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The Conservative Reader:
Iowa

Fleecing The Ones You Love

Fleecing The Ones You Love

In full harmony with the wreckless abandon that led to two northeast Iowa communities getting a combined total $100,000 in relief money for weather related damage that never happened to them, news that Cedar Rapids residents who need relief are going to take second place to other community projects.

There are some great Des Moines Register reader comments at the story site above.  Many questions, most pointed being “What is being done to ensure the next flood doesn’t cause this kind of damage?”, are being asked.  And while I can certainly agree that when rebuilding from the ground up one would want to start afresh instead of just rebuilding the same structure in the same location, one can also rebuild in phases, designing facilitities to ensure that basic services and features are available while leaving additional work for later years or donations to provide additional space.

And that is all well and good for things like the Library.  Museums can wait a bit.  I would go so far as to say that Iowans as a whole, as generous as they are, would rather see any money going to building homes, levies, drainage systems, etc. instead of non-essentials (though desirable) such as a museum. 

Also, in rethinking the Libraries that need to be rebuilt, I can undestand needing to provide additional space for internet workstations.  But with all of the content that available digitally, how much paper-based primary sources for research are really needed?  I can see liesure reading material as important, but there should be a lot of content that can be left for internet access these days, it seems. 

All that said, this topic should be about priorities and limits.  Identify the things that truly need to be fixed or replaced (like peoples homes, especially if they are living in FEMA housing), but I don’t agree with spending state money, during such hard times economically, on non-essentials.  Let the private donors solve that for now, and wait for better times to fund more cultural projects.

But government won’t change their direction just because I say they should.  Or even if the majority of Iowans say they should.  That is, until those Iowans show up at the voting booth and find better leaders.

Iowa Race For Governor: Now Featuring Paul McKinley

Iowa Race For Governor: Now Featuring Paul McKinley

paul-mckinley-2My buddy Tim Albrecht at The Bean Walker sent out this exclusive update today:

In an exclusive Bean Walker interview, Senate Republican leader Paul McKinley says he will file the necessary paperwork to form a gubernatorial exploratory committee.

He says he will remain focused on his job as the Senate GOP leader, and expects to come to a decision “by early fall.”

McKinley will join Bob Vander Plaats, Rep. Chris Rants and Christian Fong, who have all filed the necessary paperwork in their potential runs for governor.

Full story by clicking here: http://www.thebeanwalker.com.

This is turning into a fairly respectable field, and not too awry from what I would have expected, although Christian Fong had only come to my attention a couple of weeks ago.

The candidates are still working through the initial “Who Am I, Really?” phase of their campaigns, from what I think I know about these candidates we can probably expect Vander Plaats to be more heavily focused on social issues than the rest of the field, while McKinley will be very focused on fiscal issues.  I’ve met all of these gentlemen at least once with the exception of Fong (who my friend David Chung tried to introduce to me at the Night of The Rising Stars Iowa GOP event in June, but didn’t work out), and those that I’ve met seem to have a good personality for the job.  Fact is, I still don’t know much about any of them.

Unfortunately, it’s going to be difficult to get a good read on where the candidates stand on the issues that Iowans will care about in 2010 just yet.  Partly because we don’t know what those issues will be (although I strongly suspect it will be all about the state budget, spending and taxation).  So, like most long campaigns (11 months to the June 8, 2010 primary), our perception of how well each of these men would serve will be formed and reformed until we get into the Spring of 2010.

A couple of comments:

  1. I am please to see an ethnically diverse candidate (Fong) in the mix.  It is refreshing to see more and more people from diverse cultures step up and offer their skills as leaders in our communities, and we should do all we can to encourage folks like Christian to step out and lead.
  2. I think it is time to see some women consider running for Governor.  For the past several years, I was represented in both the Iowa House and Senate by women (Libby Jacobs, who stepped down last year, and Pat Ward).  I have know a number of other women legislators from around the state and they all provide strong leadership.  While I am not advocating any specific person, it would be great to start seeing some of these women considering a run for Governor, and not to run because they are women, but because they have been gifted with the skills and vision to lead our state.  I believe some of them have, and that should be reason enough.

Linda Lantor Fandel expressed similar thoughts about the presence of women on the Supreme Court yesterday in the Des Moines Register.  I think, if I grasped her point correctly, that she and I both agree that the key issue in political diversity is not voting for someone or appointing someone because of their gender or ethnicity, but rather the grasping of opportunities by women and ethnically diverse individuals.  No one should feel constrained or limited because they are not male or white.

And just think, before this is all over, we will be starting to look at candidates for President for 2012.  We never get a break, do we?

2009 Iowa General Assembly Preview

2009 Iowa General Assembly Preview

Monday January 12 will be the opening session of the 2009 General Assembly.  This year’s session timetable is here.  As was the case the pass two years, both the House and the Senate have Democratic majorities.

We urge you, as the session progresses, to take the time to communicate with your elected representatives.  Go to this link, and find your representative’s name, click on it, and you’ll get phone numbers, email addresses, information about committee assignments and links to bill sponsorships.  I will be in contact with Peter Cownie and Pat Ward, the House and Senate members who represent me here in West Des Moines.

I exchanged emails with Peter last week.  This is his freshman years in the Statehouse, and he managed to get assigned to Appropriations, Economic Growth, Educatio nand Labor committees, and on Appropriations, he is the ranking member of the Economic Development subcommittee.  He told me that this year is pretty much all about the Budget.

Which leads me to Friday Night’s Iowa Press on IPTV.  Senator Mike Gronstal (D-Senate Majority Leader from Council Bluffs) and Representative Pat Murphy (D-Speaker of the House from Dubuque) were grilled by Dean Borg (the host), David Yepsen from the Des Moines Register, and Mike Glover from the Associated Press.

The message from Gronstal and Murphy was the same one that Peter heard… it’s about the budget.  We’ve already seen Governor Culver make two swipes at state spending to try and get the budget aligned with expected revenues.  Gronstal started responding to the budget question from Glover by saying that committees will be working hard on cutting expenses, and then proceeded to hit the first shortsighted decision which is the canceling of plans for a new state office building.  Gronstal said: “we need a new state office building, Wallace needs to be replaced but not today.”  On the one hand, if we don’t have the money, we don’t have the money… but on the other hand the cost of the new building, which “we need” will jump up every year we wait.  On the third hand, we could reduce the size of government and eliminate the need for the Wallace Building altogether, but that’s not likely to happen.  This is one project that needs more careful review in my opinion.

As they discussed ideas such as leasing the Lottery (an idea that’s been floated around lately) and allowing open positions in government to stay vacant, it became clear that Gronstal wasn’t quite prepared to express a confident opinion about anything yet… he said he wasn’t going to reject any idea until looking at the details.  Glover asked about what has been at the heart of the Lottery question for decades, which is the possibility that leasing it to private interests could quickly lead to expanded gambling in Iowa (as if any more expansion is going to really matter any longer), which Gronstal rejected out of hand.  Yepsen went on the offensive, asking about campaign contributions from gambling interests, and Gronstal didn’t like it:

Yepsen: The gambling industry makes campaign contributions to state legislators. How much does that have to do with this decision? If the gambling industry wants to buy the lottery from you and you’re getting thousands of dollars in campaign donations doesn’t it get sold?

Gronstal: No, David, I don’t think that’s true at all. Look, I think it’s an interesting idea, it’s one worth considering. If we go through that process we very well may decide, no, it doesn’t make sense. But why reject the idea of considering it? I think that’s fairly silly to reject even considering an idea. I’m actually really surprised at your critical questions. The legislature has often advocated considering privatization.

Yepsen: We always ask critical questions, Senator.

Gronstal: But the idea of privatization shouldn’t be rejected out of hand.

Yepson then took the opportunity to jump to a question that should be bugging all of us: AFSCME, the state workers union, is asking for a 5% pay raise for workers next year, and another 5% the year after that.  While people in the private sector are losing their jobs, not getting raises even close to 5%, and the key question of how every state worker makes 30% more than the average citizen.  Gronstal made one smart-mouthed response about CEOs (that was just inappropriate), and then said he wouldn’t comment on it because of the fact that the state is actively engaged in negotiations, and it’s the Governor’s job, not the General Assembly.  Yepsen kept the heat up, Murphy tried defending the salaries by talking about what some of the state workers do (covering maybe 5% of those workers… don’t get me wrong, I want police and fire protection paid well, but we’re talking about a lot of overpaid workers).

Bottom line on the union is that we won’t get any serious discussion about this from Democratic leaders because they’ll lick the union bosses’ shoes just to ensure they continue to have votes in 2010.  And we’ll be left holding the check.

There was a good conversation about the use of the state’s Rainy Day Fund and the general Cash Reserve.  It was good to hear that the leaders would consider usnig the RDF if necessary to ensure Iowans that are struggling from the weather and economic disasters of 2008 are helped appropriately… I agree that the Cash Reserve should be left alone as that is needed to ensure that we don’t need to borrow money if revenue shortfalls start to impact cash flows.

Also good conversation around the numerous proposals for local option sales taxes and the possibility of introducing flexibility for local governments to collect fees to offset property taxes.  Gronstal actually said something I can strongly agree with: property taxes are too high.  The trouble is, some fees are just another property tax, so I’m not exactly keen on that.  Local option sales taxes are fine, and all the state is doing is allowing the local governments to decide to impose them… the state doesn’t pay or benefit from that EXCEPT that the pressure on the state to help out is reduced.

They also discussed the proposal to raise the gas tax by a nickel to help create jobs and improve the existing transportation infrastructure.  I’m a bit torn… I like the fact that it helps keep people employed, but I hope we don’t end up wasting money on unnecessary projects.

They also hit on teacher pay, and corrections facility needs.  The most revealing statement of the evening came next, however.  Yepsen asked if Gay Marriage would be debated this year.  Both politicians flatly said “No.”, with Murphy adding that they were going to “let the courts make that decision”.  It shouldn’t amaze me that these guys are clearly incapable of true leadership, but I suppose when you know you lack both a credible position and will lose power if you do the right thing, having the Iowa Supreme Court there to bail you out is certainly a reasonable option.

Gronstal ended by saying this year is about the Budget and Disaster Recovery.  I wonder whether we’ll ever recover from the 2009 session?

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