"No one really thought through the consequences of parking the cars and leaving the keys"

Well.... THAT pretty much sums up the Vilsack Administration, doesn't it?

Pitchforks-and-Torches

Governor Yepsen's boring column today, where he handicaps the Democrats prior to the Jefferson Jackson Dinner this coming weekend, shows why this monopoly corporate pseudo-Republicrat needs to find another line of work:

Secretary of State Chet Culver. He's likely to formally announce his candidacy for governor this week. He needs to show a little gravitas to correct the impression that he's a lightweight who is not up to the job... Also, his position supporting the death penalty doesn't sit well with many who'll be in attendance. He could do well to explain that a bit, just to soothe liberal heartburn.

How do you explain being a pro-death penalty Democrat to the party hacks and a monopoly corporate Republicrat scribbler like Governor Yepsen? That's a hard one. It's kind of like explaining that you're Republican and pro-abortion, yet you're already the governor of a really big state. Like California or New York. Something like that.

Former state economic-development director Mike Blouin. He's pro-life. Lots of Democrats are pro-choice. While some Democrats don't care, for others, it's a deal-breaker. They simply can't support a candidate who is open to tinkering with issues surrounding a woman's right to choose, particularly at a time when the U.S. Supreme Court is changing and may toss these questions into the lap of the next governor. He needs to ease those fears without flip-flopping.

Talk about the biggest "Who gives a flying fuck?" issue in the campaign. How many abortions did Tom Vilsack perform while as Governor? Terry Branstad? You might as well ask Deacon Blouin whether he's a Cubs or a White Sox fan since that would affect more people. We're going to keep the focus on Deacon Blouin's fetish with taxpayer-financed corporate welfare as economic fluffing policy.

Secretary of Agriculture Patty Judge. Look for her to reach out to Democratic women. She needs their financial help. Big time. Iowa's never had a woman governor, and she's the only chance of getting one in the next four years. But some environmentalists think she's weak on their issues, and she'd do well to shore up her image on that front.

Doesn't it just suck that female political candidates get pigeon-holed as the female political candidate? As if having a uterus makes a difference. C'mon, Governor Yepsen, look at something else besides her breasts.

State Rep. Ed Fallon. Saturday's crowd won't be a Fallon crowd. His folks are more the pitchforks-and-torches type. But he's been dogged in this race, and it's never bad to be the most liberal guy in a six-way Democratic primary fight. If he looks gubernatorial and sounds like a winner, his stock will rise.

Gee, Governor Yepsen, why don't you just bash Fallon some more and smear his campaign and followers as the sex "offender lobby" once again? Those pitchforks and torches cross party lines and will eventually poke and burn Governor Yepsen's predictions in the ass. Just wait and see.

Shenandoah Mayor Gregg Connell and Sioux City engineer Sal Mohammed. They're long shots who do themselves good just being on the same stage with the others.

Why bother mentioning them at all? Connell's main campaign platform is to bond out gambling revenues forever in order to build a billion dollar wind farm. Mohammed couldn't bother to show up at a candidate forum in his home town of Sioux City a couple weeks ago. They're below asterisks, if you ask us.

Is this the best Governor Yepsen can do? Iowa's political bloggers, on the left, right, and all over the place, are going to rip him a new one by the time the 2006 elections come around if he keeps this pedestrian stereotyping up.

Germana Nijim Emailed Us

We got this email from somebody named Germana Nijim:

what is your purpose in life?

What do you do besides try to vilify decent, honorable, intelligent people of conscience?

Stop! People often recognize lies when they hear them or read them.

Germana

Is this the same Germana Nijim who wrote this letter to the editor of the Waterloo Courier on Saturday?

The letter from Mark Larson about the Rev. Naim Ateek and the Sabeel Center makes me wonder if Mr. Larson took the trouble of attending the Sabeel conference held in Cedar Rapids on Oct. 14-15...

Is that the same Sabeel conference in which members of the Coe College's Department of Philosophy and Religion later regretted hearing about anti-Semitism being expressed?

What is our purpose in life? Other than pointing out all taxpayer-raping schemes that the Republicrats and Demicons in Iowa are proposing, we also try to vilify the Jew-haters living in Iowa because Iowa's media is too lazy to do it.

The Register will bend over for The Rachel Corrie Martyrdom Tour, the Waterloo Courier will print letters to the editor from the likes of Tanis Diedrichs who accused Israel of "ethnic cleansing," and WHO-TV can run a brain-dead piece on Islam.

Either the Iowa media is chocked full of anti-Semites or it's chocked full of freakin' retards. Probably a combination of both.

Why Did The Man Put His Car In The Oven?

Joe at the Tax Update Blog liveblogged Beggar's Night in Des Moines. Check out the photos and the jokes. The weather was about as perfect as you could get for Halloween, especially if you had to wear a costume.

Des Moines is a unique city in that the children have to tell jokes instead of saying "Trick or Treat" in order to get candy. No, this wasn't started because of the joke-telling by kids on the Duane Ellet and Floppy show. Instead, it was a city employee who was trying to reduce Halloween-night vandalism during the 1930s:

The credit for providing Des Moines children with the perfect outlet for their most groan-inducing jokes largely goes to one woman, Kathryn Krieg, director of recreation for the Des Moines Playground Commission (later the Parks and Recreation Department) for 43 years.

When Krieg assumed her post in 1931, kids on Beggars' Night were more likely to clamor "Soaps or Eats" than "Trick or Treat." Every year the newspaper ran a long list on Nov. 1 of youths arrested the previous evening for crimes ranging from soaping windows and sidelining streetcars to setting fires and throwing bricks through windows.

The flash point came on Halloween in 1938 when Des Moines police answered a record 550 calls concerning vandalism. Krieg, along with the Community Chest' group work council, began a campaign to encourage less violent forms of Halloween fun.

They set aside Oct. 30 as Beggars' Night and got the word out to the public that on that night - and only that night - children would be allowed to go from door to door and say the phrase "tricks for eats." The council urged that "eats should be given only if such a 'trick' as a song, a poem, a stunt or a musical number, either solo or in group participation, is presented."

The next year, the group work council again promoted the Beggars' Night concept, this time as a way to aid the war effort. An article published in The Des Moines Register on Oct. 29, 1942, carried the headline "Kids! -Don't Help the Axis on Halloween" and included this poem encouraging proper behavior:

"Soap and ticktacks are taboo,
Ringing doorbells? Not for you.
Thoughts of pranks, you must detour,
Lest you bet a saboteur."

The Beggars' Night program was so successful that by the mid-1940's, the number of Halloween police calls in Des Moines had been cut by more than half.

After the war, Krieg continued to issue annual bulletins in the Register laying still more Beggars' Night ground rules, including that children should stay in their own neighborhoods and that parents should turn on their porch lights for trick-or-treaters and accompany small children on their rounds.

Each year, she reiterated that children should not be given candy until they earned it "with a stunt, song, or riddle."

Now on Beggars' Night, a group of preteen girls will occasionally sing a song or a shy kindergartner opt for a cartwheel. For the most part, however, every trick-or-treater old enough to memorize one tells a joke.

Why did Dracula visit the blood bank?
He needed to make a withdrawal.

Krieg retired in 1974, a few years after the Register stopped running her yearly admonition to make children work for their candy. By then, the biggest Beggars' Night concern wasn't the danger trick-or-treaters might represent to the public but the danger some members of the public might represent to trick-or-treaters. Krieg died in March of 1999 at age 94.

The joke-telling ritual continues, as does its legacy: Reduced vandalism.

Answer to the joke in the title: Because he wanted a Hot Rod!

Coe College "Regrets" Anti-Semitism Expressed During Sabeel Conference

Israpundit has the quoted email and some thoughts.

Also check Israpundit's Trackbacks for that post for some interesting additional discussion about how Coe College's Department of Philosophy and Religion publicly denounced the anti-Semitism expressed.

The media still should have reported on this.


Related: Coe College Sponsored Jewish Hatefest And The Iowa Media Ignored It

The Robert D. Ray Asian Garden Ripped Off Taxpayers

How about this story in the DMR today about how the Robert D. Ray Asian Garden, which was originally meant to be done with private donations, somehow snagged $285,000 in taxpayer money when costs ran over by 38%:

The project was estimated to cost $800,000 and be finished this year. But when crews started work last fall for the garden's centerpiece, a three-story pavilion, they discovered the soil would not support the building. Plans were redrawn with a steel frame to brace the building that pushed the cost past $1.1 million and put plans on hold.

Organizers had exhausted their private sources to raise the initial $800,000, said Paul Shao, president of the Chinese Cultural Center of America, which has spearheaded fundraising efforts.

Shao turned to the public and, after months of grant writing and negotiation, was able to land $225,000 from the state's Vision Iowa program, which supports public projects, another $25,000 from the city, and $35,000 from Polk County...

Ray in the 1970s led a movement to welcome thousands of Vietnamese refugees to the state. Nearly 14,000 Asian-Americans were counted in Des Moines - about 43,000 in Iowa - in 2000.

What a rip.

You already know that we despise Robert "Filthy" Ray for his involvement in Clark McLeod's fiber scam and his involvement with the PorkForest scam.


Related: The Fritz Blitz

Opportunity Waterloo Story in the WCF Courier

Reporter Tim Jamison wrote a huge story on Opportunity Waterloo in the WFC Courier and is in Sunday's paper.

The article seemed focused on a certain number of businesses who are interested in obtaining cheap fiber connections and bandwidth, but it practically ignores the fact that these municipal communication utilities are all money pits for taxpayers.


Related: "The Only Primghar in the World" and The Whole Truth About Clark McLeod's Scam

Blood Creek

Charlotte Eby has an excellent and lengthy piece in the Waterloo Courier today concerning a contaminated creek near Postville.

The $3.7 Million Difference

The DMR is reporting that the Old Capitol in Iowa City will reopen in May after restoration is completed following a fire in 2001.

One thing we could never understand is mentioned in this portion of the story:

Fire caused by a work crew resulted in an estimated $5.6 million in damage on Nov. 20, 2001.

The fire destroyed the 160-year-old cupola, dome and bell, and caused interior damage from smoke, soot and water...

Employees from South Dakota-based Eviro Safe Air were removing asbestos paint from the building's cupola when the fire started. The university reached a $1.9 million settlement with the company.

So if the company caused $5.6 million in damage, how come the University of Iowa settled for $1.9 million?

Here's a Waterloo Courier report from over a year ago:

The university accepted $1.9 million in exchange for dismissing the case. That falls short of the university's insurance deductible of $2 million but was determined to be all the money Enviro Safe Air Inc. had in the bank, said university spokesman Steve Parrott.

The university sued North Sioux City, S.D.-based Enviro Safe on Oct. 31, 2003, claiming negligence and breach of contract by workers who used open flame torches to remove asbestos from portions of Old Capitol...

Enviro Safe has received more than a dozen citations from the Iowa Occupational Safety and Health Administration for failing to take fire prevention steps and required safety measures for workers removing lead-based paint and asbestos at the Old Capitol, according to data from the state office.

Wouldn't Enviro Safe have had insurance? It's all very confusing.

The Best Of State 29 This Past Week

Coe College Sponsored Jewish Hatefest And The Iowa Media Ignored It

It's Not Just A Rainforest, It's An Educational Masterpiece That Will Bring Unimaginable Amounts Of Dollars To Our Community

"The Only Primghar in the World"

Marshall County Attorney Against Iowa's Weird Sex Offender Residency Law

"I am not good, I am precise."

Evil Oil Company Profits And Senator Harkin

Update On Municipal Communications Utilities In Iowa

The Jesse Villalobotomy Insurgency

UI History Professor Jeff Cox Misrepresents Hayden Fry's Quote

Economic Fluffer Deacon Blouin Makes Guv Run Official

"It just amazes me that this thing can go on and on and on and nothing seems to happen and no one seems to respond"

Iowa Speedway President Stan Clement Arrested For Drunk Driving

Ever Heard Of Curbside Recycling?

The information has been verified, has been scrutinized by editors, has been fact-checked and proofed

Governor Yepsen Points Out Vilsack's Hypocrisy

Rainforest To Move To Des Moines?

Tom Vilsack, Military Genius

Coe College Sponsored Jewish Hatefest And The Iowa Media Ignored It

Updated below:

The media in Iowa has completely ignored the Jewish hatefest that occurred at Coe College a couple of weeks ago.

Here's the brochure (PDF) that was handed out. Note the name of John Hauptman, the soldier-spitting ISU professor who promotes the cause/martyrdom of Rachel Corrie. And note the names of Craig and Cindy Corrie, the parents of Miss Martyr herself.

We have reports that Coe College Associate Professor of Philosophy John Lemos had to issue an apology to Jewish leaders in Iowa because of reports of anti-Semitism and other "breaches of civility" during the conference.

You can read more about concerns raised by the Jewish Federation of Greater Des Moines prior to the event at this web site.

Coe College should have known what they were getting into by hosting the "Friends of Sabeel" conference when Tanis Diedrichs, a Jew-hater from Waterloo, was quoted in the media.

Why does the media allow this? The Waterloo Courier printed a letter by Tanis Diedrichs accusing Israel of "ethnic cleansing" last November, but only after Michael Weinstein of Honest Reporting in Israel complained did the editor apologize. Either the Courier is run by idiots or it's run by anti-Semites.

The Cedar Rapids Gazette ran this piece on October 9th (via NewsBank):

Coe College will host a forum this week on Israel and Palestinian issues.

Sponsored by the Friends of Sabeel - North American, speakers at the sessions Friday and Saturday will include Naim Ateek, executive director of Sabeel, Jerusalem; Jeff Halper, director of the Israeli Committee Against Home Demolitions; Marc Ellis, director of the Center for American and Jewish Studies at Baylor University, and Mubarak Awad, co-founder of the Non-Violent Training Center of Palestine.

Participants will also hear from three Jerusalem women of Jewish, Muslim and Christian faiths from Partners for Peace.

Sabeel is an ecumenical peace organization in Jerusalem founded by Palestinian Christians working with Muslim and Jewish neighbors to bring awareness, dialogue and understanding to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Friends of Sabeel - North American is the American partner of Sabeel Jerusalem.

On the Net

--More information can be found at www.sabeeliowa.org or www.fosna.org

Then on October 14th the Gazette printed this (via NewsBank):

The director of a Jewish organization at the University of Iowa said he rejected a chance to take part in a conference at Coe College on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, saying the organizers timed it to exclude Jews and denied him a fair chance to express his opinions.

"To expect me to participate in a conference where I wouldn't get the floor, where I would be stuck in some corner without an audience, and enable this organization to get credit for being diverse and responsible in that way makes no sense," said Gerald Sorokin, executive director of the University of Iowa Hillel Foundation.

Naim Ateek, the Jerusalem-based founder of the Sabeel organization, which is organizing the conference, replied: "Have they ever invited us to give a different view?"

The conference, today and Saturday, has been organized by Friends of Sabeel, the North American branch of a pro-Palestinian organization launched by Palestinian Christians in 1993.

Organizers said 200 people are registered for the event, which features mostly speakers from other states and countries.

Co-sponsored by Coe College's Department of Philosophy and Religion, it is titled "Hope for the Holy Land: Truth and Reconciliation."

In an interview, Sorokin, said Thursday he rejected an invitation to present a workshop on Jewish perspectives.

Sorokin - who said he would have been the only strong supporter of Israel at the event - noted that the conference is taking place tonight and Saturday, when the Jewish faith forbids activities involved in attending a conference, such as writing and driving.

He also noted that the event begins the day after a Jewish holy day, Yom Kippur, making adequate conference preparation difficult.

"The fact of the matter is-.-.-. they knew that observant Jews would not be able to attend," he said. "It's as simple as that."

Ateek appeared Thursday at a press conference in Iowa City to promote Coe's event. Asked about Sorokin's complaint, he said his group picked this weekend for the conference because Coe is on break. He added that it's difficult to find a perfect time for a conference, and noted that Muslims might not attend because Ramadan is under way.

Sorokin, however, said that Ramadan mainly restricts eating and drinking, but not driving or use of electricity, which he called a greater barrier to attending a conference.

He also said the event was rigged against pro-Israel views. Conference organizers wanted to relegate him to giving a workshop.

Ateek said the event was fair to Jews, noting that it features some Jewish speakers, although ones with a pro-Palestinian view.

Sorokin said that Coe's conference aims for an open dialogue. Its program says it hopes for the "responsible expression of different perspectives in a respectful dialogue . . . leading to a positive and creative path to the reconciliation of real differences."

Rod Pritchard, Coe College's public relations director, said Coe has fielded "a few calls of concern about the conference."

He would not say whether the callers were faculty or others, however.

Pritchard released a statement saying Coe brings speakers to campus each year representing a broad range of views. However, it said Coe does not condemn or endorse any of them.

So if Coe brought a bunch of neo-Nazis to hold a conference, would it be OK?

Since then, there have been no followup articles. The author of the last piece the Gazette ran, Tom Owen, can be reached at tom.owen@gazettecommunications.com. Somebody might want to ask him to do some additional digging.

The Presbytery of East Iowa in Iowa City handled the registration. Here is their web site.

Here's an account in FrontPage Magazine by Roz Rothstein of the "Friends of Sabeel" conference held recently in Chicago:

Throughout October, a largely unseen wave of anti-Semitism has been washing up across North America in a series of conferences run by a Jerusalem-based organization called the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center.

At gatherings in Chicago and Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Sabeel-trained speakers have demonized Israel, with similar speeches expected later this month at their conferences in Denver and Toronto. Started by Palestinian Christians in 1989, Sabeel does not promote peace or a genuine understanding of the Middle East conflict but instead musters support for punishing Israel through divestment campaigns, part of its larger goal of dismantling Israel to make way for a Palestinian-dominated one-state solution.

I attended the two-day Sabeel conference held at Chicago’s Lutheran School of Theology, where I witnessed intolerance and prejudice against Jews and the Jewish State. I did not think I would witness this in America’s third largest city, especially at the close of yearlong celebrations of the 350th anniversary of the arrival of Jews in America and only 65 years after the Holocaust.

The Oct. 7-8 gathering in Chicago attracted about 200 people. At the conference, Palestinian activist George Rishmawi actually claimed that Israel uses a poison gas that weakens the muscles of Palestinian demonstrators so they can’t run away, and that the IDF quickly retrieves the canisters so that no one can identify the gas. This echoed of the blood libel stories that have caused Jews so much suffering in the past.

I wish people of good faith had been with me to hear the relentless litany of historical distortions and slander. Michael Tarazi, a Harvard-educated attorney and former advisor to Palestinian leaders, accused Israel of starting all the Arab-Israeli wars, saying Israel probably withdrew from Gaza because Israel has, “depleted all the usable drinking water.”

Tarazi also warned audience members, “not to be side-tracked from divestment from companies who do business in Israel by those who want to have dialogue about this.” Instead, he urged people to, “stick to your convictions because there is no point to having dialogue with people you disagree with.”

There were also a couple of Jewish presenters including professor Marc Ellis of Baylor University. Describing himself as an “outrageous Jew,” Ellis compared Israel to Nazi Germany, attacked some progressive Jews as racists, and claimed that Jews had taken the “wrong lesson from the Holocaust.”

He also showed photos of two of Judaism’s holiest objects, the Ark that holds the Torah and also a Torah scroll, both defaced by superimposed images of Apache helicopters. He said that this is what he thinks of when he looks at arks and Torahs.

Perhaps the well-meaning Christians who attended this event have not researched how the Sabeel center tries to give religious justification to, and also Christian support for, a radical Palestinian agenda. In 2001, Sabeel’s founder, the Anglican Rev. Canon Naim Ateek, wrote that, “Jesus is on the Cross again with thousands of crucified Palestinians around him…The Israeli government crucifixion system is operating daily.”

In 2005, Ateek said that Palestinians suffer as Jesus did: “We had the Contemporary Way of the Cross, the Via Dolorosa for Palestinians…These are the demolished homes, destroyed villages, checkpoints. Every one of those is a station of the cross, a station of suffering.” Such anti-Semitic images of deicide were thought to have been buried with the Holocaust, after which many Christian churches repudiated such rhetoric. But at the Sabeel conference in Chicago, no one asked Ateek to retract words he has used to degrade Judaism and Jews.

Throughout the Chicago talks by Ateek and his allies, the audience simply nodded, as though agreeing with the noxious statements and attacks. No one asked searching questions. No one sought out Israel’s side of the story, about the terrorist campaign that Israel has been trying to fend off, about how there cannot be reconciliation if Palestinian leadership does not accept genuine responsibility for terrorism or even accept Israel’s right to exist, or about how moderation and peace cannot emerge from such hateful presentations at Sabeel conferences.

Sabeel’s North American backers have organized the conferences in Cedar Rapids, Denver and Toronto. I fear that other well-meaning audiences will be deceived by Sabeel’s cloak as a Palestinian Christian group seeking peace, and thus unwittingly sponsor Sabeel’s hate-filled, deceptive programs.

Many Israeli policies can be criticized. But unwarranted is to have Israel maligned with echoes of old anti-Semitic canards and also hear Israel’s humanitarian efforts and reasonable compromises either ignored or twisted.

I am saddened to see such ugly rhetoric given free rein in America. How troublesome to see Christians sit quietly as Sabeel’s misguided friends speak in their name.

Coe College and Iowa's lameass media have a lot of questions to answer here.


Update: A reader pointed us to two op-eds printed in the Iowa City Press-Citizen.

The first, written by Gerald L. Sorokin, executive director of the University of Iowa Hillel Foundation, and Jeffrey R. Portman, Rabbi of Agudas Achim Congregation in Iowa City, and published on October 14th before the "conference" took place, covers a lot of territory already quoted here. We did want to note this:

The conference is tonight and Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath. Observant Jews are forbidden from driving, writing, exchanging money or engaging in numerous other activities that would be necessary in order to participate. Further, the date of the conference comes immediately after the holiest day in the Jewish year, Yom Kippur. Those observing Yom Kippur would be unable to prepare adequately for the conference.

These facts are no surprise to the organizers. (Indeed, one of the keynote lectures is entitled "Israel and the Spirit of Yom Kippur.") Buth they were easily overlooked: Because no member of the Iowa Jewish community was invited to participate in planning this program, objections were never raised.

And by limiting "Jewish Perspectives" to a workshop, the organizers could claim to be open to diverse perspectives while safely ignoring presentations that challenge the thrust of the conference. That's tokenism of the most insulting form.

The second, by Darrell W. Yeaney, an Iowa City resident and a member of the planning committee for the Iowa Sabeel Conference, was published on October 24th. It includes this:

We are sorry that Portman and Sorokin were unable or unwilling to contribute their voices to this conference. A number of local Jewish people did attend the conference without charge at our invitation and participated in the discussion. It is our hope that in the future, rather than casting charges of ill intent, Portman and Sorokin will join in an effort to create a mutual dialogue regarding the conflict in the "Holy Land" without personal rancor, in respect for civil discourse and most important, in a genuine search for "truth and reconciliation."

Bogus claptrap on the part of Mr Yeaney, if you ask us.

Two Years In Prison For Pierre Pierce

Updated below at 3:00pm:



From the DMR:

Former University of Iowa basketball star Pierre Pierce will serve up to two years in prison for sexually abusing his former girlfriend, a Dallas County judge ruled this afternoon.

The sentence also requires Pierce to register as a sex offender.

We're surprised that Pierce got prison time.

All of this could have been avoided if Steve Alford and Bob Bowlsby had kicked Pierce off the Iowa Hawkeye men's basketball team after his previous assault charge in 2002.


3:00pm update: Other AP stories are saying Pierce may be in prison for up to four years.


Related: Pierre Pierce archive

Friday Iowa Newspaper and Blog Essentials

Cherokee Chronicle Times: Dad surprises daughter while on leave (above)

Fort Madison Daily Democrat: Hunting walnuts

Waterloo Courier: 63 year old woman can deadlift 200 pounds

Centerville Daily Iowegian: An Iraq War vet's suicide

Ottumwa Courier: Latest news from 224th Engineering Battalion

Harlan Tribune: Combine vs pickup truck

Sioux City Journal: WW2 German POW camp in Onawa

Fairfield Daily Ledger: Imported Icelandic horses

Mason City Globe Gazette: New elementary school is on time and under budget

Mt Pleasant News: The first black church in Iowa

Council Bluffs Daily Nonpariel: Dog lost in Hurricane Katrina reunited with owner in Council Bluffs

Corvis blog: "Labeled"

"The Only Primghar in the World"

Updated below:

A reader sent us a link to the City of Primghar's Monthly Newsletters concerning additional Iowa municipal communications utilities that have been expensive taxpayer-financed disasters. Excellent digging, sir!

This is from April 2002:

Mr. D.J. Weber, Manger of the Community Agency (TCA) has announced an Open House on May 17th (Friday) in Sanborn. The Open House will be held in the newly constructed facility with a 200 foot tower located south of Prairie Manor. This would be an excellent opportunity to tour the facilities owned by the cities of Primghar, Paullina, Sanborn and Hartley. The facility represents six years of planning, $8.5 million in investment with more than 75 miles of buried fiber optic cable to provide you with "state of the art" telephone, cable and internet service. As a part owner in this unique multi-community asset....you can be proud of this cooperative venture and look forward to a better future for our communities.

This is from April 8, 2002:

TCA presently has 398 cable subscribers, 28 hi-speed modem users, and 98 new telephone customers. Mr. Weber also indicated the installation of new telephone boxes on residential homes and required FCC notification to telephone companies of customers switching to TCA allows about two telephone switches per day with existing staff. Mr. Weber requested the Council's consideration of assigning city employees to assist TCA with installation of residential exterior boxes and transfer of services.

In other words, "We can't afford to do this, so pony up some city labor for free." Hilarious!


This one is from June 2002:

In 1998, the residents of Primghar overwhelmingly (78%) approved a referendum to issue revenue bonds to construct a municipally owned Cable TV, Internet and Telephone service in conjunction with the cities of Paullina, Sanborn and Hartley. The four cities issued $8.5 million of capital loan notes (debt) to build the telecommunication system.

On June 17th 2002, the Board of Directors (Jake Mulder and Bill Edwards are city appointed Directors) reviewed the financial progress of TCA with Ruan Securities Investment Representative Tom Mell. Mr. Mell was very direct in his analysis of "projected revenue from TCA services has not been sufficient to service operation and debt service requirements. Ruan Securities has never had a default on a municipal bond and does not want the cities of Primghar-Paullina-Hartley-Sanborn to be the first".

The Board of Directors voted to "reissue", i.e. renew and extend the debt schedule from February 1, 2003 to February 1, 2004 to avoid default. The City of Primghar will be required to make payment on the Telecommunications Revenue Capital Loan Note on February 1, 2004 in the amount of $95,055 plus interest. The extended debt payment schedule will continue until 2018.

It is important for Primghar residents to support TCA services with your dollars. The City will "at all costs avoid default on the TCA Revenue bonds to preserve the city's credit rating". Your Telecommunication Revenue Bonds will timely be paid through your purchase of TCA services or ultimately paid through increased utility fees and taxation. Please support your municipally owned telecommunication system.

Please support it, or else you're going to have to pay for it.

This is from August 2002:

DJ Weber of TCA presented Primghar's progress report. To date there are 160 phone, 60 high-speed internet, 50 dial-up internet and 358 cable TV customers. The City must focus on acquiring at least 270 phone customers by year-end to meet revenue bond payments.

40 people quit the cable service between April and August????

The next part is from January 2003's meeting:

Tom Mell of Ruan Securities briefly updated Council on the status of the City's $790,000 Telecommunications Revenue Project Note issued on March 2000. Projected TCA revenues to convert this 3-year project note into general revenue bonds are simply not sufficient due in part to slow unforeseen citizen participation in the municipal utility. Therefore, the need now exists to refinance the $790,000 project note presently at 5.35% interest with a new 2-year project note at 3.50% interest. This situation is an unfortunate setback, but it is hoped the 2 additional years will be sufficient to encourage all citizens of Primghar to switch to TCA and make this city-owned telephone, cable and internet utility profitable to surpass its debt obligations. Then Primghar can witness its intended purpose - keep profits in Primghar to benefit Primghar.

All the issues were voted on unanimously and adopted or carried.

And this bit of cheerleading from March 2004. We suppose that when you're threatened with big hikes in your taxes or using the company store, you'll probably be inclined to use the company store:

Tom Mehl presented 10-year and 12-year debt service schedules to convert the 2003 $700,000 Telecommunication Revenue Project Notes to revenue bonds. The great success of citizens utilizing TCA services places Primghar's financial stability above Hartley, Paullina and Sanborn. Therefore, repayment of debt can be achieved within 10 years versus 12 or 15 years.

Motion by Black, second by Hoppe, authorizing Letter of Intent to Ruan Securities to underwrite the 10-year financing for the $700,000 Telecommunications Revenue Capital Loan Notes. All ayes, motion carried.

And this is from April 2005:

DJ Weber returned with TCA updates. Considerations to extend services to Gaza are underway. A door-to-door salesman has been contracted to solicit TCA services in all four communities. A programming board has been established to determine cable channel line-ups. Joan Roos represents Primghar. Comparison of numbers indicates Primghar continues to lead over the other cities.

A door-to-door salesman!

We'll see how things go in the future, but all the towns involved (Primghar, Sanborn, Hartley, and Paullina) are losing population at a considerable rate. Primghar lost 5% of their population from 2000 to 2004, 891 to 846. Sanborn went from 1353 to 1323. Hartley went from 1733 to 1527. Paullina went from 1124 to 1048. So the addition of high-speed internet access hasn't done anything to stop these towns from slowly dying.

The part "comparison of numbers indicates Primghar continues to lead over the other cities" is interesting. Is that in percentage of population or total numbers?

Too bad nobody's crunching the numbers to determine if this is actually saving anybody any money. Since they're struggling to get people to sign up over the past three years we can probably guess the answer to that question.



Update: The reader follows up with:

Heh. I chanced upon their council meeting minutes...and couldn't look away...it was like a car wreck...a clown car wreck...glad you enjoyed them as much as I did. Your synopsis is a gem.

Related: The Whole Truth About Clark McLeod's Scam

Marshall County Attorney Against Iowa's Weird Sex Offender Residency Law

From Radio Iowa:

A local prosecutor says Iowa's new restrictions which bar sex offenders from living within two-thousand feet of a school or day care don't address the real problem.

Marshall County Attorney Jennifer Miller says most children who are sexually abused are not at school or the babysitter's when it happens.She says statistics show about 85 to 95 percent of all instances of child sexual abuse occur in the home, and the abuse is committed by a family member or family acquaintance. "So that 2000 foot law addresses a small minority of sexual offenses (against children) that are occurring," Miller says...


Miller pines for the "good old days" before this new law went into effect, as she says the living and working arrangements paroled sex offenders made were monitored by a parole officer. Miller says offenders were reviewed on a case-by-case basis, and parole officers told some sex offenders they couldn't take certain jobs or live in certain places because they'd be around kids.

We expect this issue percolate until either the SCOTUS throws it out or the 2006 elections. Either way, we suspect that more people in law enforcement will be coming out against this ridiculous and arbitrary law. Remember, Lance Horbach, one of the law's original co-sponsors, now has doubts about it.

All Ed Fallon has to do is stand back and wait. In time, he'll be proven entirely correct on this issue. By then, Governor Yepsen, Vilsack, Christopher Rants, Mike Gronstal, and all the others in the Iowa Legislature who advocated or voted for this mess will look even more clueless.

Thursday Iowa Blog Roundup

Iowahawk has a new column, inspired by this blog, featuring photos of some Polk County Jail-residing CILFs ("Humpday Dumpday").

Drew Miller criticizes the pathetic response by the Iowa GOP to Blouin's formal announcement ("Republicans on Blouin"). Miller is absolutely right. Check out the Iowa GOP's incredibly lame and poorly researched response that he dug up.

The Fly is all over "where the money went" in Davenport.

Governor Yepsen's Background Noise

Governor Yepsen at the DMR has a totally lameass column today about all of President Bush's problems. It starts off with nothing and ends with turning Bush into a big RINO:

Watching President Bush's administration fumble and stumble isn't pleasant. Only the most ardent Bush-haters take any joy from it, and even many of them now just shake their heads. Republicans seem stunned and betrayed.

For now, everyone is watching to see who, if anyone, in the administration gets indicted in that leak of a CIA agent's name. But that's not the only woe Bush faces. The list is long.

That's the first thing??? Are you kidding us, Governor Yepsen? That's like having a fly land on your plate during dinner. Joesph Wilson, Valerie Plame's husband, is a partisan liar. That's been proved many times over. So has the fact that Plame's name has been listed in Who's Who since 1999. And now Judith Miller, the NY Times reporter who, despite spending 85 days in prison to protect her source, now can't recall who the source was.

That's first???

The rest of the suggestions are a hoot:

Fire some people. Loyalty's great, but he's put too much of a premium on it. Indicted or not, Karl Rove and Scooter Libby need to go the route of Don Regan or Sherman Adams or John Sununu. They were key presidential aides of the past who had to drink the Kool-Aid after messing up. Even people who haven't done anything wrong may need to be replaced. People burn out or pick up so many enemies they become ineffective. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld now fits in this category.

That's got the be one of the dumbest things Governor Yepsen has ever written: Even if they haven't done anything wrong and especially if they are unpopular with lefty reporters they should be fired.

There's more:

Withdraw Harriet Miers. His nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court appears to be toast. Bush should cut his losses and nominate the red-meat conservative his base wants — and could push through the Senate if leaders are willing to use the so-called "nuclear option" to do away with the filibuster.

Pulling out at the first sign of ruffled feathers with the likes of Sam Brownbutt, or whatever his name is, seems rather pointless when you've got Harry Reid and Tom Harkin possibly on your side. Harriet Miers sounds like a slam-drunk compared to what Bush would face if he nominated a hardcore conservative woman, especially a hardcore conservative black woman. Who wants to see another high-tech lynching led by the Democrats?

More:

Balance the budget. It's not good for our children to be in hock to the Chinese. Bush should give the nation a revised, more aggressive plan for eliminating the federal budget deficits within a few years so we can start repaying our debt. Such a plan would do wonders to reassure the markets and boost consumer confidence. But it requires spending cuts - and reductions in his tax-cut plans. For example, we may not need to eliminate the estate tax, just raise its limits so only the very rich are socked.

What a dumbass. Does Governor Yepsen think that Warren Buffett or Bill Gates or Tom Harkin haven't thought out a way for their children to avoid tremendous inheritance taxes?

It is true that Bush has been a gigantic wimp about using the veto pen on all the pork, but do you think he's going to change his tune for FY 2007? Not a chance.

More:

Find a new energy policy. The nation needs to know Bush is doing something different — and more — to conserve, to lower energy prices and to assure energy independence. Washington is obsessed with Karl and Scooter and Judy. Average Americans are obsessed with heat, light and gasoline.

Sounds like an indictment of your lamestream, monopoly, corporate media there, Governor Yepsen. Your profession is obsessed with such things while the rest of us search for and invent alternative ways of seeking and storing energy.

And finally:

Find a compromise on immigration. It's a divisive issue, yet resolution of it is important to our economy and national security.

Bend over and let all the illegals in with fake ID cards? Or should we enforce the immigration laws on the books to ensure that only people who have played by the rules get in? Gee, what kind of compromise could you make out of that?

Here's A Good Idea For Christopher Rants

From the DMR this morning, in a story about how the majority of people drive faster than 70 mph on the interstates:

Iowa House Speaker Christopher Rants, a Sioux City Republican, said Wednesday he isn't alarmed by the state report because the average speed on Iowa's rural interstates remains close to 70 mph. "But I don't like to hear that people are driving in excess of 75. I think that is a problem," he said.

We've got an idea for you, Mr "fiscally prudent" taxpayer-financed corporate welfare defender:

How about creating a law forbidding people who get ticketed for driving in excess of 70 mph on Iowa's interstates from being within 2000 feet of an interstate for a certain amount of time. That will work, right?

Compare and Contrast

Naturally, it's from the Des Moines Register:

A crowd gathered outside Des Moines' Federal Building on Wednesday as the names of 2,000 Americans killed in Iraq were recited by peace activists standing around an American flag covering a makeshift casket.

About 50 activists gathered to protest the deaths and the money spent on the war in Iraq. One of the rally organizers, Kathleen McQuillen of the American Friends Service Committee, has been protesting wars since she was in high school. She has two grandsons who recently returned from Iraq.

"When people ask me if I support the troops when I don't support President Bush, I don't understand that language. I support the human beings that are in Iraq, the Americans and the innocent Iraqi people," she said.

McQuillen is happy that her grandsons came home alive, but believes that "just because a soldier comes home alive doesn't mean they are OK."

We saw how every major newspaper had orgasms when the number of US soliders killed in Iraq reached 2000. To keep the ball rolling, the DMR offers up this story of 50 Commie Quakers getting together to sing Kum-Bayh-Curious or whatever while exploiting the military they loathe for their own agenda.

And once again we notice how the DMR runs a profile on some grandma peacenik while ignoring the grandsons who volunteered to serve in the military and served a tour in Iraq! How about that for a generational twist!

"I am not good, I am precise."

A reader from Eastern Iowa sent us a link to this guestbook site concerning an orthopedic doctor who had passed away at a rather young age (48) last week. The reader's father had been treated in the past by this doctor.

Generally, guestbook entries at funeral home web sites are the usual expected fare of condolences and prayers, but you can't help but read the entries by his co-workers and patients and not be moved by what a difference he really made in people's lives.

Here are some excerpts:

[He] was the MOST caring, consientious, and concerned individual I've ever met. I had a double hip replacement performed by him in 2001 and his bedside manner was exemplary. I am very distressed to hear of his demise. He was too young and had so much to give to others that it is a great loss for the entire medical profession and community to lose such a talented and loving person at such a young age. My heart goes out to all of you who knew and loved him. Please know that we, his patients, care very deeply also.


He took my knee that had been ruined by another doctor. with alot of patience and hard work he made my knee almost new again. when i was at the point where i thought it would never be the same.


No words can express how I feel. It's been a year since I had my five year check-up for a total hip replacement. He gave me my life back. I had had polio as a young child. He gave me a new hip (mine wasn't all there) and lengthened my leg so that my legs were the same length... I can walk again!! He was a wonderful surgeon and cared so much about his patients.


He treated both of my parents and I believe my mother, at age 91, is walking because of his skill. Very professional yet caring----and respected my involvement as a family member.


Dr.was a great man and a great Dr. whom we will all miss. He replaced both my knees and life is so much better. I cried when I heard the news.


He was my doctor for many years. I am sure that I am only one of hundreds that will sorely miss him. My condolences are for you and your family. He was a great man in my book. He did a knee replacement, and I am post polio in the other leg. He always felt so bad that he could not help me with it.


He was the greatest Doctor we have ever known who could do his job well. As he put it, "I'm damn good in what I do".


[He] performed a double hip replacement as well as a knee replacement for my Father. He gave my Father back his life


This guy was awesome!!!!He was my Doc. He was the Quarterback, what ever he said I believed in!!!He did my first, second, and third knee surgury---The third was my fault!! Did too much. The one thing I remember was he said was "I am not good, I am precise."

And there are many, many more beyond just this.

New Political Utilities

From Michael Nusbaum to the editor of the newspaper in Nevada:

To the editor:

I personally know the individuals who are volunteering their time and energy to make sure the rest of us in Nevada don't lose our right as a community to form a communications utility. I have come to learn that private telephone and cable companies lobby vigorously every year down in Des Moines to make new laws to prevent or restrict communities like ours from having the right to start a communications utility. Our telephone, cable TV and Internet have become very important to all us in our daily lives. How this technology will change over the years is not known. What we do know is we can simply form our own communications utility now so that we can be prepared for the future.

I suggest that everyone in Nevada attend an OpportunityNevada presentation or contact OpportunityNevada to learn more about what is going on in the telecommunications industry. You'll learn how important it is for us to join the 51 other Iowa communities that have already seen the vision and formed their own communications utility. I'm voting 'Yes' on Nov. 8 for Nevada to form its own communications utility. Then we can be safe knowing that we have choices for our future. A vote 'Yes' keeps the door open to explore the creation of a communications utility. A vote 'No' probably slams that door shut for good.

This guy's obviously clueless and can't be bothered to research that all the municipal communication utilities in Iowa are nothing but fire pits for tax dollars.

You know what "grassroots" Iowans need to do? We need to get ballot initiatives all over Iowa so that we can have new political utilities. The old monopoly of clowns like Terry Branstad, Bonnie Campbell, Clark McLeod, Bob "Filthy" Ray, Dan Gable, Robert Koob, Bill Knapp, David Oman, Michael Gartner, and all those other dildos in the Iowa Legislature has got to go.

Why Is Diesel So High Right Now?

Iowa Ennui has a post detailing an article that complains about the current higher price of diesel.

Last we looked, it's changing from summer to winter, so refineries are switching production to winter blends.

There's also at least 59 different grades and blends of fuel that refineries have to make thanks to all the mandates by the Feds, states, and municipalities.

Who caused this? According to the Cato Institute, it was Bush 41 and the 102nd Congress. Read this piece published in the Chicago Tribune in 2000 to learn a lot more.

Deer and Rubberneckers

From the Des Moines Register:

Traffic stopped on Interstate Highway 380 for nearly an hour this morning after four accidents occurred within 10 minutes in Johnson County.

A northbound vehicle was disabled when it hit a deer at about 7:30 a.m. near North Liberty. After the driver exited the vehicle, an armored truck collided with it a short time later, "demolishing" the stranded vehicle according to officials.

Drivers in the southbound lanes were distracted by the accident, which caused a three-car collision followed by a four-car collision. Northbound and southbound lanes were closed for about 15 minutes and an hour, respectively.

Six injuries were reported, but none were life-threatening.

What about the deer???????? What about poor Bambi?????? If Iowa didn't have all these dang roads everywhere, the deer would be safe and there wouldn't be any car accidents!


Related: Motherless Fawns Will Be On Roads!!!!!!
and Anti-Hunting Terrorists In Cedar Rapids

Evil Oil Company Profits And Senator Harkin

Reuters is reporting that profits at ConocoPhilips went up 89% in the last quarter.

We wonder how long it will be before Senator Tom Harkin starts wailing on the evil oil companies again.

Harkin's wife, Ruth, now a member of the Iowa Board of Regents, was a former director of Conoco.

History of Public Transportation In Southern Iowa

The Centerville Daily Iowegian has a very interesting history lesson about public transportation in parts of southern Iowa from the 1870s until 1967.

Contrast this to Clark McLeod's scam of multiple taxpayer-financed broadband utilities in Iowa in 2005. It's the equivalent of building more and more passenger rail lines in 1930.

Update On Municipal Communications Utilities In Iowa

From the Heartland Institute:

Three of Iowa’s oldest municipal broadband systems continue to struggle to cover their costs years after they were predicted to be operating in the black, according to new report from The Heartland Institute.

“Iowa Municipal Telecommunications Systems: The Financial Track Record,” by Dr. Ronald J. Rizzuto, professor of finance at the University of Denver, documents that municipal systems in Cedar Falls, Muscatine, and Spencer, Iowa demonstrate a pattern of ongoing financial shortfalls. According to Rizzuto, costly but often hidden measures are taken by the municipalities to sustain these losing operations...

Rizzuto writes, “None of the utilities has achieved payback of its original investment. As of the end of 2004, Cedar Falls Utility was $3.1 million below payback. Likewise, Muscatine and Spencer were $25.6 million and $18.3 million, respectively, short of payback.”

Each city, Rizzuto found, has either had to raise rates or subsidize telecom operations with millions of dollars in intra-utility loans or transfers...

Any savings residents saw from lower cable rates were likely more than offset by the higher rates for other utility services called upon to cover telecom costs. Moreover, since many more residents purchased electricity from the municipal utility than they did cable services, the higher electric rates amounted to “regressive redistribution” of wealth. In other words, through higher electric bills, lower-income households who chose not to purchase cable service subsidized the service for higher-income households.

Cedar Falls

Cedar Falls Communications Utility (CFCU), the oldest of the three systems, continued to run deficits well beyond its start-up phase, Rizzuto found. Between 1997 and 2002, annual free cash flow deficits ranged between $993,102 and $253,652. To cover its costs, the utility had to borrow funds from affiliated utilities.

In 2003, CFCU had its first year of positive annual free cash flow--a slightly positive $2,498. In 2004, CFCU reverted back to a negative annual free cash flow. On a cumulative basis, CFCU has cost $10.5 million more than it has generated in revenues.

Effective January 1, 2005, according to Rizzuto, CFCU approved a rate increase that averaged 9 percent for basic cable customers, 10 percent for “Basic Plus” cable customers, and 15 percent for digital cable customers.

Spencer

At first look, Spencer Communication Utility (SCU), a unit of Spencer Municipal Utility (SMU), is performing the best of all three cities. SCU’s revenues were insufficient to cover all costs from 1999 through 2002, Rizzuto reports, but annual free cash flow appeared to turn positive in 2003 and remained positive in 2004.

But when correlating the communication utility’s finances with those reported by Spencer Municipal Utility, Rizzuto found significant cost allocations that demonstrate the SCU’s financial dependence on its sister utility.

From 1998 to 2003, SMU’s electric utility allocated communications enterprise costs to itself rather than the communications utility. In 1998, for example, the electric utility paid $670,020 of the Phase One costs for the SCU. Between 1998 and 2002, the electric utility paid $9.5 million in capital costs for fiber and coaxial cable for the communications utility.

During 2001, the electric utility exchanged some assets with the communications utility. The electric utility sold the communications utility $790,000 in assets and, in turn, purchased $2.3 million of the communications utility’s assets. The net transaction was a transfer of nearly $1.6 million from the communications utility to the electric utility.

Rizzuto says the SMU financial statements do not provide any justification for the allocation of nearly $11.7 million in communications costs to the electric utility.

Muscatine

According to its annual financial reports, Muscatine Communications System (MCS) had to borrow money from Muscatine Power & Water to pay for operating costs for the first three years, the report states. Since 2001, however, the operation’s revenues have covered operating costs.

When non-operating costs, such capital expenditures and interest payments, are included, however, MCS has operated below breakeven every year until 2004, when it essentially broke even. A peak deficit occurred in 1999 when the utility’s costs were $8.45 million more than revenues. The deficit gradually shrunk as the utility raised cable and high-speed data rates to cover those costs.

As of the end of 2004, over the life of its operation, MCS had spent $33.1 million more than it had taken in. All of that money has been borrowed from the electric utility. “It is probably no coincidence that electric utility rates have increased recently in Muscatine and that the utility’s bond rating has been lowered as a result of its reduction in investment and cash reserves,” Rizzuto writes.

What a scam that Clark McLeod, Bob "Filthy" Ray, Terry Branstad, Bonnie Campbell, Dan Gable, and all the other bottom-feeders involved with OpportunityFuckIowa are trying to weasel in at the ballot box. These scumbags are the enemies of the taxpayers of Iowa.


Related: The Whole Truth About Clark McLeod's Scam

Google Base: Another Reason For Newspapers To Freak Out

From the QC Times:

Google Inc. has unintentionally provided a sneak peek at what appears to be a looming expansion into classified advertising — a free service that might antagonize some of the Internet search engine’s biggest customers, including online auctioneer eBay Inc.

Forget Ebay. This sort of thing will take a major chunk out of advertising revenues at your local newspaper.

We'd love to see Google eventually get aggressive and venture into the world of Public Notices, which is the bread and butter advertising kickback staple of a monopoly local newspaper.

Taps In Davenport

From Bill Wundram in the QC Times:

Every night at 9:30, tattoo — a call to quarters — is bugle-called on Arsenal Island. At 10, the somber sound of “Taps” is played … “Day is done, gone the sun …” to signal the end of the day’s duty. When wind is blowing in the right direction, “Taps” is heard in much of east Davenport.

Above the din of Quad-City traffic, few of the other daily bugle calls can be heard. At 6:30 a.m. there is reveille. At 5 p.m. comes the call of retreat. During this call, the flag is lowered from the tall pole in front of post headquarters. When this is sounded, everyone on Arsenal Island is to pause and stop whatever they are doing in respect for this hallowed military moment.

Wednesday Iowa Roundup

Drew Miller has a post on 1st District Democratic candidate David Overby's suggestion that the US should pay mercenaries to kill people in foreign countries.

Iowa Ennui has a post on how Mike Blouin's campaign theme of "Vilsack II" is lame.

Midwest Mesopotamia talks about the "AFSCME whitewash" with regard to last Sunday's attempt in Sioux City to have the union thugs silence Ed Fallon's attack of the Iowa Values Fund as taxpayer-financed corporate welfare.

Tusk and Talon comments on the tobacco shakedown money refinance "windfall" and how to spend it.

No Place To Go

How about the story in the Register today on the guy who couldn't find a place to live thanks to Iowa's weird sex offender residency law?

Not all of Iowa's estimated 6,000 registered sex offenders are affected. The law does not apply to:

• Those whose offenses did not involve minors.

• Those who lived at their addresses before the law took effect.

• Those who moved to their homes before child-care centers or schools were opened nearby.

This is why the law is going to be thrown out at the SCOTUS level. It's arbitrary as hell. And the guy arrested for the residency violation was convicted in 1988!


Related: Post-Yepsen Chatter

The Jesse Villalobotomy Insurgency

The Des Moines Register has a huge piece on Jesse Villalobotomy, the idiot who last year wrote an op-ed for the DMR equating Thanksgiving with genocide. Villalobos eventually lost his job with the Jew-bashing National Conference of Community and Justice, and moved to New York City. This is hilarious:

When his job ended, Villalobos left his hometown for New York City, where he enrolled in the media studies program at the New School. He left with his girlfriend, but left behind some members of his band, the Insurgency, with which he was a vocalist and keyboardist.

Villalobos is back in town to help out with this weekend's Latino conference

His band is named The Insurgency!!! That's the funniest frickin thing we've heard in a while.

Also amusing is Villalobos's response to the question about what Des Moines is doing well, which essentially boils down to simply "beer and pizza."

UI History Professor Jeff Cox Misrepresents Hayden Fry's Quote

Jeff Cox, a history professor at the University of Iowa, had this crazy thing published in the Daily Iowan today:

Coach Kirk Ferentz stated that he has more important things to think about than the color of the visitor's locker room at Kinnick Stadium. The university administration has backed him up, declaring an end to the controversy over the color pink. Was this a big fuss about nothing, as many appear to believe?

If Ferentz believes the color of the locker room to be of little importance, others disagree. Many Hawkeye fans were walking around town wearing "think pink" T-shirts in solidarity with the athletics department. Ferentz's predecessor, Hayden Fry, thought the color of the locker room was important, contending that his choice of pink interfered with our opponents' ability to play football. Fry did not choose just any color but one that was associated with being weak. By his own account, he intended to taunt our opponents as "sissies." It would be hard to find a more obvious use of a demeaning gender stereotype.

The issue has now become broader than stereotypes promoted by the football program. The two female faculty members who first raised this issue became the targets of a campaign of abuse in private communications and in the press. One local newspaper headline referred to the debate they initiated as "madness." Is it possible for a woman to criticize gender stereotypes in athletics without being threatened or told to shut up and concentrate on issues that are important?

Hostility to women who have the nerve to criticize the athletics program has a long history at Iowa, and it is likely to make a woman think twice before speaking out. In the 1980s, the female editorial page editor of the Iowa City Press-Citizen wrote a column about turning her apartment into a "Hawk Free Zone." The result was a deluge of hate mail. What is it that causes such fury and such dismissive contempt to be directed against women who dare to criticize the athletics program?

The situation is even more menacing for a woman who dares to bring a criminal charge against a star athlete. It has not been long since Iowa men's basketball coach Steve Alford used a televised press conference to comment on a UI student who charged a men's basketball player with sexual abuse. Alford asserted that the male player was innocent, implicitly dismissing the female student who brought the charge as a liar. The university administration made no public statement condemning Alford's unconscionable behavior.

Perhaps it was a coincidence, but only a few months later, a UI student, presumably an LA Laker fan, picked up the phone and made death threats against a woman who had brought a charge of rape against Laker star Kobe Bryant. The student has since been sentenced to time in federal prison.

UI President David Skorton has announced his intention to focus attention on gender equity on our campus. As he and others proceed with that important task, they should take steps to ensure that a woman (or anyone) making a feminist critique of aspects of the athletics program will be listened to with respect. It is not merely the hate mail that is at issue - although that is important and has been rightly condemned by the university administration. It is that almost no one has been willing to stand up for the right of women to make serious criticisms of the athletics department's practices without being dismissed as foolish people who are wasting everyone's time by raising issues of little importance.

Gender equity is not merely a question of the relative numbers of men and women participating in athletics but of attitudes toward female participation both in athletics and in public debate about athletics. In the way this debate has been conducted, the university community has missed an important opportunity to educate ourselves and the general public about the meaning of equality between men and women.

Professor Cox, you totally misrepresented Hayden Fry's quote with your bit about: 'By his own account, he intended to taunt our opponents as "sissies."' Here's Hayden Fry's own words:

"One thing we didn't paint black and gold was the stadium's visitors' locker room, which we painted pink. It's a passive color, and we hoped it would put our opponents in a passive mood. Also, pink is often found in girls' bedrooms, and because of that some consider it a sissy color. It's been fun to get the reaction of visiting coaches to the color of their locker room. Most don't notice it, but those that do are in trouble. We've had some coaches — Bo Schembechler of Michigan and Mike White of Illinois to name two — who had their managers cover the walls with white paper so their players couldn't see the pink paint. When I talk to an opposing coach before a game and he mentions the pink walls, I know I've got him. I can't recall a coach who has stirred up a fuss about the color and then beat us."

Now would be the perfect moment to bring out Marshall McLuhan, acting in the role of Hayden Fry:

"I heard what you were saying. You, you know nothing of my work. You mean my whole fallacy is wrong. How you ever got to teach a course in anything is totally amazing."

Boy, if life were only like this.

Beyond that, we don't understand why Professor Cox is trying to tie the pink thing together some incident from the 1980s that everybody (but him) has forgotten, that dumbass Steve Alford acting like a bad TV defense attorney, and some mentally deranged individual who was unhealthily obsessed with Kobe Bryant. Professor Cox probably needs a larger workload.

"The odor of the wood seems to have a natural calming effect"

Why just mention recent Iowa news when we can dredge up the past?

This is from the ACLU's web site concerning an Iowa case from a few years ago ("ACLU Wins Damages for Iowa Woman Strapped Naked to a Wooden Board in County Jail"):

Issuing a strong rebuke to a local sheriff's department, a federal jury on Friday awarded $5,000 in damages to a woman who was strapped naked, spread-eagle fashion, upon a wooden board while in custody at a county jail.

The woman, identified in legal papers as "Jane Doe" to protect her privacy, was represented by the Iowa Civil Liberties Union, which filed the action in February of 1998...

Punitive damages were assessed against Story County Sheriff Paul H. Fitzgerald and actual damages allowed against several of his deputies who refused to admit that strapping the woman naked to a large round board in spread-eagle fashion was wrong.

When the Iowa ACLU initially filed the lawsuit, Stone noted, Sheriff Fitzgerald unequivocally denied the allegations of misconduct and issued a press release accusing the ACLU of engaging in "reckless and irresponsible" behavior through the filing of a "frivolous" and "untrue" lawsuit...

Evidence at trial showed that the woman was arrested for public intoxication and had been moved to a padded cell where her clothing had been removed. Later, following a shift change at the jail, the decision was made to remove the woman from her cell and place her naked face-down on a wooden board with her legs and arms strapped down spread-eagled.

The defendants testified that she was left in that position for more than three hours. Throughout the woman's ordeal, video monitors transmitted nude images of her to monitors mounted in the front office of the jail. Eventually, her buttocks were covered by a towel. Most of the deputies on duty were male.

In a 1998 interview with the Des Moines Register, the inventor of the restraining board, Linn County Sheriff Don Zeller, publicly defended Story County's use of the device, saying that "the odor of the wood seems to have a natural calming effect."

That's it! We've found the antidote to the pink locker room controversy in Iowa City. We'll just replace the pink urinals with wood urinals. The pink walls can be covered up with 1970's-era paneling. And we'll make opposing team players lie down, spread-eagled, on a piece of wood for three hours before kickoff. Yeah. That's the ticket. Those sissies!

Pardon My English on the Jetseta Bill

Pardon My English is quite upset about Chuck Grassley's neutering of the Jetseta Bill that would have Federalized the death penalty against adult killers of children.

Pardon our English, but this was a profoundly stupid law to begin with. Federalizing every offense normally handled at the State level is just plain wrong.

And we're sure you're saying, "State 29 gang, aren't you in favor of the death penalty?" Yes, we are, but not this way.

Iowa will never reinstate the death penalty in your lifetime, no matter how many children are murdered in the most heinous ways. Iowa had a chance to bring back the death penalty when Republicans were in charge of the Iowa Legislature and Terry Branstad was Governor in the past, but they punted. Now we've got a split legislature and Vilsack. Even if Nussle gets elected, nothing will ever get out of committee because of the split. And even if something did get out of committee and passed the Legislature, it would be tied up in the courts for decades or until another Democrat or RINO moves into Terrace Hill.

Now you're probably saying, "But you guys are for Ed Fallon, and he's about as anti-death penalty as it gets!"

That's right. Iowa's got bigger fish to fry than all the future Roger Bentleys. Sad to say, but rampant taxpayer-financed corporate welfare, Kelo fallout, wimpy-ass sentences for drunk drivers who kill, and many other issues are on the front burner. That's the politcal reality.

And no, the death penalty probably doesn't prevent many crimes from happening. We've never been in favor of it for that reason. Rather, the death penalty serves as the ultimate form of justice for the worst killers. We're in favor of that. But not at the expense of Federalizing every law in the land.

I Got Your F***ing Laptop

From the AP in the DMR:

Jail time is not the best sentencing option for Pierre Pierce, attorneys for the former University of Iowa basketball player said in court documents filed Tuesday.

Pierce, 22, is scheduled to be sentenced Friday in Dallas County District Court. He pleaded guilty in August to third-degree burglary, assault with intent to commit sexual abuse, false imprisonment and fourth-degree criminal mischief.

The charges stem from a Jan. 27 incident at the West Des Moines home of a former girlfriend. As part of a plea agreement, prosecutors dropped several other charges. Before the deal, Pierce faced up to 56 years in prison. He now faces up to nine years in prison.

This may seem strange, but we think Pierre Pierce should get a suspended sentence as long as he moves himself permanently out of Iowa.


Related: Pierre Pierce entries at State 29

Roundup

Like Random, we are swamped this week and lighter blogging will occur during the day.


Don't miss these excellent recent posts by:

• Mainstream Iowan ("New Iowa Board of Education Athletic Requirements")

• Iowa Pork Forest ("It just amazes me that this thing can go on and on and on and nothing seems to happen and no one seems to respond")

• Drew Miller ("David Yepsen is an Idiot")

• Midwest Mesopotamia ("Iowa’s own Kelo")

• Tusk & Talon ("Fauxscal Conservative Votes 'No'")

• And everything by The Fly at Daily Davenport Politics. That blogger always makes the QC scene sound interesting.

The Iowa Bloggasphere looks very healthy.

Those Racist Computers

From the Des Moines Register:

A Des Moines activist group has accused a Polk County sheriff's deputy of targeting Hispanic drivers for traffic stops.

Sheriff's officials describe the charges as "categorically not true" and have turned down an invitation to discuss the matter at a public meeting Thursday.

Eliseo Belmares said he was driving the speed limit and had violated no traffic laws when Deputy Shawn Van Hoozer, who is white, stopped him near Grimes on Aug. 5.

"He saw me as Hispanic and stopped me," said Belmares, a 35-year-old Mexico native who moved to Des Moines from Kansas in 2000...

Belmares claims that Van Hoozer "told me that he had looked up my license plates in his computer and it showed that I didn't have" a valid Iowa license. The state requires drivers to obtain a license within 30 days after they move to Iowa.

Belmares had only a Kansas license.

Yeah that's a big red flag: Mexico native, Iowa plates, Iowa address, but a Kansas driver's license that's at least five years old.

Hey, Eliseo, shut up and comply with the law, ya dummy.

Economic Fluffer Deacon Blouin Makes Guv Run Official

Deacon Blouin, the former head of the Iowa Department Of Corporate Welfare, announced that he's going to make his Guv run all formal on Tuesday.

That's great and all for him, but as a former economic fluffer in Iowa, Deacon Blouin should know a thing or two about being ready.

Here it is, late Monday, we're half drunk and trading emails back and forth after watching the Falcons whomp the Jets, and Deacon Blouin's web site is in need of some serious fluffing.

Go here to take a look at our screen grab of MikeBlouin.com from Monday evening during the game.

That thing's limp. We prescribe Dr George Taylor's invention and a healthy dose of Steely Dan:

This is the day
Of the expanding man
That shape is my shade
There where I used to stand
It seems like only yesterday
I gazed through the glass
At ramblers
Wild gamblers
That’s all in the past

You call me a fool
You say it’s a crazy scheme
This one’s for real
I already bought the dream
So useless to ask me why
Throw a kiss and say goodbye
I’ll make it this time
I’m ready to cross that fine line

Iowa Speedway President Stan Clement Arrested For Drunk Driving

Here's a scan from the Newton Daily News on Iowa Speedway President Stanley J. Clement being pulled over for a registration violation that led to an arrest for drunk driving.

Maybe he was hurrying home to take a phone call from UBG Financial about the racetrack's lack of 0f financing.

It could have been a call from David Oman on how to fuck over this country's taxpayers, hoodwink a bunch of small-town councilmen with stall tactics, and, along with former Governor Robert "Filthy" Ray, lick a lot of ass at the Des Moines Register in order to keep some of the bad news quiet.

Gee, nothing in the Des Moines Register about Clement's drunk driving bust. How shocking is that? Lick, lick, lick, lick, lick, lick. It's the newspaper Iowans depend on for sweeping shit under the rug.

Yeah, you wouldn't want to set a bad example like Mary Ann Dilla, the drunk driving Ames School Board President who was busted on a sidewalk in January en route to a school board meeting! And she didn't become the board president until a few months after she copped a plea when four dimwitted board members who were apparently born without spines or frontal lobes voted her into the top job.

Hey, Governor Vilsack, what's all that you said recently about fiscal restraint? Did some evil doppelganger (perhaps Governor Yepsen?) sign that $12.5 million tax break for the Iowa Speedway even though racetrack financing wasn't, and still hasn't, been secured?

That's right. We're on a mean streak tonight. "Iowa's meanest Iowa-centric blog"

And proud of it!

OK, here's some more goodies provided from the Iowa Speedway opposition's document mother lode. Here's how bad the taxpayers in Newton are going to be screwed:

Development Facts and Figures They Don’t Want You To Know

Ok folks, here are some financial figures concerning the initial cost to taxpayers for the speedway development area for the first five years.

1.) Surfacing and other work on Lincoln and Liberty Roads per bids will be around $1.8 to $2.2 million dollars.

2.) Sanitary sewer development per H.R. Green Engineering’s estimate which was quoted at a meeting on 7-18-2005 is $13 to $15 million dollars for the deluxe model of sewer work which is designed to handle any future development in the area such as hotels, restaurants and gas stations. At that same meeting, H.R Green estimated the cost of the lower model of sewer work to be around $700,000 dollars to handle the speedway alone minus any other development in the area. That figure is now up to $2 million dollars but for our calculations we will stick with the $13 to $15 million dollar figure because we believe what our city leaders said when they told us that lots of development will happen near the speedway.

3.) Exit lane additions to Exit 168 off of I-80 will cost $2 to $4 million dollars.

4.) Acquisition, design, grading and surfacing of the five lanes of Rusty Wallace Dr., also known as “Taxpayer Alley,” will be $5.5 to $7.0 million dollars.

5.) H.R. Green Engineering costs, already over $400,000 on just Phase I, will cost $500,000 dollars to $900,000 dollars.

6.) Additional City staff time for working on projects associated with the Speedway will cost around $200,000 dollars.

7.) The speedway will receive tax abatement for the first 3 years while the City provides services to the speedway. The amount lost to taxpayers due to the tax abatement is $4.8 million dollars.

8.) The speedway will receive a tax rebate in the 4th and 5th year while the City provides services to the speedway. Per their minimum assessment, the amount lost to taxpayers due to the tax rebate will be $3.2 million dollars.

9.) Replacement of wetlands, burial and compliance studies for the project will cost $100,000 to $200,000 dollars.

10.) Cost of bonding & fees for the project & loan negotiation will cost $500,000 to $1 million dollars.

Now here are some expenses that the city may have to add to the list.

1.) If the speedway is a flop, the taxpayers will have to repay that First Federal Bank loan and/or the IDED loan guarantee that was made to the bank and it will cost taxpayers $3,721,000 dollars.

2.) If the City of Newton purchases property to develop near the speedway, that could cost taxpayers around $2 million dollars.

When you add up all of the figures I just quoted, you come up with $27.3 to $34.4 million dollars worth of probable expenses to Newton taxpayers for the first five years of the speedway.

Now here is the clincher. What do you think the total anticipated revenue to the City in the first 5 years from the project will be? The answer is ....zilch….zero….nada or whatever you want to call it.

Remember that RISE grant from the State of Iowa for $6.8 million dollars that will go towards the cost of some of the roadwork to the speedway? We have to figure that into the calculations so let’s subtract that figure from what he we already have. The new probable expense to Newton taxpayers for the first five years of the speedway should now be somewhere between $21.5 and $27.6 million dollars. (By the way, don’t forget that the RISE grant money had to come from Iowa taxpayers but we will just deal with Newton taxpayers for now.)

Now let us review some facts.

The debt limit of the City of Newton is $35 million dollars. To date, the City of Newton has spent $18 million dollars of that leaving $17 million dollars to play with. We just calculated the minimum probable expenses to Newton taxpayers for the first five years of the speedway to be around $21.5 million dollars, so does anyone see a problem here? Please raise your hand if you do.

That’s right. The cost of the speedway fiasco will exceed the constitutional limit of debt for the City of Newton by at least $4.5 million dollars.

Now here are some other things to ponder. The City should anticipate at least a short-term decrease in commercial and (to a more modest degree) residential values. That will make for lower property tax income to the city and even if the valuation holds the same over the next five years, the City would still exceed its constitutional limit for debt by over $4 million dollars on this project alone!

Think about how much money our schools, city and county will not receive in extra tax income during the speedway’s first five years because of the tax abatement and tax rebate agreement with the speedway. During the first five years, Newton Schools will not receive $3,356,000, the City of Newton will not receive $3,190,000, and Jasper County will not receive $1,832,000.

Newton is screwed enough because of Maytag's difficulties and uncertain future as part of Whirlpool without this mess.

Sucking Up To The Iowa Union Thugs

From the Sioux City Journal:

Five gubernatorial candidates came to the town hall meeting in Sioux City on Sunday to share their vision for Iowa with members of the largest union representing state employees.

The following five Democrats participated in Sunday's meeting: Michael Blouin of Des Moines, former Iowa director of economic development; Gregg Connell of Shenandoah, that city's mayor; Chet Culver of West Des Moines, Iowa secretary of state; Ed Fallon of Des Moines, a state representative; and Patty Judge of Albia, Iowa's secretary of agriculture.

The candidates agreed on some issues, like the importance of alternative energy.

Culver said under his leadership, the state would only purchase flex-fuel vehicles -- ones able to use fuel containing 85 percent ethanol. He said he plans to eventually require state vehicles to use this fuel, and also to work with Iowa State University to develop a manufacturing plant for flex-fuel vehicles right here in Iowa.

Boy, that Chet Culver really is a dumbass.

The only difference between a FFV and a gasoline-only car is a different control chip in the fuel line and some different fittings, since alcohol is more corrosive than gasoline. The manufacturing cost differential due to these changes is under $100 per vehicle.

And what would it take to bring a automobile manufacturing plant to Iowa? Shitloads of taxpayer-financed corporate welfare money. What a dumbass.

Connell said he wants to bond ahead on 16 percent of the state's gaming revenues over the next 20 years to create a $1 billion wind farm owned by the citizens of Iowa. He said this wind farm could generate $100 million per year, and the state could devote a quarter of those revenues every year to a "Manhattan Project" on renewable fuel.

Here's a better idea: why not bond out $100 billion dollars to every Iowan's great-grandchildren, buy the world's largest rock of crack, and then smoke it.

While all the candidates believed in the possibilities of alternative energy, they did not all support the Iowa Values Fund -- which for the past two years has offered financial incentives to bring new companies to the state and also help existing ones expand.

Fallon said companies don't make decisions based purely on a subsidy, and he'd rather see the Iowa Values Fund money go toward the basics like education, health care and environmental protection.

"I don't believe in trickle down economics," he said. "Never have, never will."

Fallon said corporations have too much control over government these days, and that's why he doesn't take any campaign dollars from special interest groups.

But Blouin said while he was Iowa's director of economic development, the Iowa Values Fund created or retained more than 20,000 jobs. He said the average starting pay for those jobs was about $37,000 plus benefits, and that's in a state where the per capita income was about $30,500.

Deacon Blouin's going to take credit for fluffing "jobs" that received as little as $2100 in taxpayer-financed corporate welfare? You fluff rather cheaply, Deacon Blouin!

Ever Heard Of Curbside Recycling?

There's a big story in the Des Moines Register today about the bottle and can redemption law:

Connie Johnson wants to know how many Iowans haven't had a pay raise since 1979.

Johnson manages a Fort Dodge redemption center, where customers turn in cans and bottles to get their nickel deposit back. The center makes its money when beer and soda distributors pay a penny-a-can handling fee.

That pay hasn't changed since the "bottle bill" took effect in 1979 as an anti-litter measure. Redemption center operators now say they can't afford to stay in business if the handling fee isn't increased...

Expect a big fight over this in next year's legislative session. Politically powerful beverage distributors say they already pay enough to help keep ditches free of litter. Key lawmakers say it's time to end the penny-pinching and give redemption centers and grocery stores that collect cans a raise.

Why care?

Because any increase in the penny handling fee likely will mean consumers will pay more for soda and beer. Without the increase, more redemption centers may close, making it tougher to return cans. That could send more cans into ditches — exactly what the state has tried to avoid with the deposit law.

Unless everybody has been in a coma for the past decade, there's this thing called curbside recycling that practically every town in Iowa has going on. Most rural areas have it, too.

You throw your newspapers, junk mail, recyclable plastics, and aluminum cans into the recycling bin and the garbage man comes by every week and takes it all away.

We pay for this already.

What are our lawmakers going to do? Raise the price to ten cents so that the processors and their lobbyists get their cuts? That's raising taxes. That's expanding government.

The grocery industry doesn't want the filthy cans and bottles in their stores. Most people we know don't bother with claiming the 30 cents a week they generate from "empties" because it's too big of a hassle to wait in line for 20 minutes while some white trash alcoholic couple gets their tobacco spit-drenched cans rejected.

What's the best way to solve this problem? Get rid of the bottle return law.

People who litter are going to litter anyway because they're brain-damaged sociopaths. There's always a certain percentage of dirtbags on the planet. But most people know about recycling and don't litter. How about raising the fines for littering instead?

Will our ditches and cities fill up with garbage if we get rid of the bottle return law? To say that people will automatically start littering again if the bottle return law is eliminated means that any sort of social engineering and education done over the past 26 years has been for nothing.

The information has been verified, has been scrutinized by editors, has been fact-checked and proofed

Thier, thier, DMR.

From the Des Moines Register's web site this morning:

Details, Details

From DM Cityview, Civic Skinny column, October 20, 2005 edition:

And lastly, even though there have been rumblings about possibly relocating the all-but-dried-up rain forest idea from Coralville to Des Moines, if anyone involved would bother to look at the federal pork legislation regarding the project, they would notice it calls for the behemoth to be built only in Johnson County.

Why would that stop fauxscal conservative Chuck Grassley, Rainforest chief con-man David Oman, or filthy former Governor Bob Ray from trying to move the project if Coralville falls through?


Related: Governor Yepsen Points Out Vilsack's Hypocrisy

Governor Yepsen Points Out Vilsack's Hypocrisy

Updated below:

A monkey could have written Governor Yepsen's column today that points out Vilsack's hypocrisy concerning budget matters and pork spending. (Editor's note: We have renamed Des Moines Register political columnist David Yepsen as "Governor Yepsen" from now until the end of time.)

Governor Yepsen's advice to Vilsack is pretty weak, but this is a new development:

Vilsack needs to be consistent to win the presidency. So, he should:

• Give back some of Iowa's pork. Offer to give back to the federal government the $50 million Iowa got to build a rainforest in Coralville. No one else seems to be putting any money into the $150 million-plus project. It's become a source of naysaying and ridicule around the country. There's now talk of trying to bring it back to Des Moines or having the state help pay for part of it. So return the money.

That is the first time we've heard any talk of moving the Coralville Rainforest to Des Moines. Where the hell did that come from??? Did we miss a publication where this was mentioned?


Update: We did miss something. Nicholas Johnson has the article from Des Moines CityView where this is mentioned on September 29th:

The rainforest people now are talking to folks in Des Moines about putting it in Des Moines once again -- even though Des Moines sort of booted it out of town a few years ago. "There's a new cast of characters in town now, and they don't know the history of it, so Bob Ray and Dave Oman and others are quietly making some pitches around town," one business leader told us. "I suspect that they'll fail, but it's kind of frightening to think that anyone is even listening. Once again, they are saying they are 'on the verge' of getting some big money -- but they've spent the past several years 'on the verge.' What they're really on is a precipice, not a verge."

Former Governor Ray is one of the filthiest frauds ever, what with backing this con-game and Clark McLeod's scam.

Tom Vilsack, Military Genius

From the Des Moines Register:

Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack on Friday offered a new strategy for Iraq, proposing U.S. forces set up heavily guarded zones around key areas and wait for insurgents to "come to us" instead of pursuing them...

Vilsack stopped short of suggesting the United States pull out of Iraq, saying he believed most Americans wanted to finish establishing democracy. But he said the pursuit of the insurgents responsible for thousands of civilian and military casualties since the fall of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein more than two years ago has been ineffective.

That won't win any votes from the "pull out" crowd, which constitutes a considerable percentage of Democratic party activists in Iowa.

Iowa Statehouse Republicans Want To Bring Back The Death Penalty

In one of the dumbest political moves ever, the Republicans in the Iowa Legislature say they want a vote on the death penalty in 2006's session.

Uh, hello? Republicans? Last time we looked, the governor of Iowa was Tom Vilsack, a lefty Democrat who wouldn't sign a death penalty bill if his life depended upon it. You couldn't muster enough votes for a veto override even if al-Qaeda struck Tom Harkin's annual Steak Fry.

Why don't you Statehouse Republicans go back to crafting shitty laws, passing tax breaks for racetracks with questionable financing, and instituting a never-ending stream of "fiscally prudent" taxpayer-financed corporate welfare? Ya worthless good for nuttin sunzabitches. Where's mah whiskey?

Anti-Hunting Terrorists In Cedar Rapids

From a reader, and via NewsBank from the Cedar Rapids Gazette on October 18th:

Bowhunter Bert Carmer awoke at 4 a.m. Saturday to take part in the city's new bowhunt of deer only to find his pickup doused with paint and three tires on two vehicles flattened with an ice pick.

Carmer, who has been a proponent of the bowhunt and was featured in a Gazette story about it Oct. 1, said Monday that an anti-hunt "terrorist" had targeted him and his wife.

It was not adolescent vandals, he reasoned, because they would hit randomly and at targets close to the street. His vehicles, he said, were parked near the house, 50 feet from the street.

"I was a specific target," said Carmer of northeast Cedar Rapids. "This is some lowly, cowardly terrorist who sneaks around at night."

He said the crime took place between midnight and 4 a.m. He put the damage at more than $1,000 and noted that two flattened tires were on his wife's van, which displays a handicapped sticker.

Fire Chief Steve Havlik, who is the chairman of the city's Urban Deer Task Force and the bowhunt administrator, said Monday that he and the police were investigating Carmer's report.

Carmer vowed not to be intimidated. He said he had intended to take five does as part of the Cedar Rapids hunt, the number that will qualify him to take a buck inside the city next year.

But now, he said he will take at least 10 does.

"This only stiffens my resolve," Carmer said. "Every deer that we take off the street is an accident that doesn't happen. These people think more of deer than they do of motorists and property."

As of Monday afternoon, bowhunters had taken 93 deer in just a little over two weeks.

The city's Urban Deer Task Force had thought that a bowhunt this season would go slower and might see hunters reduce the city's 2,400 deer by just 100. The expectation now is for more than 200 deer.

This story failed to make any wire services or even the Des Moines Register.

From what we've been able to gather, the decision to allow the hunting of deer inside the Cedar Rapids city limits has been a contentous one, even though nearby Marion and Coralville have done bowhunting for years; as well as Iowa City employing sharpshooters to thin herds.

We've profiled some of the letters to the editor in the past ("Motherless Fawns Will Be On Roads!!!!!!") and they are full of ridiculous misinformation, lies, and violent threats, such as this quote from a letter by Mary McBride of Cedar Rapids:

Since commissioners who approved this plan don't think the hunt is cruel, I suggest they be chased through the woods and shot with arrows.

One of the loudest opponents against the hunt, a lawyer by the name of Laurie Crawford Stone, used information in an op-ed in the Cedar Rapids Gazette that sounded remarkably similar to language used by the fascist vegan terrorist group, Animal Liberation Front - which is the same group of terrorists who caused hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage to Seashore Hall at the University of Iowa last year.

It shouldn't be too difficult to find out who is responsible for this terrorism since people have a tendency to talk, but then the FBI and the University of Iowa have yet to charge anybody with what happened at Seashore Hall last year.

Who REALLY Won Powerball

From the Iowa City Press-Citizen:

The Powerball run, which started Aug. 13 and ended Wednesday night with a record $340 million grand prize, resulted in $18.6 million of Powerball sales in Iowa.

The state treasury netted $6 million in profits from Powerball over that period...

No wonder the Multi-State Lottery Association lowered the odds in order to increase the jackpot size!

Fauxscal Conservatives

Tusk & Talon mentions that Senator Chuck Grassley voted NO on the Coburn Amendment.

Grassley isn't a fiscal conservative. Neither is Jim Ross Nussle. They are fauxscal conservatives.

Fluffing The Numbers At The Iowa Department Of Corporate Welfare

The Iowa Department Of Corporate Welfare issued a report on how their "work" is going:

Wells Fargo & Co. said it has created 846 of the 2,000 jobs it pledged to create with its $175 million expansions in downtown Des Moines and West Des Moines. Nearly $143 million has been invested in building offices. The San Francisco-based company's mortgage and consumer products divisions are expanding in central Iowa. The state provided $10 million for the project.

Is that the same $10 million that Wells Fargo used to buy naming rights for the next 20 years to the Iowa Events Center?

How convenient for the Iowa Department of Corporate Welfare to claim numbers based on our money. That's $5000 a job.

Trans Ova Genetics, which clones cattle and develops animal-based pharmaceuticals in Sioux Center, said it has invested about $500,000 of its planned $36 million expansion, but has filled only four of the 235 jobs it plans to create. The state provided $9.25 million for the project, of which nearly $250,000 has been tapped.

That's a much better deal for the IDCW. About $2100 per job if they ever get filled.

When you do the math, you can see what a scam this is. A department run by the State doles out your money to some rich corporation in order to claim job growth - justifying their existence as blood-sucking leeches - for what is essentially a pittance when compared to what it costs the company to keep that job going.

In the pr0n industry, these people are called fluffers.


Related: Radio Iowa has more

Yepsen Letters From The "Offender Lobby"

The Des Moines Register had a bunch of letters this morning concerning Yepsen's hyperactive column about Iowa's sex offender residency law (history here). Here's some of them:

I have neither tolerance or sympathy for child predators and for the most part agree that they deserve whatever they get. With all of the Iowa cities and municipalities piling on more restrictions on child sex offenders, I fear we are fast approaching a constitutional crisis whereby the courts will disallow all restrictions.

Until the Legislature determines that sex offenders must be imprisoned for life or confined to a state-supported facility, they must be released into the civilian population.

I doubt the state or federal constitutions or the courts would allow Iowa law to banish all child sex offenders from the state, but in effect that is what's happening. Sex offenders must have access to jobs, transportation and basic services such as food and shelter.

No one wants a sex offender living near them or having access to parks, playgrounds or libraries. We somehow better find a way of coexisting with them before the courts determine all restrictions are unconstitutional.

-Leland Braun, Prairie City


Is the ill-conceived law that bans convicted sex offenders from living within 2,000 feet of a school or child-care facility the best answer to protecting children?

What is truly sad is that the politicians creating these ineffective laws end up distracting people from the real problem. As the politician leads the mob to ferret out the Frankenstein monster living near the schools, they miss the fact that over 30 percent to 40 percent of child sex-abuse perpetrators are family members.

The majority of perpetrators are trusted friends or neighbors (more than 50 percent). That leaves only about 10 percent who are abused by strangers...

-David Crotts, Grinnell


David Yepsen subscribes to the concept that sex crimes are reduced by residency restrictions against sex offenders ("Law Makes Life Difficult for Sex Offenders? Too Bad," Oct. 18). If he is correct, it would seem to follow that felony crimes would be reduced by residency restrictions against convicted felons, yet no such restrictions against convicted felons have been seriously considered. I would suggest that the reason such restrictions have not been considered is because it is doubtful that they would reduce felony crimes. And, in my opinion, it is doubtful that residency restrictions against sex offenders will reduce sex crimes.

Can anyone seriously suggest that a sex offender living 1,990 feet from a school is more likely to commit a sex crime than a sex offender living 2,001 feet from a school? I don't think so.

-Douglas W. Hansen, Storm Lake


David Yepsen's smear of the Iowa Civil Liberties Union and gubernatorial candidate Ed Fallon with the "offender lobby" label misses the larger issue.

Iowa's unprecedented law proscribing where sex offenders can live will most likely be struck down when it is heard by the John Roberts-led U.S. Supreme Court, more than likely citing the due-process clause of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. Naturally the right will raise the hue and cry about "activist judges" who coddle criminals and thwart the will of the people. Nothing could be further from the truth.

-Bob Jewett, Des Moines


When did the rights of sex offenders supersede the rights of children? If Iowa had tougher sex-offender laws in the first place, the repeat offenders and potential repeat offenders we are trying to protect our children from would still be in jail. We wouldn't have to worry about a 2,000-foot rule...

-Carol Quillen, Des Moines

Score one for Ed Fallon!!!!

Just wait until Fallon starts talking about taxpayer-financed corporate welfare. Yepsen will have to write a bunch of columns about how Ed Fallon isn't electable because he isn't a toady for losers like Mike Gronstal. We almost guarantee this will happen if Fallon starts polling well with... ha ha ha... Republicans and Independents.

Here's something else to think about: Isn't it strange that Vilsack signed the sex offender residency bill into law, yet he was eager to issue an executive order that automatically restored the citizenship rights of certain felons?

In one case, you have a group of people who have been charged with certain sex-related offenses who have served their time, paid their restitution, and completed their parole. Yet, for some reason, they have to remain on this State-sponsored list and web site for 10 years.

On the other hand, you have Governor Vilsack trolling for additional voters for Democrats and paying penance to the national party for signing that English-only law by issuing blanket citizenship rights restoration for criminals who may not have fully paid their victim restitution.

Doesn't that seem strange? And inconsistent?

William Stosine Alert

Serial letter to the editor writer William Stosine of Iowa City got published in the Winona Daily News:

I sincerely wish that passing this Iraqi constitution will do everything President Bush claims it will. I would love nothing more than to be proved completely wrong on every assumption that has led me for the past two years to look at my newspaper every day and think to myself, “I told you so.” I’m willing to give up my pride and my frustration with this administration just to see something that resembles peace happen over there.

I’d also like to win the lottery.

I’m wary, to say the least, because President Bush and his supporters have a kind of twisted optimism bordering on willful ignorance that is extremely disturbing. Every little “newsworthy event” like this in Iraq; the “mission accomplished” speech, the large mobilizations, the first vote, the capturing of endless “No. 2 in commands,” etc., is just more spin created to boost something in the back of people’s minds that maybe, just maybe, things are going to work out after all. The problem is, for the past two years, they have done anything but.

It is all a sham. If anything, Iraq is even closer to civil war now than it was before. The constitution will only polarize competing factions within Iraq and lead to more violence. Meanwhile, U.S. soldiers will be caught in the fray, still under-supported and poorly led.

We've got to admit that it's a well-crafted letter, even if we don't agree with it.


Related: All Stosine, All The Time

Neil Daniels Emailed Us

Neil Daniels, who once said that "The GOP has created an atmosphere of anti-intellectualism rivaling the Khmer Rouge" and "If [Jim] Leach had real integrity, he would rebuke his party's neoliberalism and declare himself an independent and speak out very loudly against Bush and his administration's amazing incompetence in Iraq." must have Googled himself, found our posts, and decided to email us.

He asked us not to print his letter, and that's fine. We'll honor his request, as we always do, despite all the numerous threats contained within it.

We think that anybody who compares a major US political party to the Khmer Rouge is crazy.

From Wikipedia:

The Khmer Rouge attempted to turn Cambodia into a classless society by depopulating cities and forcing the urban population into agricultural communes. The entire population was forced to become farmers in labour camps. During their four years in power, the Khmer Rouge overworked and starved the population, at the same time executing selected groups (including intellectuals) and killing many others for even minor breaches of rules.

The Khmer Rouge forced people to work for 12 hours non-stop, without adequate rest or food. They did not believe in western medicine but instead favoured traditional peasant medicine; many died as a result. Family relationships were also banned, and family members could be put to death for communicating with each other.

The exact number of people who died as a result of the Khmer Rouge's policies is debated. The Vietnamese-installed regime that succeeded the Khmer Rouge claimed that 3.3 million had died. The CIA estimated that between 50,000 and 100,000 people were executed by the Khmer Rouge, but executions represented only a minority of the death toll, which mostly came from starvation.

The United States Department of State and the State Department funded Yale Cambodian Genocide Project give estimates of the total death toll as 1.2 million and 1.7 million respectively. Amnesty International gives estimates of the total death toll as 1.4 million. R. J. Rummel, an analyst of historical political killings, gives a figure of 2 million. Former Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot gave a figure of 800,000. An Italian Catholic magazine claimed to have had an interview with Khieu Samphan where he said 1 million had died, although that he ever made the statement is disputed.

In 1962, the last census before Cambodia was engulfed by war, the population of the country was 5.7 million. A decade later, in 1972, the population was estimated at 7.1 million. Using Amnesty International's figure of 1.4 million deaths, about 20 percent of the population would have died between 1975 and 1978.

Republicans may be charging the Federal credit card like dry-drunken sailors, but they're certainly not working everybody to death and killing 20% of the population in the last four years.

We also called Mr Daniels a "moonbat" because, despite what Mr Daniels tried to infer, Jim Leach has always been against the Iraq War, except that one time in Muscatine when he must have had some bad pork sausage for breakfast.

So go ahead, Mr Daniels, and do what you said you're going to do. We don't care. Everybody will start Googling for the State 29 blog to find out what's so horrible about it and they'll happen upon your Khmer Rouge rant and laugh their asses off if they have any knowledge of history.

Crossing an unseen boundary may be a transgression paid for with your dignity, but only if you write completely unhinged or factually inaccurate letters to your local paper and then Google yourself a few months later only to find that others do not agree with you.


Related: "Crossing an unseen boundary is a transgression paid for with your dignity"

cFree Wireless Internet Project

Via NewsBank, and from yesterday's Cedar Rapids Gazette thanks to a tip from a reader:

The rollout of the state's largest free wireless Internet project has been one of those good news-bad news situations lately.

The Corridor Free Wireless Project (cFree), announced last spring, hoped to bring free wireless Internet access by Labor Day to downtown areas and other public spaces in Cedar Rapids, Coralville and Iowa City.

The good news is that cFree is making progress toward its goal.

The bad news is that completion is still weeks away.

Enthusiasm and support for the project remain strong, according to Jamie Licko, executive director of the Cedar Rapids Downtown District. But technological issues have been thorny.

The network will use a wireless Internet technology known as Wi-Fi. Project planners chose a variation of the technology known as mesh network technology from a California-based vendor, Strix Systems, because it can be expanded easily.

Supplying power to the wireless access points in Cedar Rapids has been a challenge, according to Keith Bowe, who is overseeing installation of the network for Communications Engineering Co. of Hiawatha.

Bowe said the original plan was to use electrical boxes on street light poles and on city parking garages, but many of the power outlets believed to be available were not wired. That required finding new power supply locations and negotiating agreements with building owners - no small task.

Another source of delays has been compatibility issues between valuable Wi-Fi access points donated to the project and others purchased from Strix Systems.

Intermec, a pioneer in Wi-Fi technology with offices in Cedar Rapids, donated Wi-Fi access points for the project with the expectation that they would be compatible with the Strix equipment.

However, compatibility issues persuaded Bowe to halt installation until they can be resolved on the test bench.

If the access points can't be made to work as expected, Bowe said, an effort will be made to see if they can be made to work in a smaller environment, or if their software can be reconfigured to work in a different way.

Compare this to Clark McLeod's scam and the idiots who support the additional fleecing of taxpayers.

Also, check out the story of the guy who built a 700 square mile wireless access point in nowhere Oregon for $5 million of his own money.

700 square miles! Polk County is only 569 square miles!

Driving On Compressed Natural Gas

Update below:

Today we point to this column a week ago at Edmunds.com concerning the Honda Civix GX:

Hybrids are hogging the fuel economy limelight, but there's another alternative that's flying below the radar. It's the 2005 Honda Civic GX and it runs on compressed natural gas (CNG)...

Now, take the basic Civic; cut the trunk space in half (to allow for the larger natural-gas tank); couple the 1.7-liter, four-cylinder engine to a continuously variable transmission; offer some attractive tax incentives; add a bunch of NASCAR-style stickers touting zero emissions and carpool lane entry; and you have the GX. It stickers for $21,760 and gets the equivalent of about 30 miles per gallon of gasoline (the EPA estimates 30/34 mpg)...

The GX can be refilled at numerous sites in metropolitan areas... When we first began refilling our test car, CNG was $1.79 for the equivalent of a gallon of gasoline and cost about $8.50 for a typical fill-up. Only two weeks later the price had shot up to $2.50. (Because the fuel is pumped at different compression rates, the exact amount of fuel in the tank is difficult to gauge. Consequently, we couldn't provide our own fuel economy findings. All we can confirm is that the GX will go 200 miles on an average of $10 worth of CNG.)

However, there is a very attractive alternative, a unit that can be installed in your garage called the Phill. The Phill costs about $4,000 installed, but there is almost $3,000 worth of tax incentives available. This electric-powered device connects to your ordinary city gas line and takes much longer to fill the GX (average of about 4 hours but up to 12 hours for a complete fill-up). But who cares if you are asleep anyway? Also, natural gas metered at homes costs much less; one Los Angeles GX owner reports it is nearly $1 a gallon equivalent.

Most Iowans would be stuck using the Phill since there seems to be very few public CNG-refuelling stations. MidAmerican has a couple of locations that offer CNG, at least one in Rock Island and one in Des Moines according to this web site written by a guy who drove a CNG-powered van around the United States in 1998, but there doesn't seem to be any comprehensive guide on the web. At least we couldn't find one via Google. Most cars are used for commuting or local errands anyway, so refuelling overnight once a week in the comfort of your garage is certainly more convenient.

According to the EPA, GMC makes a number of trucks that run on CNG. In past years there have been CNG-powered vehicles put out by Dodge, Ford, and even a Toyota Camry in 2001.

One look at the chart of estimated fuel prices on the EPA site shows that CNG is by far the cheapest way to get around. Why we don't see more promotion of this alternative fuel for driving is beyond our comprehension.


Update: The Honda Civic GX is only available for sale in California. That explains why you don't see them in Iowa!

Followup On The Yepsen/Fallon Fallout

We're kind of surprised that none of Iowa's hardcore lefty bloggers have weighed in on David Yepsen's trashing of Democratic gubernatonial candidate Ed Fallon a couple of days ago.

Background and recent history: Iowa passed a law that said certain people on the Iowa Sex Offender registry cannot live within 2000 feet of a school or registered daycare. (Ed Fallon was the lone vote against the law in the Statehouse at the time, primarily because he knew that the sex offenders would be forced into small towns and rural areas, and he considered the law pointless for a variety of reasons.) In almost all larger Iowa cities, this means that registered sex offenders can't live anywhere. Since then, many smaller towns have been passing ordinances forbidding certain sex offenders from residing within the town's borders. The Iowa Civil Liberties Union is trying to challenge the State law, which has been appealed to the Supreme Court.

Two weeks ago, Republican Lance Horbach of Tama, one of the original sponsors of the sex offender residency bill back in 2003, came out and said that he has doubts about the law now because of the unintended consequences of forcing sex offenders into small towns and rural areas.

Was that news? Hardly. It wasn't until Ed Fallon went on Iowa Public Television's show "Iowa Press" last Friday with the AP's Mike Glover and the Des Moines Register's David Yepsen that the issue became escalated (link to transcript here).

Yepsen then wrote a hyperactive column in the Register on Tuesday and repeatedly made references to the "offender lobby" which were clearly pointed at Ed Fallon. Anybody who saw Iowa Press or read the transcript knows that Fallon certainly isn't defending sex offenders. We called Yepsen's column a "cheap shot."

What we don't understand is: why aren't more lefty bloggers coming to Ed Fallon's defense? Why isn't the media, in particular David Yepsen, trashing Lance Horbach for having second thoughts about a law he co-sponsored?

And what is David Yepsen, as well as Iowa Statehouse "leaders" Christopher Rants and Mike Gronstal, going to do if the SCOTUS throws out the law? These people haven't thought this out at all.

Also, what happens if the SCOTUS doesn't want to hear the case, or hears it and sides against the ICLU? Every state will come out with their own flavor of Iowa's law. Are all the 20 year old men who had consensual sex with 15 year old women and got busted for it going to have to move to Canada? And if States can limit residency requirements for sex offenders, who's next?

Related column at Midwest Mesopotamia, which is shaping up to be another excellent Iowa-centric blog:

I don’t doubt that Fallon knows he is going down the right path on this issue. Part of what attracts me to the Fallon candidacy moreso than any of the other Democrats is that you can trust him to do what he thinks is right. The problem is these kinds of candidates almost never win. No one cares about sex offenders or wants to treat them like human beings. The fact that Fallon might be willing to put that aside and do what he thinks is right is at once admirable and crazy.

I hope this doesn’t become the huge issue of the primary. I think Blouin’s have-it-both-ways answer on the question of abortion will trump it, along with a number of other things. If I had Fallon’s ear for a minute or two, I’d tell him, “Look, you’re on the record. Let others defend the principles behind it. Let this go and concentrate on issues that will win you the nomination.”

That's good advice.

McLeodUSA Bankrupt Again

A reader sent us this from the Cedar Rapids Gazette:

McLeodUSA shareholders who lost most of their equity in the company's first bankruptcy in 2003 will give up to the company's creditors what little remains under a prepackaged bankruptcy plan proposed by the company Wednesday.

The competitive telecommunications company, with presence in 25 states, said it is seeking approval from lenders for its second prepackaged Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing. If successful, the filing would restructure about $777 million worth of bank debt plus accrued interest.

We're certain this amount does not contain former CEO Chris Davis's $1.38 million and former CFO Ken Burckhardt $910,000 golden parachutes for guiding the company into the shitter.

The company has to keep paying their $175 to $675 an hour consultants somehow. Right?

Our advice to McLeodUSA employees remains the same: steal everything not bolted down. And if it's bolted down, get a torch. You'll need welding skills once you're unemployed.

The Scam Of Using Terrorism As An Excuse For Pork Spending

From the Des Moines Register:

Des Moines taxpayers should spend about $1.4 million per year for a new police unit devoted to terrorism, Police Chief William McCarthy urged Wednesday, despite no evidence of any terror group targeting the capital city...

Polk County also would add at least two deputies under the plan. The county's cost for staff and equipment would be another $585,685.

Just another flimsy excuse to bloat budgets, raise taxes, and keep that pork rolling in.

Ed Fallon's Scary Money And Super Creeps Tour

It's just a jump to the left.... and then a step to the right!



From the home office on 10th Street:

FALLON ANNOUNCES “SCARY MONEY TOUR”

With Halloween coming soon, scary things dominate the landscape. Next week, gubernatorial candidate State Representative Ed Fallon (D-Des Moines) will tour the state to show Iowans something he thinks is even scarier: big money in politics.

“The influence special interest groups, corporate lobbyists and political action committees purchase at the Iowa Statehouse is truly horrifying,” Fallon said. “I’m organizing this tour to show voters how closely the state’s problems tie to campaign donations.”

The tour will span 1655 miles and visit 26 cities in five days, including Spencer, Storm Lake, Sioux City, Council Bluffs, Atlantic and Audubon on Monday, October 24, Carroll, Fort Dodge, Mason City, Ames and Des Moines on Tuesday, October 25, Oskaloosa, Ottumwa, Keokuk, Burlington and Muscatine on Wednesday, October 26, Bettendorf, Clinton, Maquoketa and Dubuque on Thursday, October 27, and Decorah, New Hampton, Waterloo, Cedar Rapids, Iowa City and Fairfield on Friday, October 28.

“The scary money tour will give people an opportunity to see the connections between campaign cash and public policy,” Fallon said. “It also will give me a chance to explain the Clean Election alternative, which Maine and Arizona are already using.”

Fallon cites Maine’s Clean Elections Act as the first step towards their statewide health care reform legislation. If Maine can use a Clean Elections system to clean up their health care industry, Fallon believes Iowa can use it to fix problems facing the state as well.

“Over the past five years, even as our schools have seen an allowable growth rate well under the rate of inflation, policy makers have still found hundreds of millions of dollars for wealthy campaign contributors in the form of tax breaks and subsidies,” Fallon said. “Eliminating the need for politicians to appease special interests will open the door for real answers to issues affecting average Iowans.”

At each event, Fallon will speak for 15 minutes, then open the floor for questions and discussion. Each event is scheduled to last about an hour.

Fallon will also be burning hemp-based David Yepsen effigies at each campaign stop, so bring some bio-diesel to get the party started as well as your favorite brand of soy hot dogs! OK, we're just kidding. We made that up.

This is quite a haul for Fallon. Even if you're not planning to vote for him, go show up and ask him some questions. Meet the man. And if you're an accordion player, bring your squeezebox and see if he'll do a version of that song from Doctor Zhivago that got him second place at the Iowa State Fair this year.

Don We Now Our Gay Committee

From the Des Moines Register:

The University of Iowa does not consider its pink locker rooms an athletic issue and will not address it in a report to the NCAA, school officials said.

The report, which a university committee will submit on Friday, details how Iowa has complied with NCAA rules, including fairness toward women and minorities.

An Iowa law professor, Erin Buzuvis, had complained to the committee that painting the visitors’ locker rooms at Kinnick Stadium promotes sexism and homophobia and should be addressed in the report.

Committee members said their gender equity mission was limited to studying how female athletes are treated compared with men. The pink locker rooms do not fit into that mission, but the school may form another committee to study the issue, said Pat Cain, an associate provost and committee chairwoman.

‘‘Quite frankly, we are more concerned about the backlash against those who raised this issue,’’ she said.

School officials have noticed death threats and other threatening messages posted on Web sites for Buzuvis.

What crappy reporting, but then this was written under the black veil of anonymity, the same way that comments were allowed on Buzuvis's now-deleted personal blog.

And what's this forming a committee and studying the issue in the future nonsense? What are they going to study? That some imported far-lefty from the land of Barney Frank screwed up by allowing anonymous comments in her personal blog after slandering Hayden Fry? Don't waste the taxpayer's dime on that.

Although they will. We predicted it.

The MAO Inhibitors

From Radio Iowa:

A special vote Tuesday to consolidate two western Iowa school districts has failed. Voters in both districts needed to approve the measure in order for the merger to take effect. Although voters in the Maple Valley district approved the measure by a wide margin, it was a different story in the Anthon-Oto district, where 65-percent of the voters rejected the merger proposal. Both districts have been involved in a whole grade sharing agreement since 1994, but some residents in the Anthon-Oto district felt they'd lose control with the consolidation. Yesterday's vote also means the districts will lose out on half-a-million dollars in state aid designed to encourage smaller districts to merge.

Just call the opponents to the merger the MAO Inhibitors.

One Of The Dumbest Analogies We've Ever Read

Updated below:

Gary Chambers, the CEO/President of Advanced Systems Inc, an office equipment supplier with offices throughout Iowa, has this preposterous letter today in the Waterloo Courier:

Recently the Courier ran an editorial about the effect the I-380/20/63 highway systems had on the economy of the Waterloo area. In that article the editorial board talked about the misinformation being put forth by the naysayers who are always afraid of change at any cost. I think we all would agree that without the highway systems the area would not be as prosperous as it is. We would not have the distribution companies like the Target Center or Ferguson.

We are facing a similar situation today with the forming of a communication utility. The opposition is putting forth a lot of misinformation and using scare tactics such as "it will raise your taxes," and "we have lived up to our commitments." There are still areas of our city that do not have access to affordable high-speed data. By voting yes on Nov. 8, you can help assure the growth and prosperity of Waterloo. Forming a utility costs nothing, but it does insure that we have control over our future. A communication utility does not have the ability to spend taxpayer money without first coming back to the voters for their approval. But it would have the authority to enter into contract with any provider to insure that we become a first-class technology community.

Vote yes on Nov. 8.

This has to be one of the dumbest analogies we've ever read. It's not like the highways in Iowa are all privately-owned and the owners are refusing to build new roads.

And what does Mr Chambers mean by "affordable" when he's talking about broadband internet access?

Some people, stuck in the rural boonies, think that $59 a month with $599 down for equipment and installation for satellite broadband is quite reasonable.

And what sort of financial boom will access to taxpayer-financed high-speed data bring to municipalities throughout Iowa that existing DSL, cable modem, and wireless broadband services can't offer? You know, other than a supposedly cheaper way to download free pr0n and wAreZ.

Doesn't Mr Chambers realize that taxpayer-supported municipal utilities in Spencer, Muscatine, and Cedar Falls have been financial disasters? What about the money pit called the ICN?

These supporters of Clark McLeod's scam either have no brains in their head or they probably have some sort of stake or interest in the fleecing of Iowa's taxpayers.


Update: A reader from Marion mentions that while the cFree Wireless Network planned for downtown Cedar Rapids, parts of Iowa City, and sections of Coralville is running a little behind schedule, it should be online within a month or two - at least according to the Cedar Rapids Gazette today, which only allows access to subscribers. This is a business-supported non-profit, not some taxpayer-financed municipal utility! And access is free! It doesn't get any cheaper than that.


Related: The Whole Truth About Clark McLeod's Scam

Rewriting David Yepsen

Law makes life difficult for sex offenders Iowa Taxpayers? Too bad - Not by David Yepsen

Some on the left are starting to beat the gong for weaker penalties for sex offenders eliminating financial assistance to new Iowa startups or businesses that want to relocate within our borders.

Specifically, they want to eliminate or reduce the requirement that these folks live 2,000 feet away from places like schools amount of money the Iowa Values Fund has been budgeted. They say it doesn't prevent sex crimes and may make it difficult for these people to find a place to live or get treatment is nothing but "corporate welfare" and forces Iowa businesses to compete with Iowa taxpayer-subsidized interlopers.

Once again, there's too much concern for the criminals Iowa taxpayers and not enough for the victims — or the potential victims, which in many cases are our children politically-connected fatcat lobbyists. No community wants to become a pervert's ghetto ghost town so more and more communities are imposing even tougher restrictions throwing taxpayer money up flagpoles in order to attract potential employers.

Last week, legislative leaders had the good sense to shoot down any talk of reducing the limit Iowa Values Fund. No one wants to be seen as soft on crime economic development in an election year.

At 11:22 a.m. on Oct. 12 April 27th, House Speaker Christopher Rants, a Sioux City Republican, released a statement saying "we are not going to debate any bills that water down Iowa's tough laws against sex offenders. The only way the law gets changed is if it gets strengthened . . .There is no room for debate on this issue." the House plan would invest $50 million a year for 10 years on economic development efforts. Another $21 million a year would be extended in tax credits each year, with $13.6 million of those credits set aside for employers that create new jobs. Rants also called the Iowa Values Fund “fiscally prudent.”

At 1:30 p.m on the same day a week or so later, Senate Democratic Leader Mike Gronstal issued his press release saying "the state law cracking down on sex offenders is serving its intended purpose. This law is protecting our children and if that makes life more difficult or inconvenient for sexual predators, so be it." parked his gum on top of a file cabinet and did his interview. As he walked away he plopped the gooey mess back in his mouth. When challenged on his hygiene, he said: "Hey, these things cost 50 cents apiece, I chew two at a time and there's still nicotine in here."

He said Democratic lawmakers "are considering additional measures for the 2006 session to further protect out children and grandchildren from these predators." create economic growth by having Iowa taxpayers become lifelong "investors" in municipal broadband utilities, rainforests, and not-NASCAR racetracks.

As well they should. Since the Democrats won't allow a death penalty bill to be debated in 2006, they are vulnerable to attack for being soft on crime. They need to come up with tough sex-offender proposals next year pro-business policies, lest they be Willie Hortoned by the GOP. The next, inevitable, time some little girl gets raped and murdered — leaves Iowa to become a screenwriter in San Diego, the details are always too gruesome for us to publish in a family newspaper — the pressures to restore capital punishment economic development and job growth in Iowa will grow even stronger.

It's all left the offender laissez-faire lobby wringing its hands and wondering: Where are these people going to live work? Soon there won't be any place for them in Iowa.

Exactly. Get them so-called watchdogs for the taxpayers out of here. Their crimes ideas are so heinous and so twisted that Iowans are deciding these people are unfit to live among the rest of us. Since the experts can't agree on whether treatment for sex offenders does any good are being confused about what's good for them, and that's causing decent people are to be simply unwilling to take chances.

The offender laissez-faire lobby then says some offenders companies aren't as heinous needy as others, that there are different gradations of these crimesir level of financial assistance. OK. But who wants to take a chance that a 19-year-old who exposes himself to a 13-year-old this year isn't going to graduate to even sicker pursuits next year when Wells Fargo decides to pull out and move to more business-friendly South Dakota?

They tell us the weirdo jumping out of the bushes grabbing a random victim that failed and questionable investments in business like Rudi's Organic Bakery, Prodigene, and Iowa Quality Beef is are rare. Yet we then see how some hang out in libraries doing just that — preying on random children Wells Fargo took the $10 million from the Iowa Values Fund and invested it over the next 20 years in the naming rights at the Iowa Events Center.

We are told this law doesn't restrict where offenders can go, just where they can live. That's correct and it's a reason why even tougher laws are needed. Common sense dictates parents take more responsibility. But society must do what it can, too. Residency restrictions are a start.

The offender laissez-faire lobby argues the restrictions areat "corporate welfare" is expensive. Yes, fighting crime "economic development" has become more costly, yet Iowa's spending to fight crime lure businesses away from other states and shelling out dough to keep them happy here is still well below national averages. Since protecting the public safety creating huge re-election coffers and jobs-for-life for friends and family is the most important thing government does, law enforcement and corrections agencies politically-connected exiled lefties who got a golden parachute after being forced out due to multiple scandals should get first dip from the public trough — before we start spending money on all the other things government does. Conservatives who bash crime support taxpayer financing of corporate incentives are to be commended but they are phonies if their budgets fail to provide net new money to fight ity don't heed the Democrats' call to raise taxes significantly when a recession hits.

The offender laissez-faire lobby also needs a lesson in Political Science 101. Many of them are well-meaning people who care deeply about progressive libertarian causes like education, the poor and the environment smoking pot. But they are naive. By trying to pressure their friends in the Legislature to go easy on sex offenders so-called "fiscally prudent, taxpayer-financed corporate welfare", they risk having those members be ousted by voters concerned about public safety economic development. Then what happens to the "progressive" "libertarian" agenda?

2006 is shaping up to be a good year for Democrats — if they don't mess it up with nonsense like defending sex criminals Iowa's taxpayers.

There is at least one good bad place more sex offenders Iowa taxpayers could live.

Prison. Iraq.

Related: Post-Yepsen Chatter and Yepsen's Hyperactive Column On Sex Offenders

Post-Yepsen Chatter

Updated below:

Midwest Mesopotamia has an excellent column about the Yepsen meltdown in the DMR [on Tuesday]. While MM takes Yepsen to task, he does ask some necessary questions:

State is mostly concerned with the criticism leveled at his man, Ed Fallon. Anytime you have to start with “Ed Fallon is certainly not defending sex criminals” you know you’ve got a problem. Even if Fallon is right (and I’d guess he is) that the US Supreme Court won’t allow Iowa to exclude sex offenders from every square inch of the state, this is not an issue to press as a legislator, much less as a candidate for governor. Let the ACLU and the court do their work. When it rules one way or the other, the legislature will have a good idea of the kinds of consitutional limits that apply to the issue. “What then?” State asks. Easy. Then they pass a law conforming to those limits if he court decides the state has gone too far. If the court says Iowa’s current limits are OK, then fine. Fallon does not need to stick his neck out on behalf of sex offenders. I can’t imagine why he’s even bothering with this issue.

MM has a very good point here. Why is Ed Fallon bringing this up now? Let the ICLU roll the dice at the SCOTUS level and see what happens before opening your trap, Mr Fallon.

Ah, but we all forget that Ed Fallon isn't your typical politician. If he's got something in his accordion, it's going to come out.

Besides, it wasn't just Ed Fallon who recently raised concerns about the sex offender residency law, it was Tama Republican Lance Horbach, one of the original sponsors of this law!!! That's the reason why it's a topic right now!!!

Fallon's always been against this sort of "knee-jerk" law. This is from the transcript of Fallon's appearance on IPTV's Iowa Press show last Friday:

Borg: WHAT ARE YOU VIEWS ON A CURRENT CONTROVERSY ON WHERE PERSONS WHO HAVE PREVIOUSLY BEEN CONVICTED OF SEX OFFENSES MAY LIVE ONCE THEY HAVE PAID THEIR DEBT TO SOCIETY? THAT IS, SOME FEEL, AS YOU KNOW, THAT THE CURRENT LAW IS TOO RESTRICTIVE. IN FACT, IT'S BEING CHALLENGED IN COURT. BUT OTHERS SAY TOO BAD, LET'S TIGHTEN IT EVEN MORE.

Fallon: THE CURRENT LAW IS UNFORTUNATELY UNWORKABLE. AND I WAS THE ONLY NO VOTE IN THE HOUSE. I DON'T KNOW IF YOU REMEMBER THAT. AND I POINTED THAT OUT DURING DEBATE. I SAID, LOOK, I'VE DRAWN THE CIRCLES ON THE MAP IN MY DISTRICT, AND NO SEX OFFENDERS WILL BE ABLE TO LIVE IN MY DISTRICT. DO YOU WANT THEM ALL TO BE IN THE SUBURBS, SMALL TOWNS, RURAL AREAS? WHERE DO YOU WANT THEM? AND NOBODY CAN ANSWER THAT QUESTION. BUT THEY WENT AHEAD AND VOTED FOR THE BILL BECAUSE OF POLITICS. THERE WAS A FEAR THAT, WELL, IF WE DON'T SUPPORT THIS BILL, WE'LL BE VIEWED AS WEAK ON CRIME. BUT I SAID, YOU KNOW, IT'S NOT A DEBATE ABOUT WEAK OR SOFT ON CRIME -- TOUGH OR SOFT ON CRIME; IT'S INTELLIGENT POLICY AND THIS DOESN'T WORK.

Glover: BUT AS A PRAGMATIC MATTER, THE SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE HAS SAID YOU'RE NOT GOING TO TAMPER WITH THIS SEX OFFENDER LAW. AND WITHIN MINUTES THE DEMOCRATIC LEADER OF THE SENATE WEIGHED IN AND SAID WE'RE NOT GOING TO TAMPER WITH THIS LAW. SO ISN'T THE REALITY WE'RE NOT GOING TO TAMPER WITH THIS LAW?

Fallon: WELL, AT LEAST IVERSON HAS HELD OUT SOME HOPE THAT THERE MAY BE AN INTELLIGENT DISCUSSION ON THAT SIDE OF THE AISLE IN THE SENATE. BUT I MEAN IT'S UNWORKABLE. I MEAN YOU KNOW THAT; IT'S UNWORKABLE.

Yepsen: WHY?

Fallon: WELL, LOOK WHAT'S HAPPENING. EVERY CITY IN THE STATE IS STARTING TO PASS THEIR OWN REGULATION ABOUT --

Yepsen: WHAT'S SO --

Fallon: ARE WE GOING TO DECLARE ALL OF IOWA A SEX OFFEND --

Yepsen: WHY NOT?

Fallon: SEX-OFFENDER-FREE ZONE?

Yepsen: WHAT'S WRONG WITH SUGGESTING TO THESE PEOPLE THAT THEY LEAVE IOWA?

Fallon: ALL RIGHT. YOU KNOW, HERE'S THE PROBLEM. FIFTEEN PERCENT OF THOSE WHO ARE LISTED ON THE SEX OFFENDER REGISTRY WILL REPEAT AND ARE DANGEROUS. WE NEED TO ADDRESS THOSE. THERE'S NO DOUBT ABOUT IT. THAT CONSTITUENCY NEEDS TO BE DEALT WITH SERIOUSLY AND EFFECTIVELY. BUT YOU'VE GOT A HUGE CROWD OF PEOPLE THAT ARE THERE FOR OTHER REASONS. YOU KNOW, CONCENTUAL SEX BETWEEN A MINOR AND SOMEONE JUST OVER BEING A MINOR, 18, SAY. A PORNOGRAPHIC INCIDENCE. AND I HEAR FROM THESE PEOPLE, AND MAYBE YOU DO AS WELL. BUT WE'VE BASICALLY CREATED A SYSTEM THAT'S -- THAT'S GOING TO BE -- I MEAN I GOT A CALL FROM SOMEBODY THE OTHER DAY. YOU KNOW, SHE -- SHE'D MADE A MISTAKE YEARS AGO BUT, AGAIN, IT WAS A FAIRLY MILD ONE. BUT NOW HER LIFE HAS BEEN IN ORDER FOR A LONG TIME, AND NOW SHE'S BEING REND FROM HER FAMILY.

Yepsen: I'M SORRY.

Fallon: I DON'T -- THIS APPROACH IS NOT WORKING. PERHAPS WE COULD LOOK AT THE USE OF ELECTRONIC MONITORING BRACELETS FOR THE DANGEROUS OFFENDERS, I MEAN MAYBE SOME OTHER MORE MODEST MONITORING APPROACH FOR THOSE WHO ARE LESS DANGEROUS.

Yepsen: WELL, THAT WAS MY NEXT QUESTION. I MEAN WE UNDERSTAND -- I UNDERSTAND YOUR CRITICISM OF THE CURRENT SYSTEM. BUT BESIDES ELECTRONIC MONITORING, WHAT WOULD YOU DO DIFFERENTLY?

Fallon: WELL, AGAIN, THERE'S A RANGE OF POSSIBILITIES, AND I DON'T HAVE ALL THE ANSWERS. BUT THE BOTTOM LINE IS YOU CAN'T EXPECT A KNEE-JERK POLITICAL REACTION TO WORK. IT'S GOT TO BE AN INTELLIGENT POLICY-BASED DECISION.

Glover: BUT AS A MATTER -- I WANT TO RETURN TO THE MATTER OF PRAGMATIC REALISTIC POLITICS AND WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN AT THE STATEHOUSE. SEX OFFENDERS DON'T VOTE. AND ISN'T, IN FACT, THAT POLITICAL REALITY DICTATING WHAT THE LEGISLATURE IS GOING TO DO?

Fallon: YEAH, YOU'RE RIGHT. IT MAKES A GREAT CAMPAIGN BROCHURE, YOU KNOW: WE GOT TOUGH ON SEX OFFENDERS. EVERYBODY WANTS TO BE TOUGH ON THEM.

Glover: AND 125 LEGISLATORS ARE RUNNING FOR ELECTION NEXT YEAR.

Fallon: I KNOW. IT'S A TOUGH ISSUE BECAUSE YOU'VE GOT TO HAVE SOME POLITICAL COURAGE AND AN ABILITY TO SEPARATE POLICY FROM POLITICS. AND I'M NOT SURE -- WELL, I'M PRETTY CONVINCED THAT THE SPEAKER AND MIKE GRONSTAL HAVE BOTH MADE IT CLEAR THAT THEY'RE NOT WILLING TO DO THAT. THAT'S UNFORTUNATE BECAUSE IT'S GOING TO LEAD TO CONTINUED BAD POLICY.

Sorry about the all caps, but that's the way the transcript is written on the IPTV site.

Anybody reading that transcript will realize that Ed Fallon's certainly not part of the "offender lobby" as Yepsen glibly puts it in his column - not by any stretch of the imagination. Yepsen really owes Fallon an apology. What a cheap shot.


Update: Iowa Libertarian says:

State 29 rightfully defends Ed Fallon (did I just write that...?) in Fallon's effort to enforce reasonable restraints on convicted sex offenders...

Okay... I'm gonna say it. I disagree with Fallon on many issues. But man, he sure seems to have a rare combination of guts and integrity.

And what do you have to say about Mr Yepsen? (snicker, snark... gently punches Royce in the arm...)

Taylor Krueger and Will Kenyon Updates

Taylor Krueger:

Day 264 Post Transplant

Once again Taylor's scans are clear... praise be to God!

Yesterday Taylor had her appointment in Iowa City... once again all blood counts came back within normal range! We hung around a bit though in hopes to find out the results from her spinal tap which were expected to be back in an hours time but after two hours of waiting we decided to head home as both girls were getting antsy, hungry and tired! By three o'clock I still had not heard from the doctors and as you might imagine was a nervous wreck so I called the PA who told me that there were two cells which he believed were normal cells and that he was waiting on the cytospin which would not be back until tomorrow to confirm... the call came in about thirty minutes ago that all is clear!

Related: Taylor Krueger


And here's how the Will Kenyon Memorial donations were distributed:

The final $6,000 in the fund went to the Mother's Milk Bank of Iowa, which provides donated breastmilk to NICU babies whose mothers are not able to provide it. This works in much the same way a blood bank does--with carefully screened donors, of which I was one. Breastmilk is the best form of nutrition for babies--so beneficial for the most fragile in the NICU, in fact, that it is considered medicine and is billed that way and paid for by insurance. Pumping breastmilk was absolutely essential to my continued optimism that Will WOULD come home and he would need me to be ready to feed him. When I ran out of freezer space at home and knew I had more than enough for Will's future needs, I began donating. There are fewer than a dozen milk banks in the United States according to the Human Milk Banking Association of North America. We are very lucky to have one here in Iowa, and it is expanding now beyond University Hospitals to serve NICUs in Cedar Rapids and in Davenport. This expansion means they'll need more milk, and when they get it they'll need more freezer space to store it before and after pasteurization. Our gift will provide new freezers.

Related: Will Kenyon

The Whole Truth About Clark McLeod's Scam

Tom Kirkhart of Nevada (Ne-VAY-duh) has an outstanding letter in his local paper:

To the editor:

The recent public relations campaign called OpportunityNevada reminds me of a legislator who would caution his colleagues of the difference between the truth and the whole truth.

The truth, he would say during a critical point in a debate, is that he had been in the top third of his high school class, he walked across the entire city to get to school every day and he was a starter on the basketball team all four years. Then he'd explain the whole truth: There were only 12 students in his class, the city was only nine blocks wide and only five boys were on the basketball team.

It's important for voters to know the whole truth as they consider how to vote Nov. 8 on the question of creating a municipal utility in Nevada.

First, claims that OpportunityNevada is a "citizen-led organization" are true. But they aren't the whole truth. OpportunityNevada is an offshoot of OpportunityIowa, which is the nonprofit arm of a for-profit company, FiberUtilities.

FiberUtilities installs and operates municipal utility systems with the goal of making a profit. OpportunityIowa has a direct interest in convincing voters to approve a municipal utility. Unfortunately, local taxpayers are the ones who will be on the hook for the substantial debt that will be incurred to build a municipal utility that will do nothing more than duplicate existing infrastructure.

Second, supporters of municipal utilities insist, "establishing a municipal utility doesn't cost a thing." Of course, that is only true if the people already promoting a city owned utility decide not to go forward. The whole truth, as we all know, is that you don't get something for nothing; a municipal utility will cost dollars - millions of dollars - and taxpayers will be obligated to pay for it.

Supporters can claim voters would have the safeguard of a second vote if a utility is funded with general obligation bonds. But the whole truth is that the city can - and mostly likely would - fund a utility with revenue bonds that do not require public approval. Any future city council could burden taxpayers with millions of dollars in revenue bond debt to pay for a utility - without another referendum.

Supporters say city-owned utilities can share services with other communities to reduce costs. The whole truth is that a city-owned utility will only create a duplicate telecommunications network at great cost to local taxpayers. Such a system will have tremendous difficulty keeping up with the constant changes and competition in the telecommunications industry.

Facing up to the whole truth also requires us to look realistically at the issue of fairness.

Why should older voters who may be on fixed incomes be forced to share in the cost of cable television to the homes of their wealthier neighbors? That's what will happen under a municipal utility system owned by local government and financed by taxpayers.

Our community, like every local government in the state, already faces challenges paying for sewers, water, streets, high energy costs, police and fire protection and other critical services. We don't need our government to do more things; we need our government to do the best possible job of delivering the essential services we're not going to get from any other source. Dreams of big profits for the city and taxpayers courtesy of a telecom utility are just that - dreams.

And that's the whole truth.

That's really an excellent letter and it outlines Clark McLeod's scam perfectly.

Wait, did we say that just Clark McLeod was involved with this scam? No, this scam also includes such leeches as Terry Branstad, Bonnie Campbell, Bob Ray, Dan Gable, and a whole bunch of Iowa Z-list political bottom feeders. All these con-artists are lining up behind Clark McLeod to gang rape Iowa taxpayers, if allowed.

Here's another good letter in the Nevada newspaper by Sean Stokesberry:

To the editor:

This November, Nevada residents will vote on whether or not to establish a municipally owned telecommunications utility. This issue is backed by the not-profit group OpportunityIowa. I have a couple reservations about Nevada forming such a utility.

First, Clark McLeod is on the board of advisors for OpportunityIowa. McLeod started Fiberutilities, a company which provides the major financial support of OpportunityIowa and installs networks for towns like Nevada. Clark McLeod is promoting this issue, under the guise of a non-profit organization from which his company will profit. Is this really an opportunity for Nevada?

Second, there is no clear plan stated in the issue. How will this be paid for? How long will it take to complete? Who will be on the Board of Trustees? Has an independent feasibility audit been conducted? Will the services provided by a municipally owned telecommunications utility rival those already offered by the private sector? I feel these are all valid questions that are not being addressed in the upcoming vote.

Until we can be sure that creating a new telecommunications utility for Nevada will actually benefit us, we must be prudent. Vote "No" on Nov. 8.

Pat Probert also writes to the Nevada newspaper:

To the editor:

If the municipal referendum passes on Nov. 8, the only option we'll be keeping open is the option to spend tax dollars.

If we build a municipal utility, it obviously won't be done for free. If the city decides to use revenue bonds to fund the building, voters will never vote on it again, wording used on the referendum is vague, and it NEVER states a second vote is necessary.

Everything leads to the vote in November. This is the vote that counts. There will be no other vote. We can't undo this once it's done, and I feel Nevada is rushing into it because we've been snowballed by a small percentage of our community.

How that small percentage of local scumbags, Socialists, big government Republicrats, bottom feeders, vermin, and retards got this pig flying is explained in this post.

Last week, in the Mason City Globe Gazette, was this letter by NetConX CEO Steve Price:

I read with interest Mayor Jean Marinos’ Guest View (Oct. 2) supporting the establishment of a new communications utility. While I have a high regard for her service and leadership, I have to disagree with her on this issue.

The mayor believes in order to attract new businesses, we need to run fiber to every home in Mason City. The truth is, we already have whatever connectivity a business may need with providers such as Qwest, AT&T, Sprint and MCI.

This is not about preserving options; it is about spending millions on a risky venture that has a history of failure.

The public should know that the peddler of this project, Opportunity Iowa, is an organization funded almost entirely by millionaire businessman Clark McLeod, who is best known for running a billion-dollar company, McLeod USA, into the ground. The truth of the matter is McLeod stands to benefit handsomely if this referendum passes because his new company FiberUtilities of Iowa will be well-positioned to build this duplicative network.

In addition, the Iowa roadways are littered with failed telecom utilities, particularly fiber-based projects.

In Cedar Falls, the fiber utility has yet to break even after 10 years of operation. In Muscatine, where rate hikes are common, the communications utility has borrowed $33 million from the other utilities since 1996 but has yet to turn a profit. In Spencer, the communications utility has created an $18 million cash sinkhole. And let’s not forget the Iowa Communications Network, the $400 million statewide fiber network that some argue is already obsolete.

Yet, despite these facts, you won’t hear too many public officials admit their mistakes, and thanks to creative accounting, many don’t have to. Cities have engaged in practices ranging from “borrowing” money from other utilities, using “revenue bonds” that use new income from the project to pay the loans, or, in the case of Philadelphia, creating a non-profit shell organization to own the network and be the official debtor when borrowing funds.

Fortunately, communities can avoid this path altogether. The broadband market, while far from perfect, is far from failing. Prices are constantly dropping and newer, faster services are offered all the time. And with a variety of long-range wireless technologies emerging, competition and innovation are only going to grow.

Government’s proper role in this process is to ensure that broadband providers offer services to every community regardless of income, promoting competition in every neighborhood. Real competition is always the best protection for consumers, and it offers a solution that places taxpayers at zero risk.

To protect our community against unnecessary and risky spending, vote no to a new utility on Nov. 8.

— Note: NetConX is an Internet service provider in Mason City. For more information, go to http://www.projecttaxpayerprotection.com/

Wow!


Related: The No-Brainers And The Greedy Broadbandit

Blackout Saturday

From Hawk Central:

The UI Department of Intercollegiate Athletics announced plans today to take historic Kinnick Stadium and "paint it black" Saturday when the Iowa Hawkeyes square off against Michigan in a game that pits the two teams that shared last year's Big Ten Conference championship.

The UI's "Black Out Saturday" will follow the same model as Penn State University's very successful "White Out" games and other such events staged across the country: All fans attending the game are encouraged to help add another layer of "home field advantage" to the already outstanding game-day environment inside Kinnick -- as evidenced by the UI's 22-game winning streak at home -- by showing their support for Coach Kirk Ferentz's squad by wearing a shirt, sweater or sweatshirt that has black as its primary color.

"It's really kind of simple. Fans of the Hawkeyes can make a statement of their support by joining in the fun. It doesn't get much easier than reaching into the closet on game day and pulling out black," said Rick Klatt, the UI's associate athletics director for external affairs.

Wow, not only is the University of Iowa Athletic Department a bunch of homo baiters, but now they're racists as well.

Call the diversity taskforce and get Governor Vilsack on it.

How long before Hayden Fry comes out with a new book suggesting black face paint is a harmless artistic diversion based on such bands as KISS rather than the Minstrel Show and Amos 'n Andy origins?

Now we hand the mic to MC Search to explain the rest:

Black cat is bad luck, bad guys wear black
Musta been a white guy who started all that
(Make the Gas Face!) For those little white lies
My expression to the mountainous blue eyes
Then form a face, and shake my skull cap
Dismiss the myth, that evil is not black
but opposite spectrum, this done by red man
with horns on his head, laid down the ill plan
Got all his helpers, said, "Make it snappy!
Tell all the people that their hair can`t be nappy!"
Blonde and blue-eyed, or dark-skinned half a G
A disease, created by leprosy
Don`t speak of bleach, bend them to right
Say, "It was night WAY before the light"
Put aside spooks, Serch leaves a trace
I`ve set em correct with the effect of the Gas Face

Iowa To Finally Get Smoke-Free Hospitals?

From the Des Moines Register:

University Hospitals employee Nile Lewis remembers the days when he could smoke at his desk.

Taking a cigarette break across the street from the hospital last week, he worried he'll have to go even farther away to light up because of a more expansive smoking ban that hospital officials are weighing.

"I always figured if you look up and see the sky, you're not bothering anyone else," Lewis sad. "I respect other people's rights not to breathe smoke, but as long as I'm outside, who am I bothering?"

Officials at many of Iowa's 116 hospitals are considering wider smoking bans since the Iowa Hospital Association endorsed smoke-free hospital campuses in June. Six hospitals in Des Moines plan to ban smoking campuswide , beginning on July 1, 2006.

Perhaps it's about time to quit, Mr Lewis.

Too bad the State has already spent most of the extortion money from tobacco companies on things other than smoking cessation programs.

You can always walk into your local drug store and purchase a variety of methods to control nicotine and help quit smoking. It's not easy, but the rest of us somehow manage to get through the day without smelling like a damn chimney.

Yepsen's Hyperactive Column On Sex Offenders

David Yepsen offers up a hyperactive column in this morning's DMR, mostly concerning Ed Fallon's suggestion that Iowa's weird sex offender residency law ought to be revisited. Case in point:

The offender lobby also needs a lesson in Political Science 101. Many of them are well-meaning people who care deeply about progressive causes like education, the poor and the environment. But they are naive. By trying to pressure their friends in the Legislature to go easy on sex offenders, they risk having those members be ousted by voters concerned about public safety. Then what happens to the "progressive" agenda?

2006 is shaping up to be a good year for Democrats — if they don't mess it up with nonsense like defending sex criminals.

Ed Fallon is certainly not defending sex criminals, and to frame the political debate like this is just stupid.

Mr Yepsen needs to brace himself for the hard reality that the SCOTUS may throw out Iowa's sex offender residency law. What then? Once again, Iowans will not know where the sex offenders are residing because they'll be moving back into cities. It'll put an additional strain on law enforcement.

Meanwhile, nobody seems to care that Governor Vilsack is allowing sex offenders to walk into our schools on election day and cast a ballot.


Related: Random Sex Offenders

There's Something Weird About That Boy. I Just Know It.

From Radio Iowa:

Iowa's sex offender law is strict, but there's -no- law against student sex offenders attending school. A Cedar Rapids man, whose name is being withheld, says he found his teenage daughter's boyfriend listed in Iowa's on-line sex-offender registry.

The man says his daughter met the boy while attending the same Cedar Rapids high school. He says "I ran and woke my wife up and said, 'Oh my God, look at this. What are we going to do?'" The parent called the school the next morning and asked why he wasn't notified. School officials told him the district doesn't notify parents about student sex offenders.

Suzanne Blomme, executive director of Special Services at the Cedar Rapids School District, says they're following the law. Blomme says "It's a complex issue. Safety is the number one concern for all students in the Cedar Rapids school district. At the same time, we need to recognize that every student has the right to an education." The district confirms that sex offenders are enrolled at Cedar Rapids schools but officials say it would be impossible for schools to notify parents about every student sex offender.

Good for that father!

As we've said time and time again, it's always a smart thing to check your co-workers, neighbors, and daughter's boyfriends out at the Iowa Court Search and Iowa Sex Offender web sites.

It's easy to search for high school student sex offenders. Just put the name of the town ("Cedar Rapids") and appx age ("15") which has a plus or minus of 3 years, and you'll come up with this list.

Vilsack Equates Blacks And Hispanics To Dying Leaves

This Radio Iowa piece made us chuckle. Check out Guv Vilsack's grovelling at a diversity conference in Ames today:

Governor Tom Vilsack says a recent nationwide poll found people choose to live in places that reflect a diversity of people. "Iowa is a beautiful land and a beautiful state in all parts of the year, but it is perhaps most beautiful during the fall and the reason it is is because there's a diversity of color on our landscape," Vilsack says. The governor says research shows communities that "embrace diversity" are the most economically successful. And Vilsack says a recent Gallup poll asked people what "connects" them to their home community, and while the top reason was the "aesthetic" look of the area, the second-most popular reason people pick a neighborhood is because of it's diversity. "It wasn't diversity in just the traditional sense. When we think of diversity we often think of different colors and cultures, perhaps different sexual orientations, but this was the broad array of diversity: young, old, people with disabilities, people of different colors and cultures, people of different sexual orientations," Vilsack says. Vilsack says apart from making diversity a "value" to embrace, making Iowa a "more welcoming" state is part of a strategy to improve the state's economy. There are currently eight, state-run "Welcome Centers" around Iowa which offer training and assistance to immigrants who settle here. In addition, Vilsack touts state efforts to help minority-owned businesses navigate the capitalistic culture. "I talk to a lot of business leaders in the state, and they continue to express the desire and the need for diversity in the workforce," Vilsack says.

What Vilsack is talking about here is how business leaders in the state (i.e. the non-union meatpacking industry) wanted more cheap Mexican slave labor in order to maximize profits. It was essentially the cornerstone behind Vilsack's insane idea a few years ago to bring 310,000 poor illegals into Iowa. The end result, besides all the cheap slave labor, would be generations hooked on welfare, more kids on Federally-funded ESL programs, and (hopefully) more Democratic voters. The vast majority of Iowans were repulsed, including a large percentage of Democrats, and Vilsack withdrew his plan to turn Iowa into the "Ellis Island of the midwest."

Here's the web site for the Iowa Committee on Diversity, who is sponsoring this conference along with such companies as taxpayer-financed corporate welfare recipient Wells Fargo.

We noticed something really weird on the history page. The pictures on the web page looked like stock images rather than of real Iowans.

Indeed, here is asianwoman2.jpg:


Here is spanishman.jpg:


And here is curlyhair_woman.jpg:


On the How To Get Involved page, here is whitewoman.jpg:


On the Who Are We page, here is blackman.jpg:


On the Organizations page, here is hispanicman.jpg:


Can't they go to the trouble of finding and photographing actual Iowans? This diversity nonsense is so fake and phony.

What If The AP's Mike Glover Went To Jail To Protect A Source He Couldn't Remember?

Last week we bashed Senator Evan Bayh-Curious and the AP's Mike Glover concerning Bayh-Curious's comments in Des Moines regarding Karl Rove's supposed role in Plamegate.

Now, as it turns out, Plame went to jail for 85 days to protect a source she now can't recall (source: Washington Post).

Paging the AP's Mike Glover... Paging Senator Bayh-Curious...

The No-Brainers And The Greedy Broadbandit

A reader pointed us to this KCRG news story about how some voters in the town of Vinton want to create a taxpayer-financed communications utility:

Vinton. A progressive community. A newly renovated downtown. A remodeled theater. A new 13- million dollar high school. And a city-owned electric utility. Their power is controlled by the city. Today, there's an effort to take this concept and offer cable-TV, internet, and even phone service, all in the hands of city government.

"We don't have access to the same level of service as we'd like to have," says Kurt Karr.

Vinton is one of twenty-seven Iowa communities that will place a communications utility on the ballot.

"It's a no-brainer to vote for that," says Gerald Horst of Opportunity Vinton.

Talk about having no brain!

From what we've been able to research, people in Vinton can already get broadband internet access from Mediacom (cable modem), Qwest (DSL), or from numerous satellite providers. It's not like they're deprived of access. So why force everybody in town, including those without computers or who are happy with their current set of choices, to fund this boondoggle?

Oh, you know why. It's to further line broadbandit Clark McLeod's greedy pockets:

Clark McCleod, founder of McCleod USA first pushed the idea in November 2004. "In the end, people in the community will have access to options, says McLeod. The initiative is an idea originally pushed by Clark McLeod, founder of McLeod USA.

"What you normally see in a private enterprise here is you have stockholders that would put up their own personal money. I this case, we're putting the public's money at risk," says Richard Johnson. He represents the private sector. Businesses like Mediacom and Qwest.

Johnson says thirty-percent of homes don't even have a computer. So why should every tax payer fund a system everyone can't use? "It's being presented as we're just giving them permission in the future if they want to do it. Well, that's not what the ballot issue says. It says they have the permission to go ahead and build it," says Johnson.

And at what cost? When Vinton voters opted to spend money on schools, they knew the price tag attached. Critics say the price tag for these projects is unknown and could be millions more. "This is really not the kind of risky environment that governments aught to be involved with," says Johnson.


We mentioned that Clark McLeod was the person who originally pushed this idea. We tried to contact McLeod, but he refused to be interviewed saying he no longer has anything to do with the issue. Ironically, his new company, Fiber Utilities Inc, could be the company to build the infrastructure for these municipal utilities. That would mean millions of dollars for McLeod's business.

Could be? Try will be.

What a weasel that Clark McLeod is.

We'd love to see some hapless community run by a bunch of idiots get suckered into a sort-of Hotel California agreement with Clark McLeod. Imagine the sticker shock when grandma finds out that her property taxes are going up $200 a year for the next 15 years so that junior down the street can download an endless supply of pr0n and waReZ for $25 a month. Because that's all this is.


Related: Clark McLeod: Broadbandit

The Pink End

From Hawk Central:

Whether Kinnick Stadium’s pink visitor’s locker room is sexist and homophobic will not be included in the University of Iowa’s final report to seek NCAA recertification, the chairwoman of the certification steering committee said Monday...

The NCAA recertification committee stated that it sees the pink locker room as a university issue as opposed to an NCAA issue, and the committee is recommending to UI President David Skorton that the matter be forwarded to "an appropriate university committee" for further study.

We wonder what Skorton is going to do.

It took him over two years to get a student-athlete code of conduct created. It probably wouldn't be completed today if it wasn't for Pierre Pierce getting busted again.

Still, to put things in perspective, two years is about 6 months longer than it took for the taxpayers to renovate Skorton's home at a cost of nearly $3 million. Priorities, priorities.

QCDavenport Blog

The QC Times has a big profile on the QCDavenport blog in today's paper ("City’s politics goes to the blogs"):

For Bill Boom, running for 3rd Ward alderman in Davenport is as much about clicking the mouse as it is about knocking on doors.

Boom and other candidates have found a new campaign tool in an online blog called Davenport Daily Politics. The blog serves as an electronic town hall that is buzzing with contentious debate and sometimes with personal attacks.

The Internet message board, located at www.qcdavenport .blogspot.com, is bubbling over with opinions on a wide range of topics, from the downtown skybridge to Davenport Alderman Bob McGivern’s recent drunken-driving arrest. It also is ground zero in the current Davenport campaigns for mayor and City Council, with dozens of people weighing in, many of them anonymously, on the field of candidates.


One dimension of the blog that some believe detracts from its credibility is that ability for users to remain anonymous. People can say anything they want without signing their name or other identification to it. The Davenport Daily Politics blog is moderated by someone known only as “The Fly.”


Mark Riley, a former candidate for alderman in the 1st Ward who was eliminated in last week‘s primary election, said the blog is not a place for the weak. “The public square is a rough-and-tumble place. You better come prepared. You better be able to defend your opinions.”

Riley said the blog gave his low-budget campaign a place to have a debate with other candidates. He has taken a few hits as well. “I’ve been called a homophobe on the blog because of some stances I made down at City Hall, but I’m the furthest thing from a homophobe you can find.”

He said the blog has helped bring back “the Greek tradition of debate in the public square.”


For the week of Oct. 1-7, the Daily Davenport Politics blog averaged 152 daily visitors.

This is a very good article, so read the whole thing, especially the quote from the head of the J-skool at St Ambrose.

A recent post on Saturday by The Fly concerning T.O.L.L. versus Webheads is interesting. The Fly is right about how the new methods of campaigning, such as putting up fancy web sites, probably doesn't matter all that much even in these times. But it will probably matter in the future, especially if people are able to create internet-based community networks such as blogs, message boards, web sites, and email lists.

152 daily visitors is a good number for a local concern blog that's only been around for about 8 months. During the weekdays the State 29 blog normally gets around 500 original visitors every day.

Iowa Ennui on Cuts That Heal

Iowa Ennui's post on Vilsack's recent WSJ column is devastatingly excellent:

Vilsack practices absolutely none of what he is preaching. It is such an absurdly hypocritical bunch of sentences strung together for the single purpose of advancing the George Lakoff theory on political framing through language.

The only thing we'd add is that when Vilsack became the Guv we had this thing called the Rainy Day Fund. That's long gone. And Vilsack's financial sense seems to be limited to deficit-spending, taxpayer-financed corporate welfare, and refinancing extortion debt.

Doug Geek For State Senator?

Doug Geek has announced his intention to run for Jeff Lamberti's Iowa Senate seat.


Related: BREAKING NEWS: JEFF LAMBERTI TO OFFICIALLY ANNOUNCE HIS CANDIDACY FOR CONGRESS!

Iowa Still Soft On School Board Presidents Who Drive Drunk

There's a big story in the DMR today on Mary Ann Dilla, the Ames School Board President who pled guilty in May to driving drunk after she and her car were discovered in January on a sidewalk and stuck in a snowbank. Some want Dilla to resign her post, but she's so far refusing:

"I don't think my OWI has anything to do with being school board president," she said. "I ran for school board to make a difference in children's lives. I strive for high achievement for all students, and that hasn't changed."

Her detractors say otherwise...

"These guys remind me of Puritans," said James Pritchard , an Ames parent. "I hope she doesn't surrender to this witch hunt. She's paid her price."

Karen Bergeson , another Dilla supporter in Ames, said Dilla's role will not set a bad example. Rather, it will show people that there are second chances.

"She is showing you can make a mistake and go on and be a productive member of the community," she said.

What we don't understand is why Dilla was appointed as the school board president by four of the seven members last month, other than the fact that she has been the longest serving board member. Dilla's arrest back in January made the Ames Tribune (here's a cached version of the story). Wouldn't people be chatting about this sort of thing?

If Mary Ann Dilla had been smoking pot, crack, or methamphetamine, would their opinion be different? Her supporters might say, "But alcohol is legal and meth isn't." Yes, but if you drink too much alcohol and get behind the wheel it's illegal! And dangerous! 78 people died in alcohol-related automobile accidents in Iowa in 2004 (PDF). 124 died in 2003 (PDF). Is that the kind of person you want in a leadership position over a school district?

Being busted for OWI is pretty stupid, and most people would forgive those who screwed up one time and learned from their mistake, as long as nobody was hurt or an accident didn't happen. But when you're a public official, especially serving on a school board, where do you get off acting like an arrogant ass? Four of the seven Ames school board members couldn't make a simple judgment call about what's right and what's wrong. If we had kids in the Ames school district, we'd probably be rioting over this issue.

We Love Dick! We Love Dick!

It's not very often that we agree 100% with a Dick Doak column in the Des Moines Register, but today's column about taxpayer-financed corporate welfare is right on the target:

In that perfect world, states wouldn't have to compete against one another by offering incentives (some say bribes) to businesses. It's economic warfare among the states in which Iowa has little choice but to be a combatant, even though there are better uses for taxpayers' money.

I'm rooting for the U.S. Supreme Court to begin imposing a truce.

The court recently agreed to hear a case that challenges the constitutionality of tax incentives that entice businesses to choose one state over another. The little-noticed case might be the bombshell of this court term.

The case is an appeal from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit in Cincinnati, which struck down an investment tax credit given to DaimlerChrysler by the state of Ohio. It was part of a $280 million package of state and local incentives granted to retain and expand a Jeep factory in Toledo.

Dick is referring to the Cuno case. Here's the Sixth Circuit's ruling.

There's more in this Tax Update Blog post from September.

VINCENT Are you Jewish? JULES I ain't Jewish man, I just don't dig on swine

This Jane Norman piece in the DMR concerning Guv Vilsack's recent call for a "War On Pork" is pretty amusing, especially because Vilsack's cost-cutting efforts amount to only about $42 billion and he completely leaves out Iowa.

When towns in Iowa with 1100 people in them get $225,000 for new fire trucks, you know there's room to cut.


Related: "I don’t see this as pork, I see this as good public policy"

Carol Hunter Wants To Give Driver's Licenses To Illegals

From Carol Hunter's column on Sunday about how Iowans should help (illegal) immigrants. This is crazy, but what do you expect from a Gannettoid:

A more controversial but practical step: Establish some sort of driver's license or certificate to provide identification and allow undocumented residents to buy insurance. That would better protect other drivers.

And if you don't agree with these idiots, you get labelled a xenophobe.

Another Excuse To Run That Photo Of Steve King In Hell

Wow! The supporters of Iowa's Dumbest Congressman™ turn out in full force in the DMR today.

Who needs the comic section when you have letters from people defending Steve "The Combover" King?

Our favorite letter was by Christopher P. Covill of Van Meter:

Having read the Register's Oct. 9 editorial, I'm not sure who is more irresponsible, Congressman Steve King or The Des Moines Register.

To suggest that King has morphed into an ultra conservative ideologue is not only fiction, it is irresponsible journalism. King has and I suspect will always be a right-wing conservative who has consistently put his persona and ego before the needs of the district he is supposed to represent. To his credit, King has changed very little. He just has a bigger stage to espouse his tiresome and unproductive political rhetoric.

Notwithstanding this, the Register should be ashamed of itself for endorsing King in the first place. Moreover, to suggest that King turned out to be "a different guy than we endorsed" begs the question: What kind of due diligence was conducted to endorse him in the first place? One would hope that the editorial staff would carefully scrutinize the credentials, political leanings and ultimately the potential for effectively representing his or her district as well as the state of Iowa. Apparently not.

Although I cannot argue with the theme of the editorial - King should in fact be replaced — the broader question for me is what the Register is doing to examine its own process for making an endorsement. Perhaps there should be an equally compelling call to replace the people who made the endorsement in the first place.

Finally, I hope it has not gotten lost on the editorial staff, that by clearly ignoring your responsibility as a fact-finding and reporting entity, you have not only undermined the value (if any) of your endorsements but the overall credibility of the paper itself.

Right on, sir! Steve King may be Iowa's Dumbest Congressman™, but the Des Moines Register Editorial Board is morer dumberer.

For a real hoot, visit NewsBank and find out why the Register endorsed Steve King over some inexperienced woman on October 27, 2004:

King's opponent, Joyce Shulte, has an impressive story, and Iowa is long overdue in sending a woman to Washington. During an interview with the Register, she stressed the importance of a representative staying in touch with the people of the district. She was the director of Quakerdale, a human services agency. She can identify with the personal challenges of Iowans after being widowed at a young age and going on to raise her children and earn a college degree. She sees a role for the federal government in protecting the Loess Hills. Yet the community college administrator from Creston needs more political experience before heading to Washington.

Joyce Schulte plans to run again in 2006. We advise Ms Schulte to get a sex change and a lobotomy, in addition to an industrial-strength set of kneepads, if she wants to earn the Register Editorial Board's endorsement next time.

On a related note, we were also pretty stoked to read the "Iowa Dumbest Congressman" quote being used in the Berkeley Daily Planet in an editorial by Becky O'Malley.

Rekha Basu Profiles Endangered Species: Evangelical Christian Democrats

We couldn't help but notice that the two Evangelical Christians/Democrats that Rekha Basu profiled this morning in the DMR are 87 and 85 years old.

What's the matter, Rekha? Couldn't you find any Democrats who are Evangelical Christians under the age of 60?

National Democrats To Iowa's Democrats: "Drop Dead, You Way Out Of Touch Cracker-Ass Yankee Honkies"

This article is from some The State, a newspaper in South Carolina:

South Carolina is a leading candidate to join Iowa and New Hampshire as early birds among the 2008 Democratic presidential primaries.

Working in the state’s favor: We’re cheap, we’re small, and we’re racially diverse...

South Carolina Democrats have gone all out to make it known they would like to keep the coveted first-in-the-South primary.

It makes sense, says former state Democratic Party chairman Dick Harpootlian, whose earlier clashes with the Democratic National Committee helped spur the latest rules change.

“What the party has to learn is that primaries dominated by New Hampshire and Iowa shouldn’t be allowed to define our nominee,” he says. “Iowa and New Hampshire are way out of touch.”


Iowa and New Hampshire — the leadoff contests that often set the tone for the race to come — represent less than 1½ percent of the country’s population. New Hampshire’s population is 96 percent white; Iowa’s is 95 percent.

South Carolina fits the definition of a small state with a large minority population. It has fewer than 5 million residents, about 30 percent of whom are black.

South Carolina was also the state with the highest percentage of votes for sack-of-shit liar Al Sharpton, at 10%.

South Carolina was also a backwards-ass state that was flying the Confederate Flag on top of their Statehouse from 1962 until 2000. It was originally approved by Democrat Fritz Hollings, who was Guv back then before he became a distinguished nigger-hating Senator.

Iowa may be full of cracker-ass honkies, but at least we've been negro friendly since about, oh, 1838. We also sent the highest state percentage of soliders to fight in the Civil War. 13,000 died. We guess word still hasn't hit Charleston that the war is over.

Yet we still agree with Howard Dean, who wants to move Iowa's caucuses out of the pole position. It makes sense. If the Democrats were smart, they'd start things in the South. Two reasons: It's where they still get the strongest candidates. And who in their right mind wants to fly around Iowa or New Hampshire in the middle of winter?

Mountain Lions In Muscatine

From the Muscatine Journal:

Muscatine County Conservation Board officials have confirmed that many area residents may begin having encounters with mounted lions as early as next week.

That’s when an extensive exhibit titled “Mountain Lions!” goes on display at the Environmental Learning Center at Discovery Park beginning Wednesday, Oct. 19...

Ron Andrews, Iowa Department of Natural Resources furbearer biologist, said the DNR had received hundreds sightings since 2000 with 14 confirmed by evidence of a carcass, tracks, authentic photo or actual viewing of a living animal by DNR or county conservation personnel.

Dave Bakke, a naturalist with the Board, said the exhibit has been traveling to various centers in Iowa for two years and was delivered to Muscatine this week.

“It’s very timely that it should come here now,” said Bakke, referring to the attention focused on supposed cougar sightings in the past year, including a confirmed report in the New Boston, Ill., area in December of 2004.

“People have been hearing so much about these animals, and we want to be sure they’re getting the correct information,” said Weiss.

Until the mid 1990s, the last confirmed sighting of a cougar in Iowa occurred in 1867 when a mountain lion was shot in Appanoose County.

“At that time, people killed them as soon as they found out they were in the area,” said Bakke. “In pioneer times, that was common practice. They were thought of as a threat to livestock and were pretty much hunted out of existence in Iowa.”

Ed Fallon On IPTV's Iowa Press

Ed Fallon is on IPTV's Iowa Press program this weekend. Nice suit, sir!

If you missed Friday's broadcast, check out Ed and the gang (Yepsen, Glover, etc) on Sunday at noon (Schedule). Iowa Press will also have a transcript and streaming video here.

Iowa Press is one of those shows that's generally unwatchable if you're a political junkie. You already know all the players and questions. It's a step up from crap like Crossfire or McLaughlin Group, but only because the pundits don't screetch and yell.

"Independent" Non-Xenophobe UI Law Student Googles Himself, Discovers "Asinine Snippets"

Somebody named Pedro Zayas sent us a love letter:

Hi there. Thanks for dedicating one of your blog pages to publish some of my writings. Moreover, I thank you for your asinine snippets, which not only demonstrate your lack of reading comprehension, but also, in contrast, make my own writing look much more powerful than it really is. If the red states are counting on people like you to provide intelligentsia for the right, it will be impossible for them to ever catch up with the economic and cultural wealth of the blue states.

Do you remember Pedro Zayas? He's the University of Iowa law student who advocated that illegal aliens in Iowa should be able to obtain a driver's license and then had the nerve to call all of us legal gringos living here a bunch of xenophobes if we had a differing opinion.

Zayas also claimed to be an "independent" in a Des Moines Register op-ed he wrote in 2004. The op-ed that was published right about the same time he was quoted in an article that indicated he was a participant for one of those Iowa Polls. How convenient for the Register, out of the 2.9 million people living in Iowa, that Mr Zayas could both participate in one of their polls as an "independent" and write an anti-Bush/pro-Kerry op-ed at about the same time. If those Gannettoids think that passed any smell test, they must all suffer from anosmia.

Thanks for the letter. We're always up for a chuckle. Glad to see you think we're carrying water for America's right-wingers. Stick around for another love-drenched post on Jeff Lamberti, Steve King, Jim Ross Nussle, Christopher Rants, David Oman, and Chuck Grassley this weekend.

BREAKING NEWS: JEFF LAMBERTI TO OFFICIALLY ANNOUNCE HIS CANDIDACY FOR CONGRESS!

Join Senate Co-President Jeff Lamberti for his Official Announcement next Monday, October 17th @ 9:00. Please be sure to RSVP to this exciting event by contacting Grant Young at 515-771-6104 email grant@jefflamberti.com

Official Campaign Announcement:
Monday, October 17th
Doors Open at 8:00am
Event Begins at 9:00am
DMACC Conference Center
2006 Ankeny Blvd – Building 7
Ankeny

HOW CAN I HELP JEFF?

1. Help Jeff kick off his campaign by forwarding this email to your friends, family and co-workers to invite them to the Official Announcement. Whatever you do, never ever EVER mention the Rock In Prevention scandal or the name "Pat McManus" to the press. Please. Pretty please. And if you see Pat standing outside the DMACC Conference Center with an acoustic guitar singing "Heroin" or "Sad Cunt From Preston" then just ignore him and walk in quickly.

2. Go to www.JeffLamberti.com to sign up and volunteer for the campaign. Do not, under any circumstances, mention how Jeff wanted to eliminate state income taxes on anybody under 30 years of age who is living in Iowa. That didn't poll very good and we'd like to forget about it.

WE HOPE TO SEE YOU MONDAY AT THE OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENT!


Related: Lamberti vs Boswell

Globe Spelled Backwards Is Eblog

The Mason City Globe Gazette now has blogs.

Here's an example:

Customer service just isn’t what it used to be.

Particularly on the telephone...

“Your call is important to us. All our representatives are tied up with other customers. Please stay on the line. You will be helped by the next available representative…”

Boy, I wish I had the copyright on that one.

And then the clincher: “Your wait will be approximately 10 minutes.”

If you have had this experience, I ask you - can you think of a time when your average wait was only 10 minutes?

Don't fall asleep!

And how are those blogs working over at the DMR? Here's a recent post by Jeffrey Bruner:

Fox has axed “The Simple Life,” perhaps realizing that America no longer has interest in watching talentless, vain trust-fund brats pretend to live among normal Americans.

In a perfect world, Paris Hilton would live the rest of her life without getting another five seconds of camera time or five words in print. She can’t act. She’s not beautiful. She’s not smart. No one has defined what’s wrong with America’s celebrity culture in the past decade more than this annoying woman.

In a perfect world, Paris Hilton would be making a new porn movie every so often featuring a revolving door of trust fund boys, girls, and Z-list celebrities.

We'd also pay money to see her shove a large piece of meat in her mouth.



Oh wait, she's already done all that? Nevermind.

The Number 8 Has Two Loopholes To Close

From the Daily Iowan:

To prevent college students on scholarship from living in housing designated for low-income families, UI officials on Thursday asked the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to close loopholes in its policy.

In a letter addressed to Macie Houston, the HUD regional director, UI Provost Michael Hogan and Phillip Jones, the vice president for Student Services, requested new rules that would count certain scholarships and family aid as income when deciding if a person is eligible for federally subsidized housing.

We'll believe it when we see it, mostly because last year's legislation was supposed to clear this matter up - and didn't.

We still think the media ought to ask a few questions to Chad Greenway's dad, Alan: a guy who can afford $3000 parking spots so friends and family tailgate together, SUVs to drive the family from South Dakota to the games, hiring extra help on the farm during the weekends, and who also received nearly $200,000 in farm welfare from 1995-2003.

Oh yeah, and that almost-$200,000 figure should be weighted against the average farmer, 80% of which received less than $7000 in farm welfare total between 1995 and 2003.

Maybe Chad Greenway, through one of those loopholes, somehow qualifies for taxpayer-financed housing. That doesn't make it OK to take housing away from poor people on waiting lists if you've got loaded parents and a free ride. All we're saying is that Greenway's case really doesn't pass the ethical smell test and the media ought to turn over some more rocks to find out for sure.

Bayh-Curious

Tim Higgins of the Des Moines Register cribs from the recent piece by Mike Glover concerning Senator Evan Bayh's call for Karl Rove to jump into a volcano because Rove supposedly "outed" a CIA employee in 2003 - the same CIA employee whose name has been listed in Who's Who since 1999.

Related: Evan Bayh Needs To Be Whacked Over The Head With A 1999 Edition Of Who's Who

"It's not a donation, it's a bribe"

From the Sioux City Journal:

Fallon takes on the 'big dogs'
By Charlotte Eby, Journal Des Moines Bureau

DES MOINES -- Joined by a parade of pint-sized pooches, Democratic candidate for governor Ed Fallon took aim at the "big dogs" in the race and big money interests he says are corrupting the Iowa Statehouse.

The state representative from Des Moines called for campaign finance reforms and said the state needs to end what he called "corporate giveaways" as an economic development strategy.

He said special interests that can afford to hire lobbyists and direct money to political campaigns are getting wealthy off state policies at the expense of average Iowans, while state government has become a "pawn of the special interests that fund the campaigns."

"We aren't in charge," Fallon told a group of about three dozen supporters who came to his rally with their pets. "The average Iowan's voice at the State Capitol has dwindled to a whisper..."


While special interests are profiting from tax breaks and subsidies, state policies are neglecting problems in health care, Fallon said.

"How come we can't seem to fix the health care system in this state, and yet we can give the insurance companies a $120 million annual tax break?" Fallon said.

Ice cream maker Wells' Dairy of Le Mars also benefited from state economic development programs after it considered moving its headquarters out of state. Members of the Wells family have donated close to $160,000 to the campaign of Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob Vander Plaats.

"For them it's not a donation, it's an investment," Fallon said. "From my point of view, it's not a donation, it's a bribe."

It's similar to government agencies like the IDED claiming they helped create 40 jobs at places like Soy Basics in New Hampton. Except, when you do the math, the taxpayer-financed contribution comes down to just $3000 a job.

Evan Bayh Needs To Be Whacked Over The Head With A 1999 Edition Of Who's Who

Evan Bayh, the possibly retarded Senator from Indiana who sounds like he's having trouble getting off the crackpipe, suggested in Des Moines today that Karl Rove should step down for supposedly leaking a CIA operative's name. From Mike Glover, an AP writer out of Des Moines, and published in the UK Guardian:

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) - A Democratic senator and potential 2008 presidential candidate said Thursday that White House political adviser Karl Rove must step down if he is linked to the leaking of a CIA operative's name.

Rove faces a fourth grand jury appearance in the investigation of the leaking of CIA officer Valerie Plame's name after her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, criticized the Bush administration's policies in Iraq.

``Even if he's not indicted, if it appears that a top adviser to the president of the United States was trying to harm someone personally for having a different public policy point of view, that's unacceptable behavior in the White House,'' Sen. Evan Bayh said.

If Bayh could just pull that mouse of his butt once and for all, he'd be able to surf over to the Wizbang blog and see this entry about Joesph Wilson from the 2003 edition of Who's Who:



And the post quotes a person who says that Plame's name is in Wilson's entry back to the 1999 edition of Who's Who.

Just in case you think our research may be suspect, we originally tracked all this down via the Talking Points Memo blog by Joshua Micah Marshall.

Now it's time to ream the AP's Mike Glover a new one for reporting complete bullshit. The least Glover could have done was challenge that dumbass.

Corn Burning Stoves

From Radio Iowa:

Rising energy prices are firing up the search for alternative fuels. A Sioux City dealer sells stoves made in Nebraska that'll burn wood pellets or ears of corn. Regional salesman Rob Stuhr says he can't keep up with all the orders. He calls the demand for alternative fuels "drastic," and beyond anything dealers could have imagined. He says the network's sold out of stoves beyond the spring of 2006. Stuhr says the stove can heat a home for hundreds of dollars less than traditional fuels. He says the company, Even-Temp Incorporated of Waco, Nebraska, anticipated the demand, and already added staff and lengthened shifts earlier this year. Despite the run on the stoves, a manager at Bomgaars says that retail chain, which has general stores in more than fifteen Iowa towns, expects to have them in stock this fall.

Aren't there any companies in Iowa making these stoves?


Update: These sorts of stoves will also burn pelletized switchgrass:

Additionally, switchgrass is well suited to co-generation schemes where other biomass material or municipal wastes can be used as additional fuel sources. For instance, continuing with the Iowa example, more than five-million tons of biomass from hybrid poplar trees and related "biomass-generator" crops could be grown for energy purposes each year in Iowa, producing more than 92-trillion BTUs of energy. This is equivalent to the energy consumed by more than 718,000 Iowa homes, or the energy content of nearly 37,000 100-ton railcars of coal.

718,000 homes? That's got to be more than half the homes in Iowa.

Soy Basics of New Hampton

From the Waterloo Courier:

The Travel Channel picked a candle made by Soy Basics of New Hampton for "America's Best," a new show.

"We're honored that they managed to single us out," Soy Basics co-owner Jon Nicoliasen said. "You don't know what the future holds for you."

Soy Basics started four years ago with six employees who hand made about 200 candles a day. The company now employees 50 people and manufactures 20,000 candles daily, making it the nation's largest soy candle manufacturer.

The wax in all of Soy Basics candles is made from soybeans. Nicoliasen said the candle is safe for the environment, unlike candles with wax made from petroleum...

Soy Basics also is poised for more growth. It's operation is almost finished with a 50,000-square-foot addition, expanding it to 100,000 square feet...

The show is scheduled to air at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 27. It also will re-run during the winter months.

We suspect that this company's products (Soy Basic's web site) and the way that they're marketed has more to do with their success rather than the $120,000 IDED grant issued a few years ago that was intended to "create 40 jobs."

Tom Vilsack May Want To Read This

From the Truth About Cars:

When voters elect the latest gladhander to their municipal and state governments, the chemical makeup of the gas down at their local pump is not usually high on their list of priorities. BUT if you’re an agricultural activist who wants to sell corn to the government to produce Ethanol, or an environmentalist who believes you possess the magic formula for reducing baby-killing smog in western cities, well, that’s a different story. These groups are extremely effective at lobbying government at the state and local level to create a "boutique" gasoline formula to further their cause. As a result, Missouri gas isn’t good enough to burn in California, whose gas cannot legally be sold in New York City or parts of Arizona.

According to Michael Ports of the Society of Independent Gasoline Marketers of Americas, "Twenty years ago, there were two blends of gasoline offered in three octane levels, and essentially one blend of diesel fuel. Today, there are more than 18 unique blends of gasoline mandated across the nation -- again offered in three octane grades -- and at least three different blends of diesel fuel." Okay, let’s do the math. I make it... 59 different blends of gasoline spread out over 50 states. Just to make things that much more complicated, no one refinery produces all 59 blends of gas; nor is any refinery typically dedicated to any one grade...


These factors blend together (so to speak) to create a sub-economy so complex it takes a Congressional inquiry or four to prove that "big oil" is not guilty of price gouging. Although scoring political points seems to be our elected officials’ official business, Congress would be better advised to simplify the regulatory chaos surrounding US gas production and distribution. I'm all for clean air, but there is no way that 59 different formulas of gas are necessary to accomplish this laudable goal. Picking a winning formula, even if it is more expensive to begin with, would help prevent supply and distribution problems. During times of crisis, the ability to borrow a cup of premium unleaded from your neighbor would be a strong force against severe price fluctuations, speculation and gouging.

Here's a question worth throwing out there: Can Iowa and other corn-producing states create enough hooch to satisfy a nation-wide 10% ethanol mandate from the Feds?

Related: Vilsack On Gas Price Gouging and Jim Ross Nussle Has Gas and Senator Tom Hypocrite

Bum Rushing The Des Moines Register

The Iowa Libertarian has a great synopsis of the Register's Young Adult Board Of Contributors this morning.

You can also read our entry from earlier this morning.

If anybody else wants to bum rush this piece, drop The Ed an email.

Poll Schmoll

We have been alerted to this Wall Street Journal poll that shows the Iowa Guv's race, at this point in time, essentially being a tossup:

Nussle 43.8%, Culver 43.5%

Culver 41.8%, Vander Plaats 41.7%

Nussle 45.8%, Fallon 40.3%

What if other people ran for Governor? Here's how we'd like to see those races polling:

Tom Arnold 49.8%, Fred Grandy 47.6%

Elijah Wood 48.4%, Ron Livingston 47.2%

Ashton Kutcher 46.9%, Corey Taylor 45.8%

Hayden Fry 99.6%, Erin Buzuvis 0.4%

Random 54%, Drew Miller 46%

Todd Dorman, 79.5%, David Yepsen 17.4%, Rekha Basu 2.5%, Ken Fuson 0.0%

Morgan Cline 85.5%, Clark McLeod 2.5%, David Oman (late with paperwork)

Annie Shuppy 86.9%, Heidi Schnackenberg (disqualified, lives in San Diego)

East Village Goes To The Dogs At 11:45am

The Ed Fallon anti-Kelo rally at ZZZ Records (414 Locust), just under the dome of the Capitol in Des Moines, kicks off at 11:45am.

A representative of the State 29 Gang will be on-hand to witness this.


Related: East Village Is Going To The Dogs On Thursday

Lenny Bruce Is Not Afraid

What could be funnier than reading the Register's Young Adult Board of Contributors entries for today?

With one natural disaster striking after another, the polar ice caps melting and a possible pandemic looming over the planet, would it still be unwise for me to hope the human race can finally pull itself together, as opposed to devising even more ways to destroy one another?

Or is this really, as some theorize, the end of the world?

- Beth McKiernan, Ames


How can everyday people protect themselves if the avian flu arrives? No media attention has been paid to in-home prevention.

Should we get flu shots? Would they even help? Do we need to kill all the poultry in the Far East? How can we even begin to combat a virus that is ever-changing and mutating to be resistant?

Although it's important to inform people that the government is starting to prepare for an upcoming threat, the media should be informing the public about how to prepare. The virus is predicted to be so deadly that the government will be able to do little once the pandemic begins.

- Kathryn Skilton, Nashua

Run for your lives!!!!!!!!! We're all going to die!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And then there's this from Heidi Schnackenberg, who's currently living in San Diego. Last we looked, San Diego is about as far away from Iowa as you can get in the 48 contiguous states:

Senator Chuck Grassley stated that 700 women, on average, are raped each day in the U.S. The advocacy group Men Against Violence states that 90 percent of violent crimes are committed by men.

There are scores of young women, girls, and boys being abducted, raped, kidnapped or killed nationally. What is going on with our men? There is a crisis in masculinity that the public can no longer ignore. The sexual perversities that accompany many of these crimes compound this crisis, and are very telling of something terribly wrong in how our men and boys are being raised.

Those of you who accuse State 29 of being a possibly sexist blog really ought to read what Ms Schnackenberg wrote here.

Since when do all these Feminasties think that the traits of masculinity are that of pedophilia, rape, and violent crime? That's deranged and sexist.

We're All Going To Die!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What's this Bird Flu nonsense that everybody is talking about? According to the Gannettoids, We're All Going To Die!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:

The administration is putting the finishing touches on its long-awaited pandemic plan to be released after Leavitt returns from his trip. A draft version, dated Sept. 30 and leaked to The New York Times, reportedly predicts a major outbreak might kill up to 1.9 million people and make half the country sick.

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, says he learned of the administration's prediction for the first time on Sept. 28 in a top secret meeting in a secure room in the Capitol. He and a few other senators met with Leavitt; Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases; and CDC director Julie Gerberding.

The administration, Harkin says, predicted deaths from pandemic flu could range from 100,000 to 2 million, and as many as 10 million people might be hospitalized. Up to 100 million might become sick. The briefing prompted Harkin to push for $4 billion in supplemental funds.

"We saw what happened when you're not prepared," he said. The money will bolster surveillance, increase stockpiles of antivirals including the one effective oral drug, Tamiflu; increase the vaccine supply and help state and local health officials prepare for epidemics.

So let's see here. Tom Harkin attends a super-secret meeting in a "secure room" inside the Capitol on September 28th and, voila!, two days later all the gory, Ray Nagin-esque details end up in the New York Times.

Looks like Sandy Burglar isn't the only Democrat with an 8 1/2" x 11" trouser snake in his pants!

And at least we'll be able to use up all those extra bodybags left behind after Hurricane Katrina and the Iraq War. We might even solve the Social Security insolvency problem if old people start dropping like, ahem, dead birds.

And Harkin wants $4 billion to combat the bird flu epidemic? Who's going to pay for that? The Jim Ross Nussle charge card?

Perhaps Harkin could shoehorn in another $100 million for David Oman and Company so that the Rainforest can be built and the Cure For Cancer will be discovered there.

Fire Up The Ovens

This piece in Front Page Magazine today reminded us that the Iowa chapter of the Friends of Sabeel will be holding their conference this Friday and Saturday at Coe College in Cedar Rapids.

We wonder if Tanis Diedrichs will continue to accuse Israel of "ethnic cleansing" and if they'll have a big Rachel Corrie martyrdom lovefest.


Related: Welcome Iowa Jew-Haters

"I will never forgive her"

From the Des Moines Register:

"I will never forgive her,'' Patton said. "She hasn't shown any remorse for killing my daughter. If she goes on probation, how do we know she won't do it again?"

Where did 15 year old Addy Beecher get the drugs and the car? Find those people and charge them with something. Don't give this killer a slap on the wrist because of her age. And it's a damn shame that Iowa's soft-on-crime laws won't put her away very long as an adult.


Related: Iowa Still Soft On 15 Year Old Illegally Driving Cokeheads Who Kill


Update: This seems rather bogus. From the QC Times: Prosecutor: Hit-and-run case may be difficult to try

Vilsack Defends Corporate Welfare

The DMR sure has been in full "save Vilsack's hide" mode lately.

Here's a piece by Thomas Beaumont in Wednesday's paper on Vilsack taking criticism from candidates like Ed Fallon that the Iowa Values Fund is nothing more than "corporate welfare."

"With all due respect to my friends in my party, I think they're wrong. And I think I've got the facts to prove it," Vilsack said during a meeting with Des Moines Register reporters and editors.

State Rep. Ed Fallon of Des Moines has been the chief Values Fund critic among the Democratic gubernatorial candidates, established in 2003 as a financial incentive for businesses to relocate or expand in Iowa...

Fallon opposed the measure, enacted with bipartisan support in 2003, before it was struck down last year by the Iowa Supreme Court over a dispute about Vilsack's veto power.

The Legislature revived the program this year, agreeing to spend $50 million annually for 10 years to entice businesses to stay, move or expand in Iowa. The measure also included tax credits for businesses that add jobs.

Vilsack said the program had helped create or retain about 20,000 jobs with an average annual salary of $37,000. State economic development officials said more than 300 projects had been awarded a total of more than $99 million since June 2003.

Fallon said Tuesday he doubts the reliability of the job figures Vilsack and the department have reported.

He said the Values Fund has drained money from the state treasury that could be spent on essential services.

Fallon's absolutely right. This is nothing more than corporate welfare. Even worse, it's corporate welfare paid for by Iowa taxpayers and businesses that is used to compete with other existing Iowa businesses.

Speaking of Ed Fallon, don't miss tomorrow's rally in the East Village. Details here.