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.
With polls showing Democrat Barack Obama with an ever widening lead in Iowa (and nationally), Des Moines’ resident gossip column, Civic Skinny, takes a look at who in Iowa stands to benefit from their early and fervent support of the man who is increasingly looking like the next President of the United States.
So who are the front runners? Well, all the gossip apparently points to Iowa’s Attorney General, Tom Miller, taking a Washington job in the Justice Department, Iowa House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (a big-time supporter of VP nominee Joe Biden) getting a shot at to be United States Attorney for the Southern District, and Davenport Mayor Bill Gluba, who according to Civic Skinny’s sources would “look hard at any Washington job offer.”
Next on the list are Jackie and John Norris. Jackie Norris, who spent several years in Washington, including time in the office of Vice President Al Gore, ran the Obama operation in Iowa — very successfully — and “there clearly will be something for her in Washington if she wants it,” says a person who claims to know about such things. John Norris, one-time Congressional candidate, one-time chief of staff to Gov. Tom Vilsack, and now comfortably ensconced in a well-paying but kind of boring post as chair of the Utilities Board, could also find work pretty easily in the nation’s capital.
More benefits to Iowa’s first in the nation status.
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