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.
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Iowa Rep. Tyler Olson
It was an opportunity too good for Democrats to let it pass. In the wake of Sen. John McCain’s and Gov. Sarah Palin’s visit to Cedar Rapids Thursday morning, one of the state’s youngest Democratic legislators took center stage to respond.
“During his visit to Cedar Rapids today, I was hoping John McCain would tell Iowans why he opposes policies that would help our middle-class families,” said Iowa Rep. Tyler Olson, whose Cedar Rapids district has suffered the double whammy of recent economic downturns and flooding. “Iowans deserve answers, not the same old policies as usual.”
Democrats have not been timid in drawing attention to McCain’s comments earlier this week that the “fundamentals of the economy” are strong. Olson took the message a step further, drawing a direct line from McCain to the current White House administration.
“It even appears that John McCain is the only one left who thinks this — even [Pres.] George W. Bush refuses to say that the fundamentals of the economy are strong,” Olson said.
He also noted that McCain has a long history in the beltway — a history that he believes has helped and not hindered the current economic crisis.
“John McCain served 26 years in Congress and in Washington, D.C., including a time as chair of the Senate Commerce Committee,” he said. “While chair of that committee [McCain] oversaw massive deregulation in the financial markets, the effects of which we are seeing this week with the trouble at Lehman Brothers, the sale of Merrill Lynch and now the $85 billion bailout of AIG.”
Olson went on to expound the McCain plan on taxes, insisting that the Republicans would implement plans that would benefit only corporations and not individuals.
“Barack Obama is the only candidate in the race to offer meaningful tax cuts to 95 percent of all Americans,” said Olson. “The Bush economics that got us into the recession to begin with will not get us out.”
Although the words delivered every blow in the Democratic playbook in reference to the McCain-Palin ticket and the economy, the response event was largely ignored by the local and wholly ignored by the national press. Only three media outlets chose to attend — Iowa Independent being one of them. The other two were television crews that will likely reduce the 15-minute event to a few seconds.
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