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.
Former Gov. Terry Branstad is back on the airwaves with another ad attacking his opponent, incumbent Democratic Gov. Chet Culver. Titled “Big Bad Debt,” the ad criticizes government spending under Culver, particularly the I-JOBS program. The spot repeats a charge that Culver has raised property taxes $500 million, a claim that was disproved after an earlier Branstad ad from this summer.
The ad is an almost straight knockoff of one of the more infamous campaign videos from the last few years: Big John. Branstad’s ad uses the same music and a similar sounding narrator as the video for U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, during Cornyn’s re-election bid in 2008. The style may be familiar to those who obsessively follow politicos, but it is unlikely that most voters who stumble across the commercial on television will recognize the reference to a Texas ad.
Patrick Caldwell covers Iowa for The American Independent.
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