The Bureau of Labor Statistics released another grim monthly report on the nationwide employment situation today.

UPDATE: Added statements from two members of Iowa’s Congressional delegation below.

Iowa Farm Bureau delegates defied the organization’s leadership yesterday, passing a resolution without language requiring compliance with conservation standards as a condition for receiving federal crop insurance.

I’ve seen a lot of hippie-punching by professional Democrats, but the Iowa Democratic Party’s attack on Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement yesterday was a particularly cynical example.  

Salaries for chief executive officers of major U.S. corporations rose sharply in 2010 despite the weak national economy, and various tax-dodging strategies allowed highly profitable companies to pay little or no corporate income taxes. That’s a small taste of the distubring news from the Institute for Policy Studies’ report on Executive Excess: CEO Rewards for Tax Dodging.

The Cedar Rapids Gazette ran a story over the weekend about Christie Vilsack’s Congressional campaign as a potential “ethics quandary” for her husband, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack. While possible conflicts of interest exist in this situation, some of the points raised in the article seem unwarranted.  

Texas Governor Rick Perry has quickly become the front-runner in the Republican presidential field, so it’s time to catch up on his campaign in Iowa and around the country.

Samples from the governor’s rhetoric and policy statements are below, along with recent poll numbers and some Texas-sized chutzpah from Perry’s latest Iowa speech.

Democratic Congressional candidate Christie Vilsack rolled out her first specific proposal to create new jobs last week. The plan to expand apprenticeship programs was light on specifics but heavy on conservative catch phrases.  

A year ago, the recall of half a billion eggs laid in Iowa made national news headlines. But if you thought that federal or Iowa government agencies would take meaningful steps to reduce the chance of another salmonella enteritidis outbreak in egg factories, guess again.

Economist Kenneth Rogoff, no liberal, is arguing for a higher inflation target:

What’s on your mind this weekend, Bleeding Heartland readers? Newt Gingrich is probably wondering who’s going to pay for him to fly around the country on private jets. His presidential campaign can’t afford the expense anymore, and his former gravy train 527 group American Solutions went belly up last month.

Representative Steve King is demanding Congressional hearings on what he described as the Obama administration’s new policy of “executive amnesty to illegal aliens.” My only question is, what took him so long?

U.S. Senator Tom Harkin argued yesterday that getting the economy moving again is more important than cutting the federal deficit, adding that President Barack Obama isn’t showing enough leadership on the issue. I share Harkin’s view and hope other Democrats who have bought into the deficit hysteria will get the message.

Catching up on news from last week, Governor Terry Branstad has withdrawn Iowa’s membership in the leading advocacy group for passenger rail connecting the Midwest.  

Former State Representative Geri Huser, one of Iowa’s surprise losers in November 2010, has landed a senior position in state government with the Iowa Finance Authority.

Four Democratic state legislators and the leader of Iowa’s largest public employee union filed a lawsuit yesterday challenging Governor Terry Branstad’s line-item veto of a provision barring Iowa Workforce Development from closing 36 of its 55 field offices around the state.

UPDATE: Further details are at the end of this post.

Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller kicked his New York counterpart Eric Schneiderman off the executive committee for the 50-state working group on foreclosure fraud yesterday. As leader of the working group created last October, Miller has drawn criticism for negotiating lenient terms for major lenders and not investigating some shady foreclosure practices. His latest move is another sign that Miller leans toward terms favored by banks and their Obama administration allies.  

The National Republican Congressional Committee went up on cable television this week against Representative Dave Loebsack in Iowa’s new second district. I’ve posted the video and transcript after the jump. Be warned: you may wonder whether you’re watching a real Republican commercial or a Stephen Colbert parody.  

Neither a late campaign start nor ignoring the Iowa GOP’s Ames straw poll has hurt Texas Governor Rick Perry’s standing among Iowa Republicans, according to a new survey by Public Policy Polling. Perry narrowly leads former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney and Representatives Michele Bachmann and Ron Paul among the regular GOP primary voters surveyed.

Governor Terry Branstad said Monday that a controversy over requiring non-toxic shot for hunting mourning doves in Iowa “should have been handled better” by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources’ Natural Resource Commission. He also denied that he had expressed support for a lead shot ban in a telephone conversation with one of the commissioners.

President Barack Obama declared Monday that the regime of Colonel Moammar Gadhafi “is coming to an end” in Libya. Both rebel forces and Gadhafi loyalists claim to control most of Tripoli, the Libyan capital, but the rebels have made substantial gains during the past week. For the past five months, the U.S. has supported the Libyan rebels as part of a NATO military intervention. Obama said his team is “in close contact with NATO as well as the United Nations” to plan next steps in Libya.

The full text of the president’s statement is after the jump. I will update this post if I see any Iowa political reaction to the latest developments. Iowa’s Congressional delegation split on U.S. House votes regarding our military intervention in Libya and potential funding for ground troops there. Among Iowa elected officials, Democrat Bruce Braley (IA-01) has been the only consistent critic of the policy.

Any comments about U.S. policy toward Libya are welcome in this thread.

UPDATE: This is a good summary of what happened in Libya during the past six months.