I found some unintentional comedy in this AP story on Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s one-on-one meetings with senators:

Sotomayor has managed to disarm even senators who came prepared not to like her. Sen. Charles E. Grassley, an Iowa Republican, went in thinking “she would be aggressive and maybe even a little obnoxious.”

“I would classify her as kind of much friendlier … more reserved, less aggressive,” than he expected, Grassley told reporters later.

I wonder why Grassley thought Sotomayor would be “aggressive and maybe even a little obnoxious.” Would he expect that of any high-achieving Puerto Rican woman from New York, or only one who had been on the receiving end of a hatchet job in The New Republic? Or maybe he was taken in by right-wing commentators’ caricatures of Sotomayor.

Anyway, it’s safe to say that Sotomayor’s personality wasn’t the reason Grassley voted against her confirmation to the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals. He’ll have to keep trying to remember why he cast that vote in 1998.

By the way, the Democrat who’s running against Grassley next year, Bob Krause, has his campaign website up and is on Twitter @KrauseForIowa. He plans to campaign hard against Grassley’s opposition to universal health care with a public option.

In April the Iowa State Board of Education approved new nutrition standards:

A special task force drew up the standards, which set limits on calories, fat content, sugar and other nutritional measures. Carbonated beverages are banned. Caffeinated beverages and sports drinks are banned in elementary schools.

But the rules do not apply to food provided by school lunch or breakfast programs, items sold at concession stands or certain fundraisers or items provided by parents, teachers or others for class events.

Although I would have preferred tougher guidelines, these rules were a step in the right direction. To be more precise, they would have been a step in the right direction. After protests from some school officials, the State Board of Eduation “delayed most of the standards from going into effect until the 2010-11 school year.”

By that time, the regulations may have been relaxed, judging from what happened last week in the state legislature’s Administrative Rules Review Committee (unofficial motto: “Where good rules go to die”). The rest of the story is after the jump.

All government spending on infrastructure is not created equal. With good planning and accountability measures, the federal stimulus and state bonding packages approved this year by Congress and the Iowa legislature could turn out to be wise investments with long-term benefits. Without proper monitoring, we could squander lots of borrowed federal and state money.

Laura Dean of the Huffington Post drew my attention to the Project on Government Oversight‘s review of state websites on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (the official name for the stimulus bill). They were specifically looking for resources for those who want to report fraud, waste and abuse in how federal stimulus funds are being used.

The findings are summarized here. Iowa did well as one of only seven states that “listed clear procedures for whistleblowers, such as what information to report, who to report to, and what will be done with that information.” (“Report stimulus fraud” is right on the front page of Iowa’s site, in the “featured links” section.)

However, there’s always room for improvement. The Project on Government Oversight applauded a few especially “whistleblower-friendly websites”:

Tied for first prize were Florida and Georgia, whose sites did an excellent job of providing clear procedures and protections for whistleblowers. Next up were Maine, Connecticut, and Texas, whose websites all did a good job of making the whistleblower’s job just a little bit easier.

Perhaps the webmaster for Iowa’s site on federal stimulus spending can make a few changes based on the Project on Government Oversight’s recommendations (pdf file).

As for state spending on infrastructure, the I-JOBS board will choose projects to receive funds soon. The criteria for selection are clear, and state officials understand the need for transparency in the process. Once the money has been allocated, the I-JOBS website should make it easy for citizens not only to track how the money is being spent, but to report any suspected fraud, waste or abuse.

The Democratic-controlled legislature failed to pass some important bills during the 2009 legislative session, including a tax reform package and all major agenda items for organized labor.

Since the fiasco that doomed the “prevailing wage” bill in February, I’ve thought that electing better Democrats to the state legislature is at least as important as electing more Democrats. With a 56-44 majority in the Iowa House, it’s ridiculous not to be able to find 51 votes for some of these bills.

According to a letter I received last weekend, Ed and Lynn Fallon of I’M for Iowa are already meeting with potential progressive challengers in some House districts. I’ve posted the full text of the letter after the jump. I share their disappointment with what the Democratic “trifecta” has accomplished since the 2006 elections.

The Fallons do not specify where they are recruiting candidates. The obvious targets are the six House Democrats who refused to support “prevailing wage.” Known in Iowa political circles as the “six-pack,” these incumbents also stood in the way of other labor bills. Of those six, Geri Huser and Dolores Mertz seem particularly likely targets, because they supported House Republican efforts to ban same-sex marriage in April. Marriage equality is one of I’M for Iowa’s priority issues.

Good opportunities for primary challengers include districts that are relatively safe for Democrats in the general election. That points to “six-pack” members Huser (House district 42), Brian Quirk (district 15) and Doris Kelley (district 20).

Challenging the rest of the group is somewhat more risky. McKinley Bailey (district 9), Larry Marek (district 89) and Dolores Mertz (district 8) represent marginal districts. In fact, first-termer Marek will probably be the most endangered Democratic House incumbent next year. Bailey beat back a strong challenge from Republicans to win a second term by a fairly healthy margin in 2008, but according to this report by Iowa Independent’s Jason Hancock, some House Democrats have been “quietly concerned” that he might consider switching parties.

Mertz is a longtime incumbent in a very conservative district. In the unlikely event that a progressive challenger defeated her, Republicans would almost certainly pick up the seat. On the other hand, a smaller Democratic House caucus without Mertz would be an improvement over a larger caucus with Mertz, in my opinion. As chair of the House Agriculture Committee, she blocks any decent bill in sight, and she will be the Republicans’ biggest Democratic ally in the fight to overturn the Iowa Supreme Court’s ruling in Varnum v Brien.

Two big questions come to mind. First, will organized labor put money and/or foot soldiers into serious Democratic primary races? Earlier this year, Ken Sagar of the Iowa AFL-CIO didn’t rule out supporting competitors to Democrats who are unfriendly to labor.

Second, will the Iowa House Democratic leadership spend money or political capital to defend targeted incumbents? In 2008 the Iowa Democratic Party blocked Huser’s primary challenger from access to the voter database. I heard from multiple sources at the time that the House Democrats made that call. Huser returned her colleagues’ favor by not being a team player during the general election campaign, then refusing to support the labor bills mentioned above.

I look forward to reading your comments on whether it’s worth taking on any House Democratic incumbents next year, and if so, which ones. The Fallons’ letter laying out the case for primary challenges is after the jump.

The Republican Party opposed President Obama’s economic stimulus bill earlier this year, instead advocating a federal spending freeze in response to the recession. The misguided Republican proposal would have repeated Herbert Hoover’s big mistake, ignoring consensus among economists that deficits help end recessions.

The stimulus bill wasn’t perfect, but it contained some valuable provisions, notably aid to state governments, which can’t run deficits. While Governor Chet Culver imposed two rounds of cuts to fiscal year 2009 spending, federal stimulus funds helped lessen the severity of those cuts and avoid drastic reductions in the 2010 budget.

That’s good, because state budget cuts can further weaken an already weak economy, as the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities explained in this review of state fiscal stress across the country:

When states cut spending, they lay off employees, cancel contracts with vendors, eliminate or lower payments to businesses and nonprofit organizations that provide direct services, and cut benefit payments to individuals. In all of these circumstances, the companies and organizations that would have received government payments have less money to spend on salaries and supplies, and individuals who would have received salaries or benefits have less money for consumption. This directly removes demand from the economy. […]

Federal assistance can lessen the extent to which states take pro-cyclical actions that can further harm the economy. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act recognizes this fact and includes substantial assistance for states. The amount of funding that will go to states to help them maintain current activities is approximately $135 billion to $140 billion – or about 40 percent of projected state deficits. Most of this money is in the form of increased Medicaid funding and a “Fiscal Stabilization Fund.” This funding will reduce the depth of state budget cuts and moderate state tax and fee increases.

Leave it to the Republicans to miss the point of stimulus aid to state governments, as I’ll discuss after the jump.

Columnist Clarence Page is speaking about civil marriage equality tonight, June 11, at 7 pm in the State Historical Museum Auditorium, 600 E. Locust Street in Des Moines. Unfortunately, I’m unable to attend the lecture, but I encourage anyone who hears Page speak to post a comment in this thread or your own diary about the event.

Those who can’t see Page tonight can still express their support for same-sex marriage rights. The Interfaith Alliance of Iowa has created an online petition for “Iowans of faith and goodwill who support marriage equality.” Excerpt:

As Iowans of faith and goodwill, clergy and lay, we support marriage equality.  From our deepest beliefs, we are compelled to stand for fairness in our common civic life. We oppose the use of sacred texts and religious traditions to deny equal protection and responsibility under the law for gay and lesbian couples.

From a religious perspective, marriage is about a couple entering into a holy covenant with their God and making a long-term commitment to share life’s joys and sorrows. Moreover, as many faith traditions affirm, where there is love, the sacred is in our midst.  This belief is the same for couples comprised of a man and a woman, two women, or two men.  As such, a marriage based in love and commitment must be honored and supported. […]

We affirm freedom of conscience in this matter. Marriage equality honors the religious convictions of those communities and clergy who officiate at, and bless, same-sex marriages. We recognize the state must not require clergy or religious traditions who disagree with same-sex marriage to officiate at, or bless, the ceremonies of gay and lesbian couples. The state must respect the convictions of all religious groups and individuals, while also allowing the fundamental right of marriage to be granted fairly to all people.

Click here to sign the Faithful Voices Pledge. Then pass the link along to like-minded friends.

I saw at Radio Iowa that President Barack Obama has nominated important early Iowa supporter John Norris to serve on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. He’s well qualified for the job, as you’ll see from his official bio, which I’ve posted after the jump. Not only was Norris chairman of the Iowa Utilities Board from 2005 to 2009, he also handled different positions with the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners and the Organization of Midwest Independent System Operator States.

Norris has been Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack’s chief of staff since January, but he requested an appointment on the FERC in November, before Obama had named Vilsack to head the USDA. Although Norris has worked closely with Vilsack before as the governor’s chief of staff, the FERC position seems like a better fit for the more recent focus of Norris’s career.

I’m guessing that FERC commissioners also work less insane hours than chiefs of staff do. Norris and his wife Jackie Norris have three sons under the age of six. Jackie Norris recently was replaced as First Lady Michelle Obama’s chief of staff and will serve as senior adviser to the Corporation on National and Community Service.

LATE UPDATE: The Des Moines Register reported on June 21,

Norris said he always planned to move on from the USDA, because his real goal was a seat on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, an appointment he now has in hand. He’s waiting for Senate confirmation for that position.

Norris said Vilsack asked him to take the USDA job, knowing it would be temporary. He “wanted someone who knew him and someone he trusted to get set up at USDA.”

Norris said he tried to set up a staff that would work together across their various areas of responsibility, avoiding turf wars. “This isn’t a speedboat. It’s a tanker and you have to slowly bring it around,” he said.

Newsweek published its annual list of the top 1,500 public high schools in the country this week. Iowa has six schools on the list: Cedar Rapids Washington (number 477), Cedar Rapids Kennedy (732), Iowa City West (846), Ames (923), West Des Moines Valley (1389), and Mid-Prairie of Wellman (1468).

A simple formula determined the rankings:

Public schools are ranked according to a ratio devised by Jay Mathews: the number of Advanced Placement, Intl. Baccalaureate and/or Cambridge tests taken by all students at a school in 2008 divided by the number of graduating seniors. All of the schools on the list have an index of at least 1.000; they are in the top 6 percent of public schools measured this way.

Note that this formula doesn’t tell you how well each school’s students did on the tests; it merely indicates how broad a segment of the school’s population is being prepared for college-level work. It also doesn’t give you any sense of other qualities in a high school, such as the range of extracurricular activities available.

Still, it’s important for high schools to prepare kids for college. Congratulations to the Iowa school districts that make advanced work available to a large percentage of students, especially in a small town like Wellman (population under 1,500 in Washington County).

Selective schools such as magnets and charters dominate the top of Newsweek’s list. While these are technically public schools, they are not comparable to schools that accept all students living within certain geographic boundaries. Most of the highest-ranked schools are in metropolitan areas larger than any Iowa city.

On the other hand, the fact that only one Iowa school cracked the top 500 on this list is a wake-up call to Iowans who consider our public schools the best in the country.

Speaking of Advanced Placement courses, Rachael Giertz had a good letter to the editor of the Des Moines Register a few weeks ago. It’s not still available on the Register’s website, but Giertz mentioned one downside for students who pile up AP credits in high school. Those credits help students finish college faster, but they may not count as courses passed on graduate school applications. Many graduate schools (rightly, in my opinion) don’t consider an AP course passed in high school equivalent to the same course taken in college.

A few thoughts came to mind when I read about the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Caperton v. Massey this week. The case involved a West Virginia Supreme Court judge who refused to recuse himself from a trial, even though the chief executive of one of the litigants had spent $3 million to help the judge get elected. In a 5-4 ruling, the Supreme Court found that due process requires a judge to recuse himself if large campaign contributions create the appearance of partiality.

Like Scarecrow at the Oxdown Gazette, I found the hackery of Chief Justice John Roberts’ dissenting opinion revealing.

Mostly I was shocked to learn from this New York Times article that judges are still elected in 39 states. It’s bad enough that money corrupts our elections for the legislative and executive branches. Judicial elections create opportunities for “legalized bribery” as well as incentives for judges to let public opinion unduly shape their interpretation of the law in high-profile cases.  

I agree with the Des Moines Register’s editorial board:

The fact that it is difficult, if not impossible, to draw an ethical distinction between a bribe and a campaign contribution is a strong argument for why judges should not be elected. Period.

Iowa voters did away with judicial elections by approving an amendment to the state constitution in 1962. The governor appoints judges at all levels. The public has input through nominating commissions that evaluate potential appointees before forwarding a short list to the governor. In addition, judges can be removed either by the Iowa Supreme Court for disability or good cause, or by the voters through periodic retention elections.

We are fortunate that Iowans recognized the wisdom of scrapping judicial elections when the constitutional amendment was on the ballot. This page on the website of the American Judicature Society lists failed judicial reform efforts in numerous other states. As you can see, state legislators and voters have rejected similar proposals despite years of hard work by reform advocates.

Let this be a lesson for policy-makers at all levels to seize the chance to make big changes for the better, such as the currently favorable environment for health care reform. Opportunities to ditch deeply flawed but entrenched systems don’t come around every year, every election cycle or even every decade.

A bill to encourage consumers to purchase new and more fuel-efficient vehicles, co-sponsored by Congressman Bruce Braley (IA-01), passed the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday by a wide margin of 298 to 119, with two members voting “present.”

The roll call shows 59 yes votes from Republicans, including Iowa’s Tom Latham (IA-04) and Steve King (IA-05). Leonard Boswell (IA-03) also voted for the bill. Braley and Dave Loebsack (IA-02) were not present for the roll call, but it’s safe to assume that Loebsack would have voted for it, since only a handful of the most conservative House Democrats voted no.

Braley said in a statement,

“The passage of Cash for Clunkers legislation will help boost our economy, save families money, and reduce our dependence on foreign oil,” Braley said.  “Cash for Clunkers is a common-sense idea that can have a big impact on the economy, reducing emissions and saving American jobs by jumpstarting the auto industry.  I hope the passage of this bill today is a sign that this program will start benefiting families and American workers as soon as possible.”

In my opinion, this bill has much more potential to spur new car purchases and save jobs than it does to reduce emissions or our dependence on foreign oil. The increased fuel-efficiency requirements are quite modest (presumably because American car manufacturers have done a poor job of increasing fuel efficiency).

The original draft of the bill set more ambitious mileage requirements, but that changed during negotiations over the Waxman-Markey climate-change bill, to which this measure was attached:

The compromise also waters down the so-called cash-for-clunkers program*, which ostensibly encourages drivers to turn in their gas guzzlers in exchange for a federal subsidy on more fuel efficient models. Yet under the compromise proposal, the new fuel efficiencies are hardly dramatic. For example, drivers trading in trucks between 6,000 and 8,500 pounds would be eligible for a $3,500 voucher for purchasing the same-sized vehicle that’s more efficient by just 1 mile per gallon.

Daniel Becker, director of the Safe Climate Campaign, said the program does much more to help struggling automakers sell large, unpopular models than it does to reduce greenhouse emissions.

“It’s a $4 billion giveaway to move gas guzzling vehicles that nobody wants off the lots,” Becker said.

After the jump I’ve posted the press release from Braley’s office and the information from an accompanying fact sheet on how this bill would work.

Governor Chet Culver’s re-election campaign is having a big fundraiser in Des Moines on June 11, and he told Iowa Politics.com recently that there will be more to come:

“We are gearing up,” Culver said. “You’ll see a lot of movement in terms of fundraising efforts. […].”

Asked if he had more than the $1.5 million in the bank than his campaign finance reports showed he had in January, Culver said: “We’re doing extremely well on fundraising. The response has been overwhelmingly supportive. It’s been very gratifying to know that so many of my supporters across the state continue to have complete confidence in my ability to lead this state.”

The Des Moines Register reported on June 3,

“I am going to be cranking up our political operation,” Culver said recently. “I’m excited about it. I love campaigning.”

Culver brought John Kirincich, a national policy and political aide, into the governor’s office as its chief operating officer. The former chief of staff in the U.S. House is expected to play a key role in Culver’s campaign. […]

He also plans to move his campaign operation by early July from the small office at 13th and Locust streets in Des Moines, occupied by his campaign finance and political staff now, into larger space closer to the Capitol.

“We’re going to have a very capable team,” Culver said. “I’m already assembling that team of talented political advisers. We’re going to be renting office space and raising money to run a very competitive re-election campaign.”

I’m all for hiring good staffers and giving them a decent office, but I hope the governor’s campaign will not spend too much money this year. In 2008 Culver’s campaign raised about $1 million but spent $550,000.

Some of the potential Republican challengers to Culver, such as former State Senator Jeff Lamberti, have the potential to raise large amounts of money. In addition, the Republican nominee may receive lots of out-of-state contributions from opponents of same-sex marriage.

Meanwhile, organized labor interests probably will not give Culver as much money next year as they did during his 2006 campaign, because of lingering bad feelings over the governor’s veto of a collective-bargaining bill in 2008.

I still think the governor’s in a strong position going into his re-election campaign, but I would hate to see him burn through lots of money in 2009 and then face a Republican who’s able to match his spending.

Congressman Leonard Boswell still supports a health care reform bill containing a public option that would go into effect immediately, Boswell’s spokesman Mark Daley confirmed today via e-mail.

Background and details are after the jump.

Thomas Beaumont wrote about the Republican Party of Iowa’s revamped outreach strategy in Monday’s Des Moines Register. GOP chairman Matt Strawn is working on several fronts to bring the party back to power after three consecutive losses in Iowa gubernatorial elections and four consecutive elections in which Republicans lost seats in the Iowa House and Senate.

Strawn’s strategy consists of:

1) meeting with activists in numerous cities and towns

2) using social networking tools to spread the Republican message

3) building an organization with a more accurate database

After the jump I’ll discuss the strengths of this approach as well as its glaring flaw.

I have read a lot about gentle discipline, positive discipline, loving guidance or whatever you prefer to call non-violent methods of setting limits for children. Some of my favorites include the Sears Discipline Book, Lawrence Cohen’s Playful Parenting, Common-Sense Parenting of Toddlers and Pre-Schoolers by Bridget Barnes and Steven York, and Mary Sheedy Kurcinka’s Kids, Parents and Power Struggles.

Several more discipline books are on my list to read someday. At least half a dozen friends have recommended Becky Bailey’s Easy to Love, Difficult to Discipline. The website of Attachment Parenting International links to lots of other resources, some of them geared toward special-needs or high-need children.

However, I’ve found that some of the advice that helped me most with discipline issues didn’t come from books about discipline.  

Former Iowa GOP chairman Mike Mahaffey told CQ Politics that he is thinking about running against Representative Leonard Boswell in Iowa’s third Congressional district next year. (Hat tip to WHO’s Dave Price.) Boswell barely defeated Mahaffey in his first bid for Congress in 1996.

CQ Politics highlights a big obstacle for Mahaffey if he runs:

A Boswell-Mahaffey rematch after a 14-year hiatus would also take place on quite different turf from their first race. The 3rd District in 1996 was located mainly in southern Iowa and was heavily rural; Boswell was aided in that race by the fact that he had spent his life outside of politics in farming. But redistricting, performed in a non-partisan procedure in Iowa, move the district’s boundaries north and east to take in the state capital of Des Moines, to which Boswell relocated from his rural hometown.

It will take a lot to convince me that Mahaffey, a small-town lawyer and part-time Poweshiek County attorney, poses a serious threat to Boswell in a district dominated by Polk County. So far IA-03 doesn’t seem to be on anyone’s list of competitive U.S. House districts.

Please post a comment if you know of any other Republicans thinking about getting in this race.

As you’ve probably heard, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was in Des Moines Saturday to raise money for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (minimum donation $2,500). She also tacked on a public event to discuss stimulus spending on education in Iowa.

The occasion gave us a glimpse of cutting-edge Republican strategery.

First, there was the obligatory cheap shot comment to the press:

Republican Party of Iowa Executive Director Jeff Boeyink said he’s surprised any Iowa congressional Democrats would want to appear with her. […]

“We don’t think her values are Iowa values,” Boeyink said.

True to state party chairman Matt Strawn’s promise to get the Republican message out using social media, the Iowa GOP highlighted the report with Boeyink’s quote on their Twitter feed.

Trouble is, Democrats still have a wide lead on the generic Congressional ballot. Since Iowa votes fairly closely to the national average, I’ll bet the Republican House leadership is more out of touch with Iowa values than Pelosi.

On Saturday, GOP chairman Strawn claimed Pelosi is for a “national energy tax”, which would have a “devastating impact” on farmers. Not surprisingly, this sound bite doesn’t reflect the content of the American Clean Energy and Security Act. (Click here for detailed bullet points on the draft bill to address climate change.) But who cares, if scare-mongering about tax hikes can lead Iowa Republicans out of the wilderness?

Meanwhile, the National Republican Congressional Committee paid for robocalls bashing Pelosi in the three Democratic-held Congressional districts in Iowa. Scroll to the bottom of this post at Iowa Defense Alliance to listen to all three versions of the call. Or, you can read the transcript that Blog for Iowa’s Trish Nelson posted after receiving the Loebsack version on Friday night. Its warnings about taxes, Pelosi’s “liberal agenda” and “San Francisco values” give it a “back to the future” flavor.

Wake me up when the Party of No comes up with some message that’s not 25 years old.

(Note from desmoinesdem: current map and ridiculous-looking gerrymandered map are after the jump.)

Senator Chuck Grassley didn’t take kindly to President Barack Obama’s weekly radio address about the need to accomplish health care reform this year. Early this morning, Grassley wrote on his Twitter feed,

Pres Obama you got nerve while u sightseeing in Paris to tell us”time to deliver” on health care. We still on skedul/even workinWKEND.

A little later, the senator Tweeted,

Pres Obama while u sightseeing in Paris u said ‘time to delivr on healthcare’ When you are a “hammer” u think evrything is NAIL I’m no NAIL

First of all, Obama recorded the weekly address before leaving for France. Second, it’s bizarre for Grassley to mock Obama’s “sightseeing in Paris,” as if that were the main purpose of his foreign visit. You can be sure that if Obama had not gone to France to commemorate the D-Day invasion, Republicans would be howling in protest.

Perhaps Grassley is venting because this week the president strongly affirmed his support for a public option in health care reform. Grassley has been working to forge a bipartisan consensus with no public option and published an op-ed in the Iowa City Press-Citizen on Friday warning against that approach. (Chase Martyn’s take on Grassley’s piece is worth reading.)

Or maybe Grassley’s just a little touchy lately. He wrote a letter to the editor of the Des Moines Register correcting a mistake from the Register’s vox-pop feature, “My 2-cents’ worth”:

In the Register’s Your 2 Cents’ Worth feature May 4, “Disgusted 50010 Woman” said I pay $40 a month for health insurance. In fact, I pay $356 a month for Blue Cross insurance coverage, a plan that is available to federal employees. This differs from health plans for state government employees in Iowa, where no portion of the premium is paid by the employee. There’s no basis for the assertion in her comments.

Fair enough, senator. But you have to admit, you’ve got a pretty good deal going. A couple half your age who purchase their own Blue Cross insurance plan could easily pay two or three times as much in premiums for comprehensive coverage. Even a bare-bones policy covering primarily catastrophic care could cost individuals more than $356 a month, and they’d have to pay out of pocket for most routine medical expenses and prescription drugs.

Natasha Chart recently looked into her health insurance options as a single 34-year-old woman. If she can afford it, she’ll pay $200 to $300 a month for less coverage than what members of Congress receive. I encourage Senator Grassley to read her post.

UPDATE: Greg Sargent received clarification from Grassley’s office about what the senator meant to convey in the hammer/NAIL tweet:

Senator Grassley has been urging the President to let the legislative process work so that health care reform legislation restructuring 17 percent of America’s economy will reflect broad consensus and garner bipartisan support from as many as 80 senators.

Still pushing the pipe dream of a large bipartisan majority for health care reform.

Thursday’s White House statement announcing Jackie Norris’s replacement as chief of staff to First Lady Michelle Obama did not make clear whether Norris resigned or was pushed out. My hunch was that Norris wanted out. I considered it unlikely that the first lady would have wanted to fire Norris, who has proved herself to be highly capable of managing a complex organization.

On Friday an unnamed source told Politico,

The staff shakeup in the East Wing – with Jackie Norris out as chief of staff to Michelle Obama – came because Norris wasn’t enjoying the bureaucratic part of the job and wanted a change, a senior administration official said. […]

Norris, who bonded with Obama in Iowa as an organizational force in Barack Obama’s caucus victory, didn’t like the management and scheduling duties, and the intense social component of the job, the source said.

Who can blame her?

Norris will be a senior adviser to the Corporation for National and Community Service, which does good work. It’s a less prestigious title than chief of staff for the first lady, but I hope it will be a more fulfilling and enjoyable job.

LATE UPDATE: The “Civic Skinny” political gossip columnist for Des Moines’ alternative weekly Cityview heard a different story:

Iowa’s Jackie Norris apparently lost her job as chief of staff to Michelle Obama because she – Norris – turned out to be not much of a team player. If she didn’t get her way, insiders say, she pouted or fumed or cried or threatened to hold her breath until she turned blue or whatever. That was no surprise to political people who had worked with her when she was Iowa state director for the Obama campaign – or earlier when she worked on the Al Gore and John Kerry campaigns in Iowa. But you don’t always get your way in a White House full of smart and strong-willed people. Further, she wasn’t part of the Chicago gang that runs things there – and her successor is.

I missed this story earlier in the week, but caught it at the Huffington Post on Friday:

The Iowa Board of Pharmacy sidestepped a court ruling this week, which had ordered it to consider whether the state should reclassify marijuana as having medical value. […]

The effort to reclassify marijuana in Iowa is led by the American Civil Liberties Union and local medical marijuana users. […]

The pharmacy board was fully informed by assistant attorney general and counsel to the board Scott Galenbeck of its job. “Judge Novak’s ruling states,” Galenbeck read to the board, “‘The board must determine whether the evidence presented by petitioner is sufficient to support a finding that marijuana has accepted medical use in the United States and does not lack accepted safety for use in treatment under medical supervision.’ A couple sentences before that the judge stated if the board believes that evidence presented by petitioner was insufficient to support such a finding it should have stated such in its order.”

The board had previously rejected the ACLU effort. The civil liberties group appealed to the district court, setting up this week’s rematch.

Yet the Iowa board, instead of asking whether it has “accepted medical use in the United States,” asked whether Iowa should approve of it, which is not a question for the board but for the Iowa legislature.

A bill to legalize the medical use of marijuana was introduced in the Iowa Senate this year. More details about that are after the jump.