsor Senator Webb’s legislation  because I felt that it was time to bring the systematic abuse of our  re-deploying troops to an end. It is simply unacceptable that our troops are  being deprived of the time that they need to recover from combat, complete  additional training, and spend precious time with their families. Senator Webb’s  bill would have gone a long way toward restoring our military’s readiness by  giving our brave and courageous service men and women an established amount of  time between deployments to protect their mental and physical well-being while  providing some stability and predictability for their families.

Well, well, well.  It looks like Senate Democrats are finally starting to play hardball with President Bush.  From Nicole Duran at IowaPolitics.com:

“Senate Democrats aren’t feeling very charitable toward former GOP Rep. Jim Nussle.

Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) confirmed Tuesday that an anonymous “hold” has been placed on Nussle’s nomination to lead the Office of Management and Budget.

Conrad said he did not know who placed the hold — any senator can prevent a nomination, or legislation, from coming to the floor by objecting, even anonymously, to the Senate majority leader. Holds are traditionally honored, though the majority leader may ignore it if he feels the hold has been placed for too long.”

I’m not sure what prompted Senate Dems to start getting tough on Bush and his nominees, but I’m willing to bet that his threatened veto of any pullout legislation on the Defense Authorization is partially the cause.

Nussle has consistently been a Bush clone and loyal foot soldier doing as commanded with regards to the federal budget.  He helped oversee the creation of the largest debts and deficits in recent American history.  That’s a principled enough reason to oppose his nomination, if you ask me.

While this isn’t exactly Iowa-specific or Iowa-centered, I thought it was worth noting today’s MSNBC story on the left-leaning emphasis of journalistic contributions to federal campaigns and PACs.

Marc Ambinder decides to frame the issue as “all journalists are liberals” and says it doesn’t help fight the “liberal bias” title usually assigned to the MSM by the right-wing noise machine.

I’m more inclined to agree with Matt Yglesias:

“This effort at ginning up controversy by revealing political contributions made by employees of media organizations seems fundamentally misguided. For one thing, no effort is being made to see if the people named have any ability to impact coverage of national politics. They have, for example, a former copy editor here at The Atlantic on their list, but what nefarious influence is she supposed to have had on the magazine’s coverage?”

You can find the full list of journalists and their contributions here.  A large number of the folks listed are producers, copy editors, or other senior positions in journalistic enterprises.  Clearly, personal life issues and personal politics don’t inherently have to enter the work life and the job that one person is doing.  This goes for Republicans and Democrats.

Furthermore, this kind of ‘investigative’ reporting groups the kinds of journalists writing for Bloomberg in the same category as journalists writing for a magazine like The New Yorker.  Journalism isn’t just about writing down the facts of current events and reporting them to the people, there is real investigative work and commentary that can be done–with a clear intent.  Simply put, you can consider it analysis.  Writers for The New Yorker are pretty clear about stating their intent and opinions in their pieces, which make them fundamentally different then the reporting done in a Bloomberg news piece.

Clearly, there are conflicts of interest with some of the people mentioned the in report, but is it really something pervasive among the journalistic community in this country?  I guess that’s for the consumer and the reader to decide.

And if you’re curious for an Iowa-angle, the only journalist from Iowa making the list was Des Moines Register business reporter S.P. Dinnen, who gave $250 to John Kerry in 2004.  His explanation can be found here.

Last November, right before the midterm elections, CityView also did a big cover story on bias in the media, particularly in Iowa.  They covered all angles, including print, TV, and radio.  I recommend reading the full story here as it provides great insight into the efforts of the outlets to maintain their objectivity and it also provides a good list of just who in the Iowa media is registered with which party (if any).

Finally, there is a poll in the extended entry asking if you think there is bias in Iowa’s press.

On Friday, March 9th the first-ever Drake University-IowaPolitics.com Luncheon was held.  The Luncheons will be monthly features at Drake with leaders from both parties, possibly presidential candidates, and other political big-wigs talking about issues, strategies, and everything else.  The first luncheon featured Iowa Democratic Party Chair Scott Brennan and Republican Party of Iowa Co-Chair Leon Mosley.  Chris Dorsey, Bureau Chief for IowaPolitics.com, acted as the moderator.  You can listen to an MP3 of the event here through IowaPolitics.com (be warned: it is very scratchy).

My initial opinions of the two leaders was that Brennan clearly came prepared and ready to talk about the issues as a seasoned political professional while Mosley was the down-home Republican who said what he meant, even if it was offensive or wasn’t politically correct.  Largely, it made me wonder how this man could possibly be chosen to represent a party as their chairman.  While his down-home style, seemingly like most ordinary Iowa Republican caucusgoers, might be appealing to some I think it was a big turnoff to those in the audience seeking a more enlightened and vigorous discussion about the issues, not just gut reactions.  He did frustrate a lot of people who asked questions and did get confrontational with some in the audience over Iraq.  But with such a divisive issue, that’s to be expected.

My friend Matt Clark has a write up of the event here for IowaPolitics.com (Matt’s got an internship with them and has been doing some great reporting) and I think it demonstrates Mosley’s approach to the discussion.  If that doesn’t clearly show it, the audio of the event will.  I’m not sure if any of you readers were there, but if you were, I’d like to hear your thoughts.  Or after you listen to some of the audio, feel free to leave your reactions as well.

After the event, the staff of IowaPolitics.com collected surveys filled out by those in attendance with questions relating to who they’d want to see at future events and asking for an overall rating of the event.  My suggestion for the next luncheon was to attempt to get the Caucus Directors for both the IDP and the RPI to come in and talk strategy a bit.  While this early most strategy would still be speculation, talking about what has worked in the past and what hasn’t could be mighty interesting to see.