Battle of Madison moves to Des Moines

Battle of Madison moves to Des Moines

The Battle of Madison moves to Des Moines tomorrow as the House holds a public hearing (6-8:15 pm) on House Bill 545, which would end binding arbitration for public employee and generally scuttle collective bargaining. "Wisconsin lite," says local labor leader Patrick Hughes.

If you're headed up there's a "Rally to Save Iowa's Middle Class" beforehand at 5. Bus leaving Coral Ridge Mall (by Barnes & Noble) at 3 pm on Monday.

I'll be otherwise occcupied; Ron Paul is headed to the People's Republic for the second in Bob Vander Plaats' "Presidential Lecture" series. That's at 4 at the IMU. Show up early to submit questions, but fair warning: BVP screened them all last month with Pawlenty. (Scheduled for April and May: Bachmann, Santorum).

And as the Republican candidates flood the state, Iowa's not forgotten by The Prez:

The president's reelection committee plans to put its own organizations into the early primary and caucus states - Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.

"We can't cede the playing field," one adviser said. "We can't just play general election. So we're going to have to organize on the ground in early states."

Note the presence of experienced Iowa hand Jennifer O’Malley Dillon.

The Reg has a must-read on the brewing battle between Christie Vilsack and Blue Dog Boswell. Of note: "Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader in the U.S. House, is scheduled to headline a fundraiser for Boswell at the home of Des Moines lawyer Roxanne Conlin on March 24." So much for the Iowa-Mississippi Club solidarity...

Dumb and Dumber

Dumb and Dumber

Dumb = Steve King: "Planned Parenthood is invested in promiscuity."



Dumber: Ex-Louisiana Gov. Buddy Roemer, who hasn't won an election since 1987, who swapped parties mid-term only to lost a primary to David freakin' DuKKKe, wants to run for... president? This guy makes Rick Santorum's resume of losing a home state senate race look solid.

Also seen around the web:

The recent Supreme Court ruling finds me in agreement with Fred Phelps:

In upholding the rights of the members of Westboro Baptist, the Supreme Court - in a surprisingly united 8-1 decision - rightly embraced one of this country's most cherished principles. Speech cannot be quashed or punished simply because it is hateful or expresses an aberrant point of view.

First Amendment cases are always on the edge. Burning flags, Larry Flynt, Illinois Nazis.

Before there's even a map, the D Trip doubles down for Blue Dog Boswell.

And Bear fan Obama, perhaps hoping to stymie the Pack's title defense, declines to intervene in NFL owner-labor dispute.

Johnson County Dems Elect Officers

Johnson County Dems Elect Dahms Chair

Hello from the IC school district building. It's 7:00 and time for the election of the Johnson County Democratic Party's officers. This slate will run the show through the 2012 caucus cycle and presidential election.

Incumbent chair Dennis Roseman is stepping down; Terry Dahms is the only announced candidate that I know of. As for me I've taken the anti-Sherman statement: if nominated I will run, if elected I will serve.

The election will be followed by the "off-year caucus," which party rules require but basically means passing some resolutions.

Sarge At Arms Tom Larkin starts the show and electing the new chair is item one. I take that back; rules are item one, THEN the chair.

While we read the rules, we have some electeds on hand: supervisors Sullivan Neuzil and Harney.

Rules approved.

24 voting members on hand as of 7:08; time to elect.

Peter Hansen nominates Dahms. No other nominations. Unanimous. Larkin hands the gavel over.

Dahms starts by thanking the Rosemans (Robin Roseman holds over as platform chair because that's elected at convention)

Mike Carberry nominated for first vice chair (no "Co" like the GOP). Acclimation again. That's traditionally the GOTV job.

Meredith Place nominated for 2nd Vice Chair. She was a staffer in the `10 cycle and a recent ex-UDems chair. Once again, party unity. 2nd Vice Chair is historically the event-parade job.

Treasurer: Gina Schatteman nominated. She was treasurer in the `08 cycle, then left town for work-related research for a year or so. Acclimation.

Secretary: Carl Fongheiser is our first re-elect of the night. Sue Bruell named permanent acting secretary.

Candidate Development: goes vacant for the moment. (If anything, we tend to have surplus candidates.)

Data management: I'm re-elected.

Fundraising: Liz Etchells re-elected.

Membership chair: Lori Bears elected. Not using any ballots so far.

Public Relations: Karen Disbrow by acclimation.

So that's the slate of officers as of 7:25. We shift into the brief official central committee meeting.

May 7 Hall of Fame dinner planned; guests of honor are Dick and Doris Myers, Ralph and Arlene Neuzil, and Jae Retz and Roberta Till-Retz.

Joe Nehring calls our attention to anti-labor bills in IA Legislature; public hearing in Des Moines Monday 6 PM.

Jean Lloyd-Jones is hosting a $raiser for Dave Loebsack at her home 2-4 PM Sunday March 13.

Matt Beltrami from OFA steps up for The Prez with "Promises Kept" packets.

Carberry talks energy rates and nukes in the legislature.

Ed Flaherty makes his annual announcement of the anniversary of the Iraq War. 11:00 March 19 the walk starts at the Courthouse. (St. Joseph's Day for the Bohemies in the house) Hopefully the last one. But I think I said that last year.

Meeting transitions to caucus at 8:27.

Ed Flaherty offers end war in Afghanistan resolution based on last week's DNC resolution. Passes with no dissent.

Joe Nehring supports collective bargaining for all public sector workers. Party Unity once again.

Nancy Porter wants to add a platform clause on education "provided by the public education system." We decide it goes better as a free standing resolution. It passes, then we struggle with how to say Private Education Is Good Too but can't pull it off. So we give up and adjourn at 8:56. Thus the Dahms Administration begins.

Iowa To Lead Senate Seniority

Iowa To Lead Senate Seniority

Yesterday's retirement announcement by Sen. Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii) marks a major milestone for Iowa. Assuming they stay in office, the Iowa team of Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin will give our state the most senior Senate delegation in the country.

Smart Politics just crunched the numbers and shows Iowa at number two behind the state the President grew up in (sorry, Huckabee). The just-re-elected Grassley has 30 years and change while Harkin, with four years to go on his term, sits at 26. (Harkin happens to be the most senior junior senator.)

That's a total of 56, and 60 by the 2012 election when Hawaii will drop to Daniel Inouye's 50 (!) years. Even with a brand new freshman, that STILL leaves them at number two.

Hawaii can't do what number three state Indiana did, when they replaced two term Evan Bayh with 10 year former Senator Dan Coats. Hawaii has no living former senators. Coats' prior service only puts him at the top of the class of 2010 for committee assignments and such. In any case Indiana is likely to drop soon as six-termer Dick Lugar is at the top of the tea party primary list.

Iowa's rise has been accelerated by the devastation of the top ranks of Senate seniority since 2008. Ted Stevens and Arlen Specter got beat, Pete Domenici and Chris Dodd left semi-voluntarily, Joe Biden got promoted to vice president, and mortality took Bob Byrd and Ted Kennedy.

It's a far cry from the dark ages of the 60s and 70s. We went 20 years, 1966 to 1986, without re-electing ANY Senator. Harold Hughes retired after one term; Jack Miller, Dick Clark, John Culver and Roger Jepsen all got beat.

Iowa is also the only state in the current top ten with a split-party team. Indiana did till recently but Lugar had far more seniority that Bayh. Research project: has ANY other state EVER had a Senate pair of opposing parties with both senators in fifth terms or more? UPDATE from the comments: Yes. Strom Thurmond and Fritz Hollings.

Exclusive Interview with Jerry Mandering

Exclusive Interview with Jerry Mandering

In the biggest political scandal to hit Iowa since Terry Branstad appointed his donors to the Regents and Supreme Court, the secretive Iowa-based redistricting consultant Jerry Mandering has been caught working not only for both major political parties, but for a term limits organization as well.

In an exclusive, we have the first interview with the elusive Mandering.

You're working for two parties AND for US Term Limits. That's pretty shameless.

Hey, a guy's gotta eat. You know how hard it is being an Iowa based gerrymandering consultant? The clean districting system Iowa's got, with the nonpartisan Legislative Service Bureau drawing the map, makes it hard for a guy like me to make a living. You know how much they pay for this s*** in Texas?

Funny how your job works with your name.

Yeah, Ma said it was my destiny.

What was her name?

Sally. Sally Mandering. My dad's Garry Mandering. He says "gary" is how the guy who drew the first one of these, Vice President Elbridge Gerry, said the name.

Anyone else in your family?

I have a sister, Jeri Mandering, which gets confusing sometimes. Plus I got two brothers, Peyton and Eli, but they don't like maps, they just play football. That's a wimp sport compared to the total war of political cartography. Only thing is, the Super Bowl is every year but I only get a Census every ten.

I didn't see your brothers in the Super Bowl this year.

Yeah, I hear you're a Packer fan. Anyway, who'da thought the Pack winning the Super Bowl would be the SECOND biggest story out of Wisconsin in February?

Let's look at the maps, starting with the one you did for the Republicans.



Right. I started by shoving all the students, professors, and overpaid public employees I could find into one district. Hawkeye, Cyclones, Panthers, even whatever those Grinnell kids call themselves. It's got not just Black Hawk and Linn, but Johnson too. So Dave Loebsack has nowhere to move. It's him or Braley, baby.

But you put Tom Latham in that seat too.

Yeah, technically, Latham needs to move. But he goes back to the farm in Alexander. He just moved to Ames a few years back. And I gave him as much of the surrounding old turf I could manage. Polk dominates no matter what district you put it in, because it's bigger than half a district. But this district has pretty much all the suburbs. Latham beats Boz in this map. I hear you been bugging him to retire for a while.

Steve King is solid no matter how you draw him, but I love that panhandle you stretched over to the Mississippi.

And I made that open seat in the south for Mariannette Miller-Meeks. Maybe Christie Vilsack could make a go of it. A two-woman race would finally get us out of the no-women club with Mississippi. But in a good year Republicans could go 3-1 with this map.

Have you shown this to Mike Gronstal?

Nah, you're the first.

You realize this one would never pass the Democratic Senate.

Not my job. I just draws `em. A guy can dream, can't he? But since you asked, I don't think a plan that pairs two Dems or two Republicans will fly, unless there's a clear exit strategy for one of the guys who gets paired, like I gave Latham here. Doing this business I get to know a lot of good realtors. I think it comes down to Latham-Boswell, and that comes down to where they put Dallas County.

Besides, the whole plan is a package, up or down, legislative and congressional maps together. And when it comes down to it, the legislators are looking at their own seats, not the congressional. So these things don't always go party line. So all I gotta do is give two Democratic Senators a sweet district, and bada-bing, they can shove this through. Hey, the Legislative Service Bureau might do that on accident, without even tryin'. They don't even know where people live.

Speaking of which, where are your state legislative maps?

Highly classified. That's what they pay me the big bucks for.

Fair enough, Jerry. Let's see what you drew for the Democrats.



Well, they did pretty good with the old map so Braley and Loebsack I left alone, they've got the overwhelming majority of their old districts.

You moved Muscatine.

Big freakin' deal. You gotta do something just to earn your consulting fee.

Loebsack moves into some GOP turf in the west.

Dave can handle a few Dutchmen from Osky and Pella with the Johnson County presidential year vote.

Tell me about Steve King's seat.

The trick with a gerrymander is, you pack as many of the other team into one seat as you can to run up the score. So I took Krazy King all the way up to the Dallas-Polk line to waste all those suburban votes on padding his margins. So he wins with 70% instead of 60, and that's all votes Tom Latham can't get. And if Latham moves into this seat, King kills him in a Republican primary electorate.

So what does Latham do in this map, move back to Alexander?

That's the beauty of it. Notice how all three of the other districts touch Franklin County and chop up his old base. Meanwhile I gave Leonard all those farmers he used to represent in the State Senate. I think anything is tough for Leonard against Latham, but this ain't bad if I do say so myself.

Frankly I'm more impressed with the map you did for US Term Limits.



I know. King, Latham, Braley and Loebsack all in one district. Polk is too big, so mathematically you can't do all five. But Leonard ain't from Des Moines anyway. Plus I made sure to stretch that one from Polk all the way over to Mt. Pleasant, just to give Christie Vilsack some encouragement.

Thanks for the exclusive on this. I see you have one more map here.



Now this -- this is just a thing of beauty. I had to trace it with my finger just to make sure each one really fit together. It's too bad Iowa makes you keep whole counties together. I literally have dreams at night of what I could do with a freeway median strip. I really should go work in Chicago.

What about the standard of compactness?

It's like that judge said about porn: I know it when I see it. And any of these would fly in another state. Bad enough that Iowa law won't let you meet at a point. They do that in North Carolina.

You take a lot of pride in your work.

I'm an artist at heart. I got a bunch more of these.

You're really doing a public service.

How's that?

No matter what that nonpartisan Legislative Service Bureau comes up with, no matter how much anyone hates it, they'll still be thinking, I'm better off than I would be with one of Jerry's maps.

Oh, yeah? Let's see you do better.

Wednesday Clips

Wednesday Clips

Sure. Great. The day AFTER I see him, Mike Huckabee goes and says something stupid about Obama growing up in Kenya.

Attention Lori Cardella: If you don't own property, tea partiers don't want you to vote. Didn't we settle this in, like, the William Henry Harrison administration?

If you have nothing going on tonight, stop by Shambaugh Auditorium at 6:30 for Political Organizing and Political Communication in a Digital Age, where I'll be speaking along with some other blogger types.

New Jersey Rep. Rush Holt beats the supercomputer on Jeopardy. Both finish far ahead of Sean Connery.



And in another test of knowledge: that's not what your mother said... but is it what Charlie Sheen or Muammar Gaddafi said?

Huckabee: Running or Selling?

Huckabee: Running or Selling?



It's hard to get a big juicy story out of the sixth stop on a seven stop trip, and so it was for me and Mike Huckabee yesterday.

Huckabee was Officially in the state to sell and sign copies of his latest book, "A Simple Government." Conventional wisdom is that the 2008 caucus winner, with a new mortgage and a lucrative Fox News gig, is NOT running next year. But of course, book tours don't just randomly come to Iowa.

At 3:52, eight minutes to announced start time, the line was 40 or so bodies long; it grew to 75 unique folks as the signing progressed, plus a few who circled around for a second helping.

The first dude in line was student Zach Allee, an `08 Huckabee backer who said "our beliefs and ideals line up well." He'd been in line an hour; a respectable wait but not an all-night Sarah Palin campout. The faithful were a good mix of young and old.



Huckabee, of course, was officially on hand to sell and sign books, but once he was done with the personal signing and greeting (which he managed to keep fresh; the "what's your major" line was generic but the conversations that followed were unique to each fan) he had time to chat with us liberal conspiracy media types while he generically signed another stack of books.

Huckabee, in a McCain-like move that I mean in a good way, took a moment to shake hands and get names from each reporter and promised to "ignore you if you don't like our questions."

Naturally, he says he's undecided about another run but he's "gathering information," though even he notes that "anyone here to stand in line isn't going to say they hate my guts." He offered praise for governors as presidential candidates, saying they have run "a microcosm of the federal government."

"I was governor of Arkansas an extraordinarily long time - 11 years," he said, though the 2008 caucus winner should be well aware that by the Iowa incumbent's standards, that's not much.

"I predicted that train wreck on page 35 of this book," said Huckabee, in a perfect politics meets sales reply, when I asked him about the battle of Wisconsin. "And I wrote that last July."

"When you have a public sector union bargaining with state government, they're bargaining with a third party's money, that of the taxpayers. Neither one of them have skin in the game."

When asked about Libya and the other revolutions of the Middle East, Huckabee focused first on his own numerous trips to the region, listing countries and including, with emphasis, 15 trips to Israel. He also talked about personally negotiating trade missions with heads of state before turning to the focus of the question. Huckabee said the revolutions were legitimate attempts to claim freedom, but was concerned about the power vacuums in countries like Libya with no institutional infrastructure. It would be said for Egypt, he said, if all their sacrifices only led to a Muslim Brotherhood government. "If there's a vacuum, the most organized entity has a foothold."



Unfortunately, Huck turned his attention to the folks taking a second trip through the line before I was able to ask the music fan for his review of Lady Gaga's new single and segue into marriage equality.

Traded some chit-chat with some of the local Republicans about how Florida was playing primary-date leapfrog with us; one speculated that we'd end up "somewhere in the 20's" of January while another hoped RNC chair Reince Priebus -- I'm gonna love typing THAT name the next couple o' years - will be able to persuade Florida.

Huckabee was accompanied by a handful of slightly vague staff from "the speaker's bureau." Their shirts bore logos for Huck's day gig employer, Fox News, for the publisher, and Huckabee's name.

There were also a handful of self-ID'd "volunteers" taking names and urging book buyers to join "Team Huck." Just in case.