Kevin McNellis of the National Institute on Money in State Politics published a report yesterday on Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller’s 2010 campaign fundraising. The report connects Miller’s contributions from out-of-state law firms and people in the finance, insurance, and real estate sector with the nationwide foreclosure investigation Miller has been leading since October. Miller objects that the report “is false or misleading from the start to the finish.” More details and context are after the jump.

Former First Lady Christie Vilsack announced Wednesday that she will move to Ames next month and “continue to explore the possibility of representing Iowa in the US House of Representatives.” A Christie Vilsack for Iowa Facebook page and Christie Vilsack for Iowa website launched today as well. Vilsack’s statement and more news on the IA-04 race are after the jump.

Governor Terry Branstad, Republican Iowa House Speaker Kraig Paulsen and Democratic Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal met yesterday to talk about the state budget. Paulsen left the meeting feeling less optimistic that the Iowa legislature will finish its work for the year on schedule, by April 29. Senate President Jack Kibbie concurred that the budget discussion “didn’t go very well.” Unresolved issues include the overall amount of state spending, allocations for education and human services, and the right approach for commercial property tax reform.

Kibbie told IowaPolitics.com that the biggest roadblock is Branstad’s commitment to two-year budgeting. The governor vetoed a one-year transportation appropriations bill last week, claiming two-year plans were essential to “restore predictability and stability to the state budgeting process.” In a press release on Monday, Branstad repeated that his administration “remains committed to a biennial state budget,” which, he said, would provide “predictability for communities while ensuring a solid fiscal foundation for future generations of Iowans.”

I’ve never understood how Branstad can say with a straight face that it’s fiscally responsible to approve a two-year spending plan in the absence of two-year revenue projections. Furthermore, most states that adopt biennial budgets face a projected budget gap larger than Iowa’s for fiscal year 2012. Names and numbers are after the jump.

In the first major breakthrough on tax policy this legislative session, a bill containing tax cuts and supplemental appropriations cleared an Iowa House and Senate conference committee Monday, then passed both chambers unanimously.

Details are after the jump, along with recent news on efforts to reach a compromise on the state budget for fiscal year 2012.

Citing “several sources familiar with her thinking,” Alex Isenstadt reports at Politico today that former First Lady Christie Vilsack is leaning toward challenging five-term incumbent Steve King in Iowa’s fourth Congressional district. Isenstadt notes that Vilsack met with Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Steve Israel last week in Washington. Israel reportedly promised Vilsack that he would support her if she runs against King, but that he would “unequivocally” back Representative Dave Loebsack if she runs against him in the Democratic primary to represent the second Congressional district.

Isenstadt’s piece doesn’t clarify whether Israel promised the DCCC’s financial backing for Vilsack in an IA-04 race. The DCCC officially supports all Democratic nominees for the U.S. House, but usually only spends money on behalf of a few dozen candidates. The 39 counties in the new fourth district (map after the jump) are in five different media markets, although most of the population could be reached by advertising in just Des Moines, Sioux City and Mason City.

Last week the Des Moines rumor mill suggested Vilsack had been calling state legislators in the second district. According to Isenstadt, she has discussed a possible race against King with some Democrats in IA-04:

Jan Bauer, chairwoman of the Story County Democratic Party in Ames, said she spoke with the former first lady several weeks ago and that Vilsack raised the possibility of challenging the conservative congressman.

“I’d be surprised if she doesn’t do it,” Bauer said in an interview.

A campaign in IA-04 would be an uphill climb for any Democrat, although Vilsack would start the race with unparalleled name recognition and the capacity to raise significant funds. King has never been a major-league fundraiser; his latest FEC filing indicated that he had $142,610.38 in his campaign account as of March 31.

Share any relevant thoughts in this thread. I think a campaign in IA-02 would give Vilsack her best chance of winning a seat in Congress and holding that seat for more than two years. On the other hand, I would enjoy seeing a serious and well-funded challenge to Iowa’s most embarrassing politician of my lifetime.

Final note on IA-02: Loebsack’s latest FEC filing showed $121,874.47 cash on hand as of March 31. Representative Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin headlined a fundraiser for Loebsack in Iowa City over the weekend. Next month, Representative Bruce Braley (IA-01) and Senator Tom Harkin are hosting a fundraiser for Loebsack in Scott County, while Representative Leonard Boswell (IA-03) plans to hold a fundraiser for Loebsack in Jasper County.

UPDATE: U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack told Democratic state senators on Monday that if his wife runs for Congress, “it will be a holy war.” That suggests she is leaning toward challenging King, rather than forcing a Democratic primary in IA-02.

SECOND UPDATE: From Bret Hayworth’s blog on April 19:

This morning, Iowa Republican Party Chairman Matt Strawn was traveling through Northwest Iowa to talk politics, including making a stop to talk with me at the office. He was raring to talk about the possibility of a King-Vilsack matchup.

“She can try and take Steve King on, but I think that will be a great opportunity for Republicans to mobilize. A presidential year, having  a very highlighted race in Northwest Iowa, is a guarantee that we are going to be able to turn out every Republican and conservative vote that would benefit a presidential candidate, all the way down the ticket,” Strawn said.

“Not only does Mrs. Vilsack not have any natural connection whatsoever to Northwest and north central Iowa, but culturally is out of step. She’s someone that has an affiliation with some organizations that would certainly inflame a lot of the pro-life voters in this area… Congressman King has a national following as well, and he would have the ability to call in all sorts of resources to aid the fight.”

THIRD UPDATE: Matt Paul, a former staffer for Governor Tom Vilsack, told the Des Moines Register on April 19,

“I can confirm that Christie and Tom Vilsack have completed a transaction and are moving to Ames,” said Matt Paul, a Democratic strategist who was a staffer for Tom Vilsack when he was governor. […]

Paul declined to offer further details about Christie Vilsack’s political intentions, but said: “There will be an announcement very soon.”

FOURTH UPDATE: A rare moment of agreement between Governor Terry Branstad and me:

“Well, she’s never lived in northwest Iowa and it’s a heavily Republican area,” Branstad said this morning. […]

“I think in southeast Iowa she would be a pretty formidable candidate where she grew up,” Branstad said. “I think in northwest Iowa she’d be a fish out of water.”

Two-term State Representative Nate Willems announced this morning that he will run for the Iowa Senate in the new district 48 in northeast Iowa. Willems was first elected in 2008 to Iowa House district 29, comprising parts of Linn and Johnson Counties. He is the ranking Democrat on the Iowa House Education Committee.

Senate district 48 comprises all of Delaware County, most of Linn County (other than Cedar Rapids and its suburbs), and part of Jones and Buchanan counties. Part of Willems’ current district (southeast Linn County, including the towns of Mount Vernon and Lisbon) are in Senate district 48. He grew up in Anamosa (Jones County), which is also in the district. After the jump I’ve posted the detailed map of the Senate district 48, the map showing all 50 new Iowa Senate districts, and Willems’ campaign announcement.

No incumbent senator lives in the new district 48, and it is one of the most evenly-balanced districts created in the redistricting plan. As of April 2011 the district contained 11,553 registered Democrats, 11,552 Republicans and 15,559 no-party voters.

Democrats currently hold a 26 to 24 majority in the Iowa Senate. For Democrats to maintain that majority after the 2012 elections, district 48 is probably a must-win.  

A bill to legalize online poker in Iowa has been up and down this legislative session. The effort spearheaded by Democratic Senator Jeff Danielson stayed alive past the funnel deadline but faced opposition within both political parties. On Thursday the Iowa Senate Ways and Means Committee called for further study of the issue.  

[Senate File 458] asks the Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission to prepare a report to the Iowa Legislature by Dec. 1 regarding the creation of a framework for state regulation of intrastate Internet poker. […]

The state commission’s report on Internet poker would be required to consider the current state of unregulated Internet poker play in Iowa, consumer protection, and “responsible gaming” measures that can be implemented.  The commission could also consult with Iowa casinos and potential Internet poker hub operators in developing the report.

Sen. William Dotzler, D-Waterloo, the bill’s manager,  said the revised proposal will allow lawmakers to take a deliberate approach to examining Internet gambling, recognizing that thousands of Iowans are already gambling online. Other proposed changes are aimed at recognizing the important role that casinos and gambling have in contributing to the economies of  Iowa’s communities, he said.

Some commission reports influence future legislation; others collect dust on shelves at the statehouse. Enthusiasts for bringing legal online poker to Iowa say it would harvest some $30 million in state tax revenues from an activity Iowans are already engaged in. Opponents say it would increase compulsive gambling and diminish protection against underage or drunk people losing money through Iowa casinos. In the Des Moines Register’s Iowa Poll conducted by Selzer and Co. in February, respondents against legalizing online gambling outnumbered supporters 3 to 1.  That survey did not ask specifically about online poker games.

I tend to agree that Iowa has enough gambling already. Enticing people to spend more on new forms of gambling will hurt local economies by reducing the amount people spend on goods and services in their own communities. Online poker is not going to solve the state’s budget issues or create a large contingent of self-made poker-playing millionaires.

On Friday, federal prosecutors indicted founders of three of popular online poker websites for fraud and money laundering and shut down the Full Tilt Poker, PokerStars and Absolute Poker sites. Depending on how you view the issue, this prosecution could either undermine or strengthen the case for legalizing and regulating online gambling in the U.S.

This is an open thread. What’s on your mind this weekend, Bleeding Heartland readers?

Citing “a Democratic source in the Hawkeye State,” Nathan Gonzales blogged at the Rothenberg Political Report that former First Lady Christie Vilsack “is likely” to run against Steve King in Iowa’s new fourth Congressional district. Vilsack “has not yet made a final decision,” according to this unnamed source.

Sounds to me like an Iowa Democrat wants to show Vilsack how favorably a campaign against Mr. “10 Worst” would be received. However, I would be very surprised to see Vilsack run in the state’s most Republican-leaning district, rather than in the Democratic-leaning second district in southeast Iowa. If she won a primary against Dave Loebsack, she would be almost assured of winning the general election in IA-02.

On the other hand, the new IA-04, containing 39 counties in northwest, north-central and northeast Iowa, is less of a hopeless cause for Democrats than King’s current district. John Kerry won just over 44 percent of the vote in the counties that will be in IA-04, and Obama took just over 48 percent of the vote there.

If Democrats do recruit a strong candidate in the new IA-04, there will be plenty of small-dollar donors and volunteers willing to help retire King. But King has passionate supporters too, far beyond heavily Republican northwest Iowa.

Spin your own 2012 Congressional election scenario in this thread.

P.S.: Suzy Khimm of Mother Jones asked King this week about a Republican proposal to raise the qualifying age for Social Security:

Not every House Republican seemed so excited about [Senator Lindsey] Graham’s plan. Even on the party’s right flank, some members seemed wary of tackling Social Security, long described as the untouchable “third rail” of politics. Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), a well-known flamethrower within the party, demurred when asked about the issue. “It’s a delicate thing,” King said. “I represent perhaps the most senior congressional district in America. I’m not in a position where I can speak about [Social Security reform] publicly.”

According to the National Journal, 16.8 percent of the residents in King’s current district are at least 65 years old; that makes IA-05 the 18th “grayest” district in the country. The current IA-04 is the 37th “grayest,” with about 15.9 percent of residents at least 65 years old. I don’t know the exact figure for the new IA-04.

Governor Terry Branstad announced this morning that he will sign the redistricting bill approved yesterday by the Iowa House and Senate. While taping an episode of Iowa Public Television’s “Iowa Press” program, Branstad asserted that all four Congressional districts will be competitive.

I’ve posted the Congressional district map after the jump. Click here to view the state House and Senate district maps and other redistricting information on the Iowa legislature’s official site.

Soon after Branstad’s announcement, Representative Tom Latham sent his supportersan e-mail announcing his plans to run for Congress in Iowa’s new third district. I don’t blame him for wanting to avoid a Republican primary against Steve King in the new fourth district. Latham’s move sets up a contest between him and Democrat Leonard Boswell, who lives in Polk County. Boswell currently represents Polk County, the largest in the district. Latham currently represents Warren, Dallas and Madison counties.

Boswell’s campaign and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee already released statements about Latham’s plans today. I’ve posted those after the jump. Boswell is on the DCCC’s list of “Frontline” incumbents who may be vulnerable in 2012. The DCCC will hit Latham and other Republicans hard over their vote today for Paul Ryan’s fiscal year 2012 budget resolution. Boswell’s statement emphasized his connection to the district, noting that during his political career he has represented nearly 70 percent of the new IA-03 population. Boswell served three terms in the Iowa Senate before winning his first term in Congress.

In other redistricting news, State Representative Janet Petersen announced today that she will run for the Iowa Senate in the new district 18 (map). She was first elected to House district 64 in northwest Des Moines in 2000. I’ve posted Petersen’s campaign announcement below.

Any comments about the new maps or Iowa elections in 2012 are welcome in this thread. I will update the post if more state House and Senate candidates announce plans to move, retire or run for higher office.

UPDATE: Boswell spoke to Shane D’Aprile of The Hill this week:

“I would just say that I’ve had a tough race every time and that’s what I expect,” said Boswell, adding that his new district will have “half the counties I’ve served before anyway.”

“The one thing [Latham] would have to think about, or even King for that matter, if he were to move south, is that if you’re going to represent the capital city, you better be ready for a tough competition every year,” Boswell said. “So they’ll have to really think about that. Whereas if one of them wins that new 4th district, they could probably coast a little bit by comparison.”  

SECOND UPDATE: No surprise, King confirmed he is running for re-election in the new fourth district.

THIRD UPDATE: Branstad signed the redistricting plan into law on April 19.

The federal government is no longer in danger of shutting down. Today Congress approved a bill to fund operations through fiscal year 2011, which ends on September 30. In the House of Representatives, the bill passed by 260 votes to 167 (roll call). The bill needed bipartisan support, because only 179 House Republicans voted yes, including Iowa’s Tom Latham (IA-04). Steve King (IA-05) was among the 59 Republicans who voted against; that’s about one-fourth of the House GOP caucus. Leonard Boswell (IA-03) was among the 81 House Democrats who voted for the budget bill; Bruce Braley (IA-01) and Dave Loebsack (IA-02) voted against it.

After the bill passed, the House voted for two “corrections” to the bill, which passed on nearly party-line votes (roll calls here and here). One of those resolutions would defund the 2010 health care reform measure, the Affordable Care Act. The other would eliminate federal funding for Planned Parenthood. Latham and King voted for both “corrections,” while Boswell, Loebsack and Braley voted against them.

The Senate quickly took up the spending bill. The House measure to defund health care reform went down first; all 47 Republican senators voted yes, but all 53 senators who caucus with Democrats voted no. Then senators rejected the measure to defund Planned Parenthood. On that resolution, 42 Republicans, including Iowa’s Chuck Grassley, voted yes, while a few GOP moderates and the whole Democratic caucus, including Tom Harkin, voted no. The Senate then voted 81 to 19 to pass the spending bill. Most of the no votes were Republicans. Both Grassley and Harkin voted for the compromise to fund the government through the current fiscal year.

After the jump I’ve posted statements from some members of the Iowa delegation. I will update those as more become available. I noticed that Leonard Boswell did not issue a statement on his vote today; he also didn’t send out a press release Friday night about voting for the stopgap one-week spending measure. King’s press release today glossed over his vote against the budget deal; instead, he emphasized the House vote on language to block funding for “Obamacare.”

There’s some confusion about how much federal spending will be cut in the current fiscal year. According to the Congressional Budget Office, “while the agreement cuts almost $40 billion in budget authority, the near-term reduction in the federal deficit is only about $352 million.” Philip Rucker explained some of the accounting gimmicks in this Washington Post article. Many of the cuts will hurt, however.

Of the $38 billion in overall reductions in the budget that funds the government for the rest of the fiscal year, about $20 billion would come from domestic discretionary programs, while $17.8 billion would be cut from mandatory programs. […]

Although the pain would be felt across virtually the entire government – the deal includes a $1 billion across-the-board cut shared among all non-defense agencies – Republicans were able to focus the sharpest cuts on areas they have long targeted. The Education, Labor, and Health and Human Services departments, which represent about 28 percent of non-defense discretionary spending, face as much as a combined $19.8 billion, or 52 percent, of the total reductions in the plan.

In addition, the Environmental Protection Agency, long a target of conservatives, will see a $1.6 billion cut, representing a 16 percent decrease from 2010 levels. At the Department of the Interior, affected agencies include the Fish and Wildlife Services ($141 million cut from last year), the National Park Service ($127 million cut from last year) and “clean and drinking water state revolving funds” ($997 million cut from last year).

Democrats were able to beat back the most severe cuts originally proposed by House Republicans and protect funding for some cherished programs, such as Head Start, AmeriCorps and the implementation of the new health-care and food safety laws.

This pdf file lists the program cuts, grouped by department. There are basically no Defense Department cuts, although spending has been reduced on military construction and a few veterans’ programs. In other areas of domestic spending, there are too many ill-advised cuts to list in this post. Some terms in this deal are merely short-sighted: reducing spending on various literacy and conservation programs, energy efficiency and renewable energy, and a big cut to high-speed rail projects. Other provisions are immoral, like slashing spending for community health care centers and the Low-Income Heating and Energy Assistance Program’s contingency fund. It depresses me that a Democratic president and Senate majority leader agreed to make the largest USDA spending reduction apply to the Women, Infants and Children nutrition program.

The bill also contains provisions that have nothing to do with federal expenditures. For instance, it removes gray wolves from the endangered species list in Montana so that farmers and ranchers can shoot them.

At the end of this post I’ve added reaction from the Iowa Congressional delegation to President Barack Obama’s April 13 speech on bringing down the national debt. I didn’t watch the speech, but I read through the full text, as prepared. It contained some nice words for liberals and some Republican-bashing. The trouble is, based on the president’s handling of budget negotiations in the past few months, I believe Obama will end up agreeing to almost all the spending and entitlement cuts Republicans want. Despite his promises yesterday, I very much doubt he will block a permanent extension of the Bush tax cuts for all income levels.

The Iowa House and Senate voted this morning to accept the first redistricting plan proposed by the Legislative Services Agency. Click here to view maps of the redrawn Congressional and state legislative districts.

The Senate vote was 48 to 1, with Republican Sandy Greiner the only dissenter. Greiner would not face re-election in 2012 under the plan, but her new district contains more of Johnson County, and for that reason would have a Democratic voter registration advantage. Republican State Senator James Hahn had previously said he would vote no on this plan; perhaps he and fellow Republican Shawn Hamerlinck have figured out what to do now that they are in the same Senate district.

John Deeth explains here which senators would face the voters in 2012 and how some potential contests between two incumbents might shake out. I would add that Pat Ward is not guaranteed an uncontested GOP primary in the new 22nd district, containing Waukee, Windsor Heights, Clive and a lot of West Des Moines. Other people, including former radio talk show host Steve Deace, may be interested in that safe GOP seat.

In the Iowa House, 91 representatives voted for the plan, including all Democrats present and most of the Republican caucus. Seven House Republicans voted no. Clel Baudler’s House seat was and remains solidly Republican; maybe he just doesn’t like the idea of being in the new third Congressional district (a swing district).

Mark Brandenburg and Mary Ann Hanusa were two more no votes; the plan puts them into the same Council Bluffs House seat, leaving Democrats a possible pickup in the empty district containing the rest of Council Bluffs.

Annette Sweeney was another no vote; she’s risen to the position of House Agriculture Committee chair but now will be thrown into a district with Pat Grassley. He didn’t vote against the plan, so maybe Sweeney feels she will get the short end of the stick there.

Two members of the House Republican leadership team voted against the map. One was Assistant Majority Leader Renee Schulte, and I’m not surprised. She won her Cedar Rapids district by only 13 votes in 2008, and the new map gives Democrats a larger registration advantage there. UPDATE: Schulte said she opposed splitting the Iowa City/Cedar Rapids corridor into two Congressional districts.

House Speaker Pro Tem Jeff Kaufmann was the other member of the Republican leadership team to vote no today. Deeth notes that his new district leans Democratic, losing part of Muscatine County while gaining more of Johnson County. UPDATE: Kaufmann wrote to Deeth:

It would have been nice for you to ask me about my NO vote. It had nothing to do with my new House seat. My seat has always been Democratic-leaning and was actually almost 1200 plus Democrats a few years ago. In fact since it is rural Johnson County it is only about a 500 vote difference than my current district even after the 2010 election. Actually a new map could have been much worse for me in party registration […].

My NO vote had to do with the new Senate District and my constituents, both Democratic and Republican, wanting uniformity in their Senate District instead of a rural county attached to an urban area. My NO vote reflected the desire to have a conversation about uniformity within Senate Districts, something I have talked about for years.

Governor Terry Branstad now has three days to sign or veto the redistricting bill. He has promised a careful review but also indicated that he hasn’t heard “a compelling reason to reject it.” For that matter, neither has anyone else. Yesterday The Iowa Republican blog publisher Craig Robinson suggested that the maps aren’t good for Republicans long-term and said he’d like to see what was behind door number 2. Perhaps Robinson is trying to encourage Branstad to veto the plan, or he could just be spinning.

After today’s votes in the legislature, Representative Dave Loebsack confirmed that he will move from Linn County, which would be part of the first Congressional district, into the new second district, covering most of southeast Iowa.

UPDATE: Statements from Loebsack, Iowa GOP Chairman Matt Strawn and Iowa Democratic Party Chair Sue Dvorsky are after the jump.

Tom Latham’s press secretary told the Sioux City Journal’s Bret Hayworth that “the congressman will have no statement on the redistricting plan and what it means for him, since it’s still not official, pending action by the governor.”

SECOND UPDATE: Added Bruce Braley’s statement below.

THIRD UPDATE: Added Leonard Boswell’s statement. James Q. Lynch talked to several of the Republicans who voted no. Excerpts from their comments are below.

Steve King’s recorded voice greeted me when I picked up the phone at about 6:30 pm today. He asked if I was registered to vote; I said yes. He wanted to ask a few questions about a very important issue. Did I support the “total repeal of Obamacare”? Not thinking like a blogger, I gave the “wrong” answer to this question (no), so King’s voice thanked me for my time and ended the phone call. He said the call was paid for by the King for Congress committee and gave a 712 area code phone number (my phone showed that the call came from the Washington, DC area).

I live in Polk County, and the only voters in my household are registered Democrats. At least one household I know of, containing only Democrats in Dallas County, received the same robocall. I don’t know whether King is calling district-wide or just in the IA-03 counties he hasn’t represented before. The proposed third district (map) contains 12 counties King currently represents: Pottawattamie, Mills, Fremont, Cass, Montgomery, Page, Adair, Adams, Taylor, Union, Ringgold, and Guthrie. It also contains three counties Republican Tom Latham currently represents: Warren, Madison and Dallas. Democrat Leonard Boswell represents the largest county in the district, Polk, containing Des Moines and most of its suburbs.  

A request for Bleeding Heartland readers who get King’s call: please let me know what questions follow if you answer yes, you support the total repeal of Obamacare. Also, it would be helpful to know what county you live in and whether your household includes registered Democrats only, or also no-party voters and Republicans. You can either post a comment in this thread or e-mail me confidentially: desmoinesdem AT yahoo.com.

If King is trying to identify Democrats in IA-03 who share his stance on health care reform, then presumably he has not ruled out moving to this district to avoid a GOP primary against Latham in the new IA-04. The new fourth district has a Republican tilt, whereas the new third district is almost evenly balanced politically. The proposed IA-03 voted 51.9 percent Obama, 45.8 percent McCain in 2008, and 47.1 percent Kerry, 52.1 percent Bush in 2004. The proposed IA-04 voted 48.1 percent Obama, 49.8 percent McCain in 2008, and 44.2 percent Kerry, 55.0 percent Bush in 2004.

I believe it would be foolish for King to run in IA-03; my hunch is that a lot of Polk County independents and even Republicans would vote for Latham but not King. Then again, Latham would be unbeatable in the new IA-04, where he has represented 35 of the 39 counties. King would be strongly favored in IA-04 but perhaps vulnerable against the right Democratic candidate, especially in a presidential year.

UPDATE: In the comments, Bleeding Heartland user rurallib describes the rest of this phone call, as heard way over in eastern Iowa (Muscatine County). King obviously isn’t thinking about running for Congress in the second district, so perhaps he is robocalling statewide to identify and raise money from health care reform-haters.

A new report, which includes video images, shows that across wide swaths of Iowa our rich, dark agricultural soil is being swept away at alarming rates, which in some areas are 12 times higher than average soil loss estimates from national studies conducted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resource Conservation Service.

More after the jump …

Few weapons are more effective in politics than well-placed ridicule. Used incompetently, however, political mockery is just cringe-inducing.

Case in point: the event the Iowa Democratic Party staged yesterday to make fun of Mitt Romney.

The Iowa Senate confirmed six of Governor Terry Branstad’s appointees to state offices and boards yesterday, but Democratic senators indicated that two of the governor’s picks may not receive the two-thirds vote needed in the upper chamber. Meanwhile, Branstad suggested at his weekly press conference that race may be a factor in opposition to Isaiah McGee as director of the Iowa Department of Human Rights.

Follow me after the jump for more on who was confirmed yesterday and the battles coming later this week.

UPDATE: On April 12 the Senate rejected McGee as well as William Gustoff, one of Branstad’s appointees to the state Judicial Nominating Commission. Senators confirmed Teresa Wahlert with two votes to spare and three members of the Environmental Protection Commission. Details on the April 12 votes are below.

The five-member Temporary Redistricting Advisory Commission unanimously recommended today that the Iowa legislature “accept the first proposed Congressional and Legislative redistricting plan,” submitted by the Legislative Services Agency on March 31. I’ve posted the full text of the commission’s report after the jump. Key excerpt:

a. The Commission is grateful to those members of the public who made the effort to provide oral and written testimony concerning the redistricting plan and for those members of the public who attended the public hearings conducted throughout the state. While the concerns expressed by the participants at the public hearings concerning the plan were thoughtful and constructive, they were not within the constitutional and statutory criteria upon which the plan is to be evaluated by the Commission and the Commission is of the opinion that the Legislative Services Agency has satisfied those constitutional and statutory requirements.

b. The Commission is supportive of the many comments heard during the public hearings praising Iowa’s unique and nonpartisan redistricting process.

The commission’s report did not specifically address concerns that Bettendorf resident James Davis raised in a 20-page document last week. Bleeding Heartland discussed Davis’ arguments about the “convenience” standard and other criticisms of the redistricting plan here.

Click here to download the proposed Iowa maps for four Congressional districts, 100 House districts and 50 Senate districts. The Legislative Services Agency’s report on the redistricting proposal is available there too. The Iowa House and Senate may consider House Study Bill 235 as early as this Thursday. If both chambers approve the plan and Governor Terry Branstad signs the bill, Iowa will be the first state to complete its redistricting process.

On Iowa Public Television over the weekend, House Speaker Kraig Paulsen said of the proposal, “I look at the House map, I see a pathway to Republican control;  I can also see a pathway to Democratic control.  So that tells me maybe there’s a heightened level of fairness.” Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal commented, “I’d actually say the opposite.  We kind of both don’t like what we see but don’t figure there’s a way to get a better map.  If it was actually stacked pretty well for Democrats, I’m pretty sure Speaker Paulsen is going to take it down in the House and vice versa.  So we both look at the map and see no guarantees, but we both see a pathway. And that is […] that is kind of the essence of a fair map.”

Share any thoughts about the redistricting plan or process in this thread.

P.S.: A rumor going around says Christie Vilsack has been calling state legislators in the proposed second Congressional district.

P.P.S: Representative Dave Loebsack is said to be calling state legislators in his district too.

Earth Day is Friday, April 22, but festivals, community clean-ups and related celebrations begin this week in many Iowa communities. Details on those and other events are after the jump. As always, please post a comment or send me an e-mail if you know of another public event that should be included on this calendar.

While I was checking the Iowa Environmental Council’s calendar and April newsletter, I learned that earlier this year, the American Institute of Architects, Iowa Chapter office in Des Moines became the U.S. Green Building Council first LEED Platinum certified project in Iowa. Congratulations to the AIA for demonstrating how to do an office renovation in an eco-friendly way. Click here to learn more about the project’s sustainable features.  

Federal income tax returns are due this Friday, April 15 make that next Monday, April 18. This week the IRS released a list of 12 common tax scams.

If House Republicans get their way, taxes on the wealthiest Americans will fall further in the coming years, while government programs benefiting lower-income groups will be slashed. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s blueprint is like a caricature of Republican Reverse Robin-Hood-ism. And it wouldn’t reduce the deficit by nearly as much as Ryan claims.

The Pew Charitable Trusts recently published a report on Who’s Winning the Clean Energy Race? (pdf). Not the United States, unfortunately. We have slipped to third place globally, behind China and Germany. But the American Wind Energy Association’s annual report shows that within the U.S., Iowa ranks first for percentage of a state’s electricity generated from wind power (about 15 percent). (Texas still has nearly three times as much installed wind capacity as Iowa.) Think how much more clean energy we could be producing if we’d adopted an ambitious renewable energy standard at the state or federal level during the past decade, or if Iowa’s utility companies had embraced renewable energy production a decade or two ago. MidAmerican is adding turbines to several of its existing Iowa wind farms, but for years the company resisted wind power and lobbied against legislation aimed at ramping up wind energy production.

This is an open thread. What’s on your mind this weekend, Bleeding Heartland readers?

UPDATE: Sidney Lumet died on Saturday. I didn’t know he never won an Oscar for best director, despite making so many good movies: “12 Angry Men,” “Serpico,” “Network,” “Dog Day Afternoon,” and “The Verdict.”

SECOND UPDATE: Nice tribute to Sidney Lumet by Dennis Hartley, with a few extra comments from Digby.

At literally the eleventh hour Friday night, President Barack Obama and Congressional leaders struck a deal to keep the federal government running through the end of the 2011 fiscal year. The deal cuts a further $38 billion in spending, bringing total spending to a figure $78 billion below Obama’s original 2011 budget request. (That request was never enacted; the federal government has been running on a series of continuing resolutions since October 1.) The Hill reported last night,

Because it will take several days to translate the agreement into a legislative draft, both chambers passed a stopgap to keep the government funded until the middle of next week. The short-term measure would cut $2 billion from the budget […]

The deal cuts a total of $37.7 billion from current spending levels over the next six months. Of that total, $17.8 billion came from mandatory spending programs, including $2.5 billion in House transportation spending, according to a senior Democratic aide familiar with the deal.

Democrats knocked off most of the controversial policy riders that House Republicans had included in H.R. 1, the package of spending cuts that passed in February.

Republicans, however, won the inclusion of a rider to expand the District of Columbia’s school voucher program and to authorize a Government Accountability Office study of a financial oversight board established by the Wall Street reform bill.

Most significantly, Democrats won the disagreement over funding that included Planned Parenthood, which provides abortion services.

The Senate approved the short-term spending bill on a voice vote last night. I posted a statement issued by Senator Tom Harkin after the jump.

The House approved the bill a few minutes after midnight on a 348 to 70 vote (roll call). Republican Tom Latham (IA-04) and Democrats Bruce Braley (IA-01), Dave Loebsack (IA-02) and Leonard Boswell (IA-03) all voted yes. Steve King (IA-05) was among 28 Republicans to vote no. I’ve posted Loebsack’s statement after the jump and will add comments from other Iowans in the House when I see them.

Although most of the House Democratic caucus voted to keep the government running, this deal is a huge victory for House Republicans, especially Speaker John Boehner. He gave up the Planned Parenthood and EPA riders, but only after getting much deeper spending cuts, almost all from non-defense domestic programs. Reuters listed the cuts in the short-term spending bill. Most of the money comes out of high-speed rail, which is an idiotic program to cut from a job creation perspective. The deal covering the remainder of the fiscal year includes only about $3 billion in defense spending cuts, compared to $17.8 billion from benefit programs.

Obama bragged in his weekly radio address today, “Cooperation has made it possible for us to move forward with the biggest annual spending cut in history.” Yet again, he’s validating Republican ideology, rhetoric and tactics on the budget. Look for House Republicans to insist on even deeper cuts in domestic spending as a condition for raising the debt ceiling. I dread thinking about what will be in the 2012 budget bills. Republicans will make sure all the “shared sacrifice” comes from people who depend on government benefits.

Share any thoughts about the federal budget in this thread. I enjoyed Philip Rucker’s feature on the top negotiators for Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.