Tag: Iowa

2018 Primary Elections: Eight States Voting Today

Voters in eight states go to the polls today with the main event focused on California where voters choose the top two candidates, regardless of party, who will face off in November. Californians call it the “jungle primary” which was instituted back when Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, was governor. Arnold thought that it would bring …

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Iowa: Bathrooms and Locker Rooms times three

Two Iowa transwomen have won the right to use public women’s restrooms, while one transwoman has been denied the use of women’s facilities at the Burlington, IA YMCA.

In 2007 Iowa added gender identity to the state’s nondiscrimination policies.  In the fiscal year 2008, there were six complaints filed with the Iowa Civil Rights Commission on the basis of gender identity.  That has increased to 51 complaints in the fiscal year that ended on June 30, 2013.  Beth Townsend, director of the Iowa Civil Rights Commission attributes that to increased awareness about the Iowa Civil Rights Act.

The new law does require … that individuals are permitted to access (restrooms) in accordance with their gender identity, rather than their assigned sex at birth, without being harassed or questioned.

–Sara Stibitz, civil rights specialist with the Commission

Iowa NAACP head needs a history lesson

Sioux City businessman and Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob Vander Plaats got a surprising endorsement on Monday from Keith Ratliff, pastor of the Maple Street Missionary Baptist Church in Des Moines and president of the Iowa-Nebraska chapter of the NAACP.

Vander Plaats was the front-runner in the Republican field until former Governor Terry Branstad entered the race. Ratliff said Vander Plaats’ position on same-sex marriage rights was “an important factor” in his endorsement.

A Confeduhracy of Dunces. Symbol of slavery & Joe Wilson worth defending to Rep. King (Clown-IA)

Crossposted at Daily Kos

    Rep. Steve King (R-IA) is proud of Confederate heritage, but confused about geography and American history.

    Meet the Republican plan for the 2010 elections

    Rep. Steve King (R-IA) has been circulating a letter to his House Republican colleagues, asking them to sign onto a petition in defense of Rep. Joe “You Lie!” Wilson (R-SC).

thinkprogress.org

     Save Joe Wilson and his right to lie and call others liars, in the name of the Confeduhracy!

More from thinkprogress.org

    [Wilson] is an officer and a gentleman and everyone who knows him knows that. … Being a son of the South puts you in a different position when it comes to the Confederate flag. It means something entirely different to the people who have ancestors who fought in the Civil War on the south side of the Mason-Dixon line.


    I have ancestors who fought for the Union, Mr. King, and they kicked your ancestors ass. Huh? How do ya like that!

    Now, even if Rep. King’s ancestors fought for the Confederacy to defend secession and slavery over almost 150 years ago, I don’t think that is what the people of Iowa circa 2009 really want from their Congressmen today, but then again, judging by the teabaggers and their antics this weekend, maybe I am wrong.

     More of teh stupid below the fold

Action Diary: Tell Those Wicked Iowans What Ya Think Of ‘Em!

I’m pretty gosh-darned frightened, America.  Frightened of what’s happenin’ to this great country of ours when a beloved fly-over state like Iowa turns its activist judges loose to pee on the holy institution of marriage.  Are patriotic Americans expected to stand idly by while gay people try to sign the same piece of paper in a church?  In a state with the first presidential caucus no less?  It’s time to draw a line in the sand!  Or dirt, in Iowa’s case.

Putting 2 and 2 Together: Julie Myers, ICE, and Postville, Iowa

We learned from Dr. Erik Camayd-Freixas in his devastating essay (posted by Duke in its entirety at Sanctuary), that there were horrible travesties of both the law and justice itself in how the Postville, Iowa raid was executed.

As Dr. Camayd-Freixas said, speaking of his conversation with one of the immigration judges who had no choice but to rule as a rubber-stamp for the ICE:

As a citizen, I want our judges to administer justice, not a federal agency.

Yet that is exactly what happened.  A federal agency administered “justice” and the defense attorneys and judges were helpless to change anything.  As a result, an entire town was ripped apart, economic devastation ensued, and as we now see (h/t woc phd by way of symsess’ great roundups at Sanctuary), the human rights abuses continue:

Women were deeply impacted by the raids. First, female workers at Postville were part of the round up. The lost access to their children, including babies that were still nursing, without warning nor concern. For others, many of the primary or main source of income in their household was permanently removed. In many cases, the raids also labeled these women as undocumented, ensuring that they could not work. Others, afraid of being deported in a raid, did not return to their jobs. The result is that most of the women are also unemployed and unable to be employed.

For women who did not immediately hear about the raids, there was also the fear and confusion about the location of their sons and husbands. Some women went for days without knowing what had happened. As fear turned into confirmation that men were being held for deportation, women’s anxieties and stressers went up.

Iowa is Saved! Bush and McCain Both Visit on Thursday (Updated)

Hooray for us Iowans!  Our long regional nightmare is over!

President Bush visited Cedar Rapids and Iowa City today to personally vanquish the Godless floods that have caused so much damage over the last two weeks.  And John McCain visited Columbus Junction, IA, to vanquish things a few miles downstream from the President.  They shrewdly made separate trips so as to maximize the disruption to local recovery efforts.



(the President recoils in horror as he encounters an average Iowan)

Devastating Floods Continue Across Iowa

I had a chance to take a few pictures of the flooding in Iowa this weekend.  In much of the state you are bound to run across a scene like the following picture.  This is the Iowa River near Amana, IA, about 20 miles upstream from Iowa City:

An Update on Flooding in Iowa (Updated 3x)

(please forgive my recent absence — a combination of the flu and the flood have kept me away from the computer)

Last week I had started on a diary about how flooding in the Midwest was likely to affect food prices, as the corn crop suffers and farmers get too deep into the growing season to re-plant their crops.  Articles like this one and this one described how the flooding would decrease the number of acres planted with corn, and decrease the yield for corn that was planted.  But the rainfall from this weekend made those stories old news.  Up to 10″ of rain fell in some areas, and widespread areas received between 2″ and 6″ of rain.  The situation grew exponentially worse over the weekend as flash flooding hit first from the heavy rainfall, and now sustained flooding will occur as that water works its way through rivers already flooded.

Live Blog with Kevin Miskell IA-4!!!

Join us over at the EENR Blog for a live blog with IA-4 Democratic candidate Kevin Miskell! At 4pm pacific time Kevin Miskell will be at EENR to answer any questions you have about his run for Congress in Iowa’s 4th district. Hope to see you there!

Kevin Miskell is a fifth generation Iowa farmer from Story County, Iowa. When family farmers were facing an economic crisis under Reagan, Miskell became very involved in his community working to help save family farms. Here’s a snippet from Miskell’s website about his backround as a family farm advocate:

For the past 21 years, he has been active in grassroots politics across the state, promoting sustainable agriculture and fighting to protect the environment. During these past two decades, Kevin has worked with elected officials on both the state and national level on legislation relating to agriculture, rural economic development and renewable energy.

During the past four years, Kevin served as Vice President of Iowa Farmers Union, a grassroots organization that promotes the viability of small family farms and sustainable agriculture.

Since 2003 Kevin has worked on the staff of three presidential campaigns. In 2003, he worked for Senator Bob Graham. When Graham dropped out of the race, Kevin was hired by Senator John Edwards’ campaign to serve as his Midwestern Director of Rural Policy and Outreach and worked again in this capacity in 2008.

More below the fold….

Democrats in Iowa’s State Legislature Thwart Constitutional Ban on Gay Marriage

An effort by Republicans in the Iowa state legislature to debate a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage failed last week.  The amendment will likely not be debated at all this year since it could not advance through the House Judiciary Committee by March 7th, the deadline for getting on the current session’s calendar.  The Republicans attempted a seldom-used maneuver to hold a floor vote to move the stalled proposal out of committee, but the Democratic majority in the Iowa House  blocked the attempt by a 50-46 party line vote.

Before the vote, the leading Republican in the Iowa congress warned:

“We have to do it now, or this issue is done,” House Minority Leader Christopher Rants, a Sioux City Republican, said Monday. “We’re going to see gay marriages take place in Iowa. Iowa’s going to be sort of the Las Vegas of America, because we have no residency requirement and we’ll have people from all across the country coming to Iowa to get married.”

As Iowans we are used to being the butt of “country hick” jokes and have developed a pretty thick skin.  But to be compared to Las Vegas?  Mr. Rants was playing Republican hardball with that.  But the Democrats in the house weren’t as insulted as Rants hoped they would be.

Dems and Medical Marijuana: Harkin v Michigan, IL

xpost at kos

While 1500 delegates to the Michigan Democratic State Convention were approving, by acclamation, a resolution supporting legal access to cannabis as medication (On Monday, an Initiative was approved for the Statewide November Ballot), Iowa Senator Tom Harkin replied to letter from a constituent/patient with hyperbole that would make even a Republican White House Drug Czar blush.

Meawhile, the Illinois Senate’s Health Committee holds a hearing today on a State Medical Marijuana bill. Action link

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