Wednesday was a difficult day for The American Independent News Network, which is the larger entity that operates The Iowa Independent. Our chief executive and founder announced two of our sister sites would close and their content would be moved to The American Independent.
A recently introduced bill could have far-reaching impact on the U.S. sugar industry, including American Crystal Sugar, a farmer-owned cooperative that locked out 1,300 Midwest workers on Aug. 1.
The chairman for Herman Cain’s Iowa effort says the campaign “relied more on the word of farmers than Washington regulators” in deciding to run an ad containing claims the Environmental Protection Agency says are false.
The Iowa Senate will remain under the control of a slim 26-25 Democratic majority when it reconvenes in January 2012.
[Commentary] I’ll never forget the time I was driving home from work in Iowa City on a cold, dismal, rainy day. The date, forever etched in my memory, was Oct. 25, 2002 — just two weeks after the U.S. Senate approved a joint resolution (77-23) authorizing President Bush to use the Armed Forces against Iraq. When I turned on the radio that day, NPR was broadcasting a Paul Wellstone speech from the Senate floor. The impassioned senator from Minnesota was speaking out against the Iraq war, and I thought to myself, thank God, somebody’s still carrying the torch for the “Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party.” I was moved by Wellstone’s courage, but my heart quickly sank when the speech was cut short by an NPR host, whose sobering words informed listeners that Wellstone and his wife and daughter were killed in a plane crash in Minnesota.
I then realized that the broadcast was a tape of Wellstone’s speech on the Iraq resolution before senators had cast their votes.
Given that Wellstone was an outspoken opponent of the Iraq War Resolution and it was just 11 days before his pivotal re-election bid to the Senate — a crucial seat in maintaining Democratic control — my mind immediately began hatching conspiracy theories. As these mental exercises in futility slowly subsided, all I could think about was Don McLean’s song, “American Pie,” which eulogized the deaths of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and the Big Bopper, who died in a plane crash outside of Clear Lake, Iowa. But instead of McLean’s coined phrase, “The Day the Music Died,” my mind shifted gears to Wellstone’s death, and the words “The Day the Democratic Party Died” were programmed into my memory’s jukebox.
A memorial for Wellstone and the other crash victims was held in Williams Arena at the University of Minnesota and was attended by 20,000 people, not to mention it was broadcast live on national television. Had others sensed what I had sensed — that Wellstone’s passing had earmarked the death of the Democratic Party? Wellstone’s personal eulogy was delivered by his close friend, Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin, who, unlike Wellstone, voted in favor of the Iraq War Resolution (H.J. Res. 114).
The crowd was whipped into a frenzy when an impassioned Harkin described Wellstone as “the soul of the Senate”:
“That’s right! A DFL liberal who constantly reminded those of us who are Democrats of the real center of gravity in our party — the progressive grounding of our being: that everyone should be able to reach their whole potential in our society
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