Iowa is 14% Liberal

I missed this from a week ago, buried at the bottom of a Des Moines Register story:

The ideological tilt in the Iowa electorate appears to favor Branstad: 48 percent of voters describe themselves as conservative, 34 percent moderate and 14 percent liberal.

I have issues with the whole "conservative/moderate/liberal" labeling and what constitutes a definition for each. For the media, the labels tend to always boil down to the abortion issue or gay marriage rather than, say, whether or not you think Obama's massive deficits are a good idea or not.

Iowa is a weird state. We love our incumbents. How else do you explain voting Branstad back in, or re-electing the likes of Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin over and over again? It's kind of sad, really.

The whole 14% liberal thing is an interesting figure. Those are the true believers. The big Reds. The ones who will drive off the cliff with Obama at the wheel. The ones with the Gore/Lieberman and Kerry/Edwards bumperstickers still on their Saab. In other words, the Des Moines Register Editorial Board and pretty much every opinion columnist working for a dying newspaper within our borders.

As for the 34% moderate figure, I'm certain this contains a bunch of liberals who like to lie about what they believe in. They probably think Dan Rather is a moderate. Or Jon Stewart. In other words, they're delusional. The only time they get uppity about Republicans is when some "teabagger" challenges a liberal Republican. Also in that bunch are the "country club Republicans", who are generally older white males who are prudent about their own money and go to church regularly, but who have fucked around on their wives or get drunk way too often and who gets all soppy when Sally Struthers comes on TV with a kid whose eyes are full of flies.

And what about the 48% self-described conservatives? Are they social conservatives or fiscal conservatives? There's a big difference in that term. I like balanced budgets without raising taxes, does that make me conservative? I like people to not cause crimes and, if you do, you should go away to jail or prison, so does that make me conservative? I like legal immigrants who aren't exploited by companies, does that make me conservative? I like a business climate that is favorable to private enterprise but one in which the government doesn't try to pick winners and losers, does that make me conservative? But since liberals overwhelmingly run the dying newspaper industry in Iowa, you can be sure they believe half of Iowa is full of bible-thumping, nigger-lynching, "God Hates Fags" types, and so that's how they'll spin it down the road.

So if Iowa is really 14% liberal, why are all the newspapers run by libs? Why are all the columnists pushing the lib meme?

Why is the University of Iowa 8% Republican and the law school faculty has one registered Republican out of 50?

Why is the Iowa Judicial Nominating Committee comprised of 86% Democrats and 7% Republicans?

I'm not saying you should have quotas or anything. Certainly, there should be political fairness when it comes to the Judicial Nominating Committee.

But why don't newspapers hire a few local columnists who don't tow the liberal line? I'm not saying you've got to go find the next Rush Limbaugh or Mark Levin. Do liberals only read newspapers? It hasn't gotten that far, has it? But when it comes to deciding whether to keep reading, isn't it easier for self-described "conservatives" to give up and drop their subscription when nothing they read reflects any of their values?