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.
U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., has said he can deliver votes from his fellow Republicans to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, just as long as the trials for terrorism suspect Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and the other Sept. 11 conspirators are held in military commissions and not civilian courts.
But while U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said he believes Graham’s efforts are sincere, they are a “long shot,” do to “the philosophical feelings of Republican senators” and “grassroots opposition to closing Gitmo.”
“If Lindsey Graham came to Chuck Grassley and said, ‘Well, if I can make a deal with the president to close Gitmo, move these people to continental United States, and we don’t give them our constitutional rights, we’ll still try them in military commission,’ would I be for it? I’d say no,” Grassley said in a conference call with Iowa reporters.
Republicans have attacked President Barack Obama’s plans to close Gitmo and move terror suspects to a maximum security prison in Illinois, just across the Mississippi River from Clinton. The facility, which has remained mostly vacant since it was opened in 2001 due to Illinois budget issues, is expected to house fewer than 100 terror detainees along with more than 1,000 other extremely dangerous federal prisoners.
There are already 350 inmates in U.S. prisons convicted of international or domestic terrorism, including 35 in Illinois.
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