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.
Here are two coinciding stories that indicate just how far removed public opinion is from economic reality. (1) The Democrats’ $787 billion economic stimulus bill has saved or created 1.2 million jobs, USA Today reported today, a median figure based on a survey of 50 leading economists. And (2) 74 percent of Americans think that at least half of the stimulus money has been wasted, according to a new CNN poll.
To some degree the divide makes sense. While the stimulus has prevented unemployment rates from hitting 10.8 percent, the economists estimate, that means little to the 10 percent who are still without a job. And while economists agree that the stimulus prevented things from getting worse, even fans concede that the Democrats frittered some of the spending on provisions with no stimulative effects at all.
Still, 1.2 million jobs isn’t a trivial number, and Republicans — hoping to campaign this year on the bill’s allegedly failure — might want to keep that in mind.
Mike Lillis covers Congress for The Washington Independent, a Center for Independent Media site.
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