Radio Iowa

Grammar police, part II

The Iowa Senate has begun debating the anti-smoking bill.  The bill's floor manager, Senator Staci Appel (D-Ackworth), uttered a few clunkers as she read her opening remarks. We'll see if Senate Democratic Leader Mike Gronstal of Council Bluffs chooses to ridicule her mistakes later tonight in the same way he ridiculed those uttered by Senator Brad Zaun (R-Urbandale) last night.

"This bill is not a divisive issue for those who have chose to smoke," Appel said in her opening remarks.  "...That is my opening comments, Mr. President, and I believe there is amendments."

Gronstal as grammar policeman

The Iowa Senate debated state education policy this evening for nearly four hours. 

The grammar police in the crowd cringed when Senator Brad Zaun, a Republican from Urbandale, declared his disgust with how the debate "had went."

Later, Mike Gronstal of Council Bluffs, the leader of Democrats in the Senate, offered this critique of Zaun's speech. "I've heard people tonight talk about what standards should be in the core curriculum and I've heard the English language murdered on the floor of the Senate here. 'What we done was'" Gronstal said, repeating one of Zaun's mistakes.  "What kind of language is that?"

In the "dog ate my homework" category...

The Senate Transportation Committee was scheduled to debste a bill today that outlines new restrictions for teen drivers (SSB 3085).  Senator Tom Hancock, however, informed the committee he had lost the "official" copy of the bill.  It seems to have vanished during or after Hancock evacuated the statehouse last week during the fire alarm (the alarm was set off when floating dust hit sensors in the law library at the capitol). 

Jeneane Beck of Iowa Public Radio says Hancock admited to the committee that legislators get "in big trouble" for losing the "official" copy of a bill.  For those of you who've never seen one, these official copies of bills are placed in a light blue folder.  So if you see that folder, you might want to return it to Hancock.

Everything old is new again

The weekend focus on NAFTA -- the Clinton rebuke & the Obama mailer brought to mind a story on Radio Iowa from November 13, 2007.  This perhaps was the first time this subject came up on the campaign trail, and what the Obama camp alleged in the mailer is pretty much what he said in Dubuque that day at a labor convention.

You can listen to his remark on the subject here (mp3 runs about 25 seconds). 

Here is the pertinent part: "When a candidate rails against NAFTA today, you, then I think it's fair, then, to ask her where she was with NAFTA 20 years ago, right?" Obama said. 

One member of the audience yelled out, "Hey, hey!"  Others laughed and many of the union members applauded. 

"...You don't just suddenly wake up and say, 'Boy, NAFTA's a terible thing,' after having been for it," Obama said.

Obama swiped at Edwards that day, too, and the Edwards campaign provided a quick response.  The Clinton campaign did not.

Iowa Supreme Court vacancy

The Iowa Supreme Court has released a list of the people who have applied for the opening on the Iowa Supreme Court.  News release after the jump:

Clinton dropped $95,000 for deli sandwiches

The New York Post has a story no doubt generated after a reporter combed through Hillary Clinton's campaign expense report.  Clinton apparently spent $95,000 at a Hy-Vee deli in West Des Moines on January 1.  The Post refers to Hy-Vee as a "low-end supermarket-deli chain" in the story.

Culver and the penny

Governor Chet Culver spoke Wednesday morning to about two dozen members of the Iowa State Education Association.  The topic of the local option sales tax came up during Culver's discussion with the group.  Culver indicated he was "open" to using the sales tax revenue on teacher salaries and he urged the ISEA members to contact their legislators and lobby on the issue.  Local option sales taxes are currently reserved for school infrastructure projects. Voters in each of Iowa's 99 counties have approved a local option sales tax for schools, but for a duration of 10 years.  Legislators are mulling a bill which would make permanent the penny sales tax -- statewide -- and distribute the money back to schools on a per pupil basis.

After his meeting with the ISEA, Culver spoke briefly with reporters from Radio Iowa and The Des Moines Register. (FYI:  School Infrastructure Local Option is shortened to "SILO" among statehouse regulars)

Radio Iowa's O. Kay Henderson:  "I don't remember what you've said about SILO.  Do you think there should be a statewide sales tax collected for school infrastructure?"

Culver:  "I've said I'm open to discussing this with the legislature and figuring out if this is the right time so I've encouraged debate.  I've encouraged discussion.  I'm seeking, you know, input from educators, from legislators.  I do, my goal, if you will, is to make sure we're giving equal educational opportunities to young people regardless of where they live and the fact is we do have some concerns about that and it's historically always been a challenge so if SILO can help us address it, you know, that might be another reason to try to do it."

Henderson:  "Do you have concerns about how broadly that money should be used?  Should it be narrow or what do you think the money should be used for because that's part of the discussion?"

Culver:  "Well, yeah.  It's not clear. We've got a lot of competing ideas on how to best utilize those additional resources.  The other complicating factor is you have counties like Johnson County, for example, that just passed this and they've already kind of planned on how they want to use it and they've budgeted and this could have an impact on those plans so, but I still think it's possible that we could arrive at some consensus before the end of the session."

The Des Moines Register's Megan Hawkins:  "I just want to go back to that sales tax issue real quick.  You kind of hit on this.  Would you support changing it from just being used for facilities to actually pay for staff?"

Culver:  "Um, you know, it's too early to tell you that.  Again, if we can work on this in a bipartisan way and get some consensus I'm confident we can use this as a vehicle to address a lot of different needs and that might be one of them."

Iowa House endorses statewide smoking ban

After four-and-a-half hours of debate, the Iowa House has passed a bill that would ban smoking in most public places around the state. 

Here's the Radio Iowa story.

Vote tally was 56 to 44, with Democrats providing most of the "yes" votes and Republicans providing most of the "no" votes.  Eleven Republicans, though, voted "yes" and nine Democrats voted "no" -- there's no link yet on the Iowa General Assembly website to the roll call vote.

Leader says Iowa Guard "stretched & stressed"

Iowa National Guard Adjutant General Ron Dardis delivered the annual "Condition of the Guard" address this morning at the Iowa statehouse.  The title on the front page of the text was the following:  "The Iowa National Guard – From Prairie Soldier to Global Minuteman, a legacy of service”  The text of his speech is below.

Blast from the past

Some of you long-timers on Iowa's political scene may remember David Wilhelm. Wilhelm was the Iowa campaign manager for Joe Biden's 1988 run for the White House.  Wilhelm met Degee Dodds of Danville, Iowa, during that '88 Iowa campaign and the two married.  Wilhelm's father-in-law was a former state representative from southeast Iowa, a minister who served as the chaplain for Burlington's minor league baseball team.  One former Burlington resident, Ron Parker, describes Wilhelm's father-in-law as a "delightful guy."

But back to David Wilhelm.  Wilhelm was the manager of Bill Clinton's 1992 campaign.  After Clinton won, Wilhelm became head of the Democratic National Committee.

Well, Wilhelm's not endorsing Hillary Clinton.  He's endorsing Obama according to this from Time magazine.