Can you imagine how frustrated Mitt Romney must be right now?

I submit to you that if Romney’s opposition research team had discovered that John McCain didn’t pay property taxes on one of his seven homes for more than four years, or that McCain didn’t know the price of gasoline and didn’t think that it was important for him to know it, Romney would be the Republican presidential nominee.

He didn’t lose to McCain in Florida and California by much, and Mike Huckabee didn’t lose to McCain in South Carolina by much either. With most GOP primaries being winner-take-all, McCain would probably have been out of the running if primary voters had known about his tax problems.

I so wanted Romney to win the nomination. I think either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton would have beaten him in a crushing landslide. Whatever the pundits thought about his telegenic nature, he came across as incredibly phony to me. A lot of evangelical Christians would have stayed home or voted for third-party candidates rather than vote for him because his change of heart on abortion didn’t seem authentic.

I’m surprised his well-funded campaign didn’t figure out that McCain defaulted on California property taxes.  

The wonderful Frankenoid is hosting an open house for bloggers coming to Denver for the Democratic National Convention.

Read this diary to find out where and when the party will be held. You might want to RSVP by commenting in one of Frankenoid’s diaries. She has a regular Saturday morning gardening series at Daily Kos.

Did Barack Obama sell us out by endorsing the new version of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and not showing up to support a filibuster of that bad bill last week?

Are too many Obama supporters in the netroots making up excuses to cover for him?

Or are the bloggers criticizing Obama being way too tough on a guy whose overriding concern has to be to get elected?

Is it right for some activists to say they no longer plan to volunteer for Obama’s campaign because he has failed to stand up for us on FISA?

Here are some links to good diaries exploring those questions.

Nathaniel Ament Stone is sure that Obama’s actions on FISA are better than they appear at first glance: Obama’s Outsmarted Us Again.

Big Tent Democrat argues that Obama is just like any politician and contrasts Obama’s previous statements on retroactive immunity for telecoms with his recent actions.

JedReport thinks the activists vowing not to lift a finger to help Obama (beyond voting for him) are making a big mistake: President McCain Just Got Elected, But That’s Okay.

Mike Lux seems to think the criticism of Obama over FISA is a waste of time, since “there is literally no acceptable way of holding a Democratic Presidential candidate accountable in the last few months before a general election.”

Chris Bowers counters, I Thought I Was Helping Obama. His point is:

First, we lefties are repeatedly told that it is necessary for Democrats to distance themselves from us in order to win elections. However, we are then we are told that we should be quiet in our criticism of Democrats, even though such criticism overtly distances Democrats from us.

I don’t get it. Aren’t we helping Democrats out by distancing them from us? Won’t Obama be helped by news stories about how he has angered the left? Won’t it make him look like he has Sista Soulhaj-ed us, or something? Why is our criticism a negative? Either Obama will be helped by distancing himself from the left, or he won’t. And, if he will be helped by distancing himself from the left, then our criticism should actually help him, especially when it starts to appear in news stories like these:

–National Journal: The Netroots Push Back

–Newsweek: Netroots Angry At Obama

–CBS: Netroots Feel Jilted By Obama Over FISA

Through our criticism of Obama, aren’t the netroots providing exactly the distance from lefties that we have always been told Democrats need to win? And, as such, aren’t we really helping Obama?

Attorney NCrissieB, who has experience with legal arguments surrounding the Fourth Amendment, offers A pragmatist’s view on FISA.

Wmtriallawyer, a vocal supporter of Obama this past year, has a warning: Barack, Take Note: FISA Demonstrates What’s Wrong with Washington. Key excerpt:

Sen. Obama, are you getting to see the problem now? As much as you talk about the partisan rancor that usually stalemates Washington (and I agree with you believe me), you’ve got to watch out for the so-called bipartisan compromises that actually serve noone but a few entrenched interests.

THIS has been the problem in Washington for years now.  The partisan fights occur over issues that actually matter and can benefit the people, and the bipartisan stuff compromises are over insidious stuff that benefits noone but the entrenched few.

Chris Bowers makes a strong case for taking Obama at his word instead of constructing theories about how he secretly agrees with FISA opponents, even as he fails to help stop the bill.

David Sirota notes that Obama has explicitly said, “You should always assume that when I cast a vote or make a statement it is because it is what I believe in.”

The exchange between Salon’s Glenn Greenwald and MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann is worth your time. Here is Greenwald’s original post, which contrasted Olbermann’s scathing commentary about President Bush’s support for FISA a few months ago with Olbermann’s cheering as Barack Obama goes along with the same bill.

Olbermann posted a response that shot to the top of the Daily Kos recommended list, even though he admitted not to have read Greenwald’s entire post.

Greenwald’s next shot was wonderful: Keith Olbermann’s reply and Obama’s secret plan to protect the rule of law.

Then Olbermann changes the subject with a crowd-pleasing diary about Grover Norquist saying Obama is “John Kerry with a tan.” Nice try!

The final vote on FISA will take place after the Senate’s July 4 recess, but efforts to remove the provision granting retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies appear unlikely to succeed.  

cross-posted around the blogosphere

Two days before the June 3 Democratic primary in Iowa, I received an automated push-poll, followed the next day by a second robocall containing “important information” for me. Both calls were hit jobs on Jerry Sullivan, the leading Democratic candidate in Iowa House district 59.

Many of us will receive similar calls between now and November. We need to be prepared to help the Democrats who will be targeted in this way.

My number one piece of advice is do not hang up the phone.

Do not hang up the moment you hear an automated voice on the other end.

Do not hang up the moment you are asked to participate in a brief survey.

Do not hang up the moment you realize that this is not a legitimate opinion poll.

Stay on the line and grab a pen and paper for taking notes.

Follow me after the jump for further instructions.

I have my own ideas, but would like to hear from others out there.  I'm looking for constructive criticism and more importantly fresh ideas.

Thanks! 

Did anyone go to the Iowa Democratic Party’s state convention today?

Use this as an open thread to talk about what happened there.

UPDATE: John Deeth liveblogged the convention for Iowa Independent.

Chet Culver donated $100,000 from his campaign committee to the “coordinated campaign” that will get out the vote for all Democrats in Iowa this November.

The organized labor community is still mad at Culver for vetoing the collective bargaining bill this spring, as this curtain-raiser by the AP’s Mike Glover confirms.

The solution is to elect more Democrats to both chambers of the legislature, which the coordinated campaign will help do. With solid Democratic majorities, another collective bargaining bill can be passed in 2009, with a more open legislative process than what occurred this year.

It’s no surprise that the Bush administration and other Republican politicians would seize on high gasoline prices as an excuse to expand offshore drilling for oil. Never mind that oil companies apparently are not fully utilizing the leases they already have to drill offshore, as Tom Harkin points out in a statement excerpted at iPol.

But are you cynical enough not to be surprised by this story in the New York Times?

Faced with a surge in the number of proposed solar power plants, the federal government has placed a moratorium on new solar projects on public land until it studies their environmental impact, which is expected to take about two years.      

The Bureau of Land Management says an extensive environmental study is needed to determine how large solar plants might affect millions of acres it oversees in six Western states – Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah.

But the decision to freeze new solar proposals temporarily, reached late last month, has caused widespread concern in the alternative-energy industry, as fledgling solar companies must wait to see if they can realize their hopes of harnessing power from swaths of sun-baked public land, just as the demand for viable alternative energy is accelerating.

If that makes you mad, get involved with the Iowa Renewable Energy Association. Their list of upcoming events includes a residential solar energy workshop on July 19, as well as a huge annual Energy Expo, which will be in Cedar Falls the weekend of September 13 and 14.

Speaking of renewable energy, the Iowa News Service ran this report on growing demand for wind turbine technicians, which has prompted Iowa community colleges to create new programs for training them.

Also from the Iowa News Service, I found this report on how farmers can increase their cash flow by owning their own wind turbine.  

John Deeth takes the wayback machine to the 1970s in a long post about what Cheap Trick meant to him during his formative years.

It’s a good post, because it made me curious to listen to some of those Cheap Trick albums. I don’t think I ever heard one from beginning to end–just the hits that were on the radio.

Someday I may write about my own favorite under-appreciated semi-rock-star of the 1970s (and 1980s, and 1990s): Todd Rundgren.

Use this as an open thread to discuss the songwriters or bands who mean a lot to you.

Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton headlined a rally today in Unity, New Hampshire, where each candidate received 107 votes in the January 8 primary.

I didn’t watch any of the footage, but it sounds as if they had lots of effusive praise for each other. The main sound bite from Obama about Hillary was, “She rocks.”

Use this as an open thread to discuss anything related to healing the Democratic Party going into the general election.

As I’ve said before, I think the long primary battle was on balance good for our party.

I still think it’s important for Obama to “do no harm” with his choice of a running mate, which means that if he doesn’t want Hillary Clinton on the ticket, he better choose someone who will not alienate the demographic groups that favored Hillary in the primaries.

UPDATE: You can view loads of pictures from the event in this diary by a college student:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/…

A friend forwarded this to me. Please pass it on to anyone who wants to come volunteer in Iowa communities that were hit by this month’s floods.

The Iowa Commission on Volunteer Service has just launched a statewide volunteer registration system so anyone who is interested in volunteering their time to help with recovery efforts can sign up and can be easily connected to local needs.  We are also helping with a huge statewide recruitment effort for AmeriCorps members that can be deployed to affected areas.

If any of you get calls from people or groups who want to volunteer to help with flood recovery efforts, please direct them to http://www.Flood2008.iowa.gov – on the left side of that page, they can use the “Volunteer Opportunities” or “AmeriCorps Volunteers” links for more information.

[…]

On the Web:

ICVS  – www.volunteeriowa.org

Iowa’s Promise – www.iowaspromise.org

Iowa Mentoring Partnership – www.iowamentoring.org

It sounds like they are still compiling the list of where volunteers are most needed in Iowa.

I checked the site, and it seems that you need to register as a disaster volunteer first. Then coordinating agencies will get in touch with you by e-mail to connect you with a community in need of assistance.

It’s a tiny sum of money compared to what we appropriate for building new roads, but I’ll take it:

Immediate Release:  June 26, 2008

Contact: John Krieger – (614) 214 9888

Phineas Baxandall – (617) 747-4351                                  

House addresses high gas prices by investing close to $2 billion in public transportation

Responding to record-high gas prices and the rising use of public transportation, the House of Representatives today passed HR 6052, the Saving Energy through Public Transportation Act, by a vote of 322 to 98 which authorizes 1.7 billion dollars to transit agencies across America to expand services and reduce fares.

This investment is part of a long-term solution that gives Americans affordable and convenient alternatives to driving and allows transit agencies to keep up with drastic increases in ridership brought on by high gas prices.

“We applaud this legislation for its rare combination of practicality and vision,” said US PIRG staff attorney John Krieger, “The House recognized today that we cannot kick our oil addiction without driving less, and we cannot drive less without better transportation alternatives.”

According to analysis released this week by US PIRG, American families are spending close to 100 dollars a week on gasoline.  That spending has increased almost 40 percent in the last five months, and   household spending on transportation is now the second highest expense for the average family –  more than food, clothing, even healthcare.

Americans have responded to higher gas costs by taking public transportation at record rates in areas where it is available, and American drivers traveled fewer miles last year for the first time in almost thirty years.  

Analysis by U.S. PIRG shows that public transportation created net oil savings of 3.4 billion gallons in 2006. That is enough to fuel almost 6 million cars for an entire year and saves consumers about $13.6 billion in gasoline at today’s prices.

“Rising gas prices are getting people out of their cars in record numbers,” said Krieger, “Investments like this give them a better and cheaper way to go.”

#  #   #

U.S. PIRG is the federation of state Public Interest Research Groups.  State PIRGs are non-profit, non-partisan public interest advocacy organizations.

Here’s hoping the U.S. Senate approves this bill with a clear bipartisan majority as well.

We also need the leadership of the Iowa House and Senate, as well as Iowa Department of Transportation officials, to understand the need for greater investment in public transit options.

Unfortunately, the TIME-21 transportation plan adopted in Iowa this spring doesn’t require any additional funding to go toward public transit.

It’s possible that every one of the $4 billion likely to be raised through TIME-21 over the next two decades will be spent on roads. The legislature didn’t even impose a “fix-it first” requirement to make sure maintaining existing infrastructure would take priority over building new roads.

Like I’ve written before, it’s hard to drive less if no alternatives to driving are available.

Over at the Washington Independent, Spencer Ackerman has given Congressman Steve King the “jackass award”. Here’s why:

He says first that we can’t trust interrogators who want to “cuddle up to someone” to get the truth, even though that’s pretty close to what professional interrogators actually do to get the truth. And then he says that Bush used the same “aggressive” reasoning to go into Iraq to deal with weapons of mass destruction, because if he hadn’t and “we had been attacked again,” or if we hadn’t waterboarded Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and then we were attacked again, then the critics now would be perhaps impeaching Bush. This is his defense! A mess of counterfactual conditionals, factual misstatements (there, like, weren’t any WMDs in Iraq) and pure, unadulterated politics. God bless Mr. King.

Please help rid our state of this national embarrassment. Support Rob Hubler, Democratic candidate in the fifth district, with a donation before the June 30 deadline.

I went over quite a few reasons to support Hubler against King in this post.

It’s also worth noting that Hubler released a strong statement opposing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that just passed the House last week.

With only a few days left before Iowa’s smoking ban goes into effect on July 1, the Des Moines Register reports that some business owners are finding creative ways to vent their anger:

At least one Iowa nightclub owner will raise the Soviet flag while playing the former communist country’s national anthem for his customers June 30.

[…]

Blues on Grand will officially go nonsmoking at 9 p.m. June 30 and “have a flag-raising ceremony that truly represents the direction our government is heading,” [manager Jeff] Wagner said. He has already lined up the Soviet flag and music.

As it happens, I visited the Soviet Union several times and have spent a fair amount of time in post-Soviet Russia. It’s probably the last place on earth where smoking would be banned in public. Russians still allow smoking almost everywhere, including on airplanes.

I also can’t imagine the Soviet regime caring enough about the health of ordinary citizens to pass any law to protect indoor air quality. Neither public health nor environmental protection were high priorities in the USSR.

If Wagner thinks it’s tough operating a business in Iowa’s regulatory environment, he should talk to people who have tried to do business in Russia. Between corrupt government officials demanding bribes for permits and organized crime groups that regularly extort business owners, it’s not easy to make money.

According to the Register, advocates are encouraging consumers to make a point of visiting newly smoke-free establishments next week:

Peggy Huppert of the American Cancer Society said various anti-smoking groups across the state have planned their own celebrations. Members plan to visit businesses like Blues on Grand on July 1 and tell their owners they wouldn’t have come if smoking was allowed.

Well, count this guy out:

I have been champing at the bit to finally be able to go to Blues on Grand without having to breathe the filth and stench of the smoke that filled my lungs and permeated my clothes the one and only time I went there.

However, after reading the June 22 story, “Iowa Smokers Smolder Over Ban,” in which the owner states that he plans on putting up the Soviet flag at his bar, it will be a long time before this nonsmoker walks through the door of Blues on Grand, if ever.

Why would this guy intentionally offend the majority of nonsmokers, a group of people that he is going to want and need to prosper under this new worker-safety law?

By the way, I will agree that the casino exemption must go.

– Chuck Davis, Urbandale

So do I, Mr. Davis. It’s still possible that restaurant and bar owners will file suit to challenge the casino exemption, so we may get our wish.

Today John Yoo, the great legal mind who shaped the Bush administration’s policy on torture when he worked at the Department of Justice, testified before the House Judiciary Committee. Look how he evaded a simple yes-or-no question from Committee Chairman John Conyers:

Conyers: Could the President order a suspect buried alive?

Yoo: Uh, Mr. Chairman, I don’t think I’ve ever given advice that the President could order someone buried alive. . .

Conyers: I didn’t ask you if you ever gave him advice. I asked you thought the President could order a suspect buried alive.

Yoo: Well Chairman, my view right now is that I don’t think a President . . . no American President would ever have to order that or feel it necessary to order that.

Conyers: I think we understand the games that are being played.

Click the link to watch the video at TPMMuckraker.

The Bush administration’s policy on torture is an international disgrace. One of its legal architects won’t even concede that the president  can’t order a suspect to be buried alive.  

Unfortunately, John McCain has supported laws that give the president the discretion to define torture however he wants.

The Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution says:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

For generations, the Supreme Court has interpreted this to mean there is a right to keep and bear arms in the context of a “well-regulated” militia.

Today in a 5-4 ruling, Republican-appointed Supreme Court judges finally gave the National Rifle Association and other gun advocates what they’ve been seeking for decades: an opinion that says the Second Amendment implies an individual right to keep and bear arms.

In the process, they invalidated a Washington, DC statute banning handguns and requiring trigger-locks on other guns.

There’s a lot of legal commentary on this ruling at the SCOTUSblog and at The Volokh Conspiracy blog.

Here are some other posts on the ruling:

Jeralyn at Talk Left (an attorney)

Adam B at Daily Kos (also an attorney)

Dahlia Lithwick at Slate (this includes an observation that Justice Scalia, who wrote today’s ruling, recently dissented to a court ruling on the rights of Guantanamo detainees by saying it “will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed.”)

Parking is going to be a nightmare in downtown Des Moines this weekend, with the Des Moines Arts Festival running in the Western Gateway Park Friday through Sunday, and the Iowa Democratic Party holding its Hall of Fame dinner on Friday night and state convention on Saturday.

If you can’t bike or bus your way to these events, consider carpooling with friends to reduce the number of parking spaces you’ll need to find.

The Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom opened its 30th Triennial Congress at Simpson College in Indianola on Wednesday:

The time is NOW for WILPF to take its measure, to listen and learn from each other so we can shout out and stand up for the common good.  Democracy requires us to serve in the interests of those who cannot speak, cannot stand up.  Our 30th Triennial Congress provides a platform of all of us to form cohesive and effective voices in a time of greatest need.

The time is NOW.  The place is the Heartland.  Iowa is a microcosm of the local, national and the global issues that concern so many of us in WILPF.  The Des Moines branch wants YOU to join US in educating and agitating in June (and the rest of year) for a better world, a more peaceful  world, a world where women are respected, a world where children are sheltered, a world with no boundaries, no apathy, and no way but up.

Much more detail about that event can be found here:

http://www.wilpf.org/

I am only putting the highlights of the weekend’s events on this calendar, but WILPF has a lot more planned.

Thursday, June 26:

The Sierra Club Iowa Chapter, Iowa Global Warming Campaign, and Center on Sustainable Communities are proud to have Stephen Hren, one of the co-authors of The Carbon Free Home, at East Village Books, 510 E. Locust St. in Des Moines from 5:30-7:30 pm. There will be a discussion of the book followed by a question and answer session and ‘meet and greet’. There is no admission charge to attendees. Sponsoring groups will be on hand to answer questions about global warming, green building, and other related issues.

Friday, June 27:

The Iowa Democratic Party’s Hall of Fame dinner will be at the Polk County Convention Center in downtown Des Moines, beginning at 6 pm. More information is here:

http://www.iowademocrats.org/

The Des Moines Arts Festival opens in the Western Gateway Park of downtown Des Moines. More information about the weekend’s events is here:

http://www.desmoinesartsfestiv…

As part of the WILPF Congress at Simpson College in Indianola, Amy Goodman will deliver the keynote address at 7:30 pm on “Independent Media in a Time of War.” Amy Goodman is a syndicated columnist, author and the host and executive producer of Democracy Now!, a national, daily, independent, award-winning news program airing on 700 radio and television stations in North America. book signing after the event

Saturday, June 28:

The Iowa Democratic Party State Convention is going on all day at Hy-Vee Hall, 730 3rd Street in Des Moines.

The Story County Democrats are hosting a fundraiser for Becky Greenwald, Democratic candidate in the 4th Congressional district. The event is at the Prairie Moon Winery located at 3801 W 190th St in Ames. It starts at 5PM. There is no set amount to donate in order to attend.

Go here to view the schedule of events at the Des Moines Arts Festival:

http://www.desmoinesartsfestiv…

If you like art that you can buy as well as enjoy looking at, you might want to check out the “other art show” at the State Fairgrounds (Varied Industries Building), which runs on Saturday and Sunday. It’s more like a big craft fair, with many affordable items. I like buying note cards with paintings or photographs by Midwest artists.

It’s “tribute night” at the WILPF Congress in Indianola from 6:00 – 9:00pm. “Moving Forward” – The Great Hall  Public Invited to Join us for a cocktail hour followed by a Formal Dinner

Welcome, Moderator: Pat O’Brien  

Presenter of James Cheney Freedom Prize:   Pastor David Lewis    

Recipient:  Chris Morin and Sha’an Mouliet  Presenter of first annual Des Moines Branch, WILPF Strong Feisty Woman Award: Sue Dinsdale

Recipient:   Peg Mullen      

Introduction of Speaker: Marybeth Riley Gardam

FRAN KORTEN, publisher & executive director of YES! Magazine  Over many years and several countries, Korten has “helped bring about  substantial policy and institutional reform by creating common agendas among visionary leaders from the governmental, nongovernmental, and academic sectors.” *possibility of signing her magazine after the event

Sunday, June 29:

Go here to view the schedule of events at the Des Moines Arts Festival:

http://www.desmoinesartsfestiv…

As I said above, I also recommend the “other art show” at the fairgrounds.

Ian Welsh explains what happened tonight:

The FISA Cloture vote just passed. The Senate will now consider the motion to proceed with the bill, then they’ll head to the bill itself (corrected procedural details, h/t and thanks to CBolt). Various motions will be put forward to strip immunity, odds are they will fail. Then a number of the 80 who voted to restrict debate will vote against FISA so they can say they were against the bill. However this was the real vote, and the rest is almost certainly nothing but kabuki for the rubes.

Obama and McCain were both absent, as was Clinton. Unimpressive, but unsurprising, though I suppose I’m disappointed by Clinton (Obama has made it clear he didn’t intend to try and stop the bill.) Clinton and Obama will claim there was no point since it wasn’t close. But, with their leadership, it might well have gone the other way.

It wasn’t even close. We needed 41 votes to block the cloture motion on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, but the vote went 80-15 against us.

Here is the roll call. I’m proud to say that Tom Harkin was one of the 15 who tried to stop this bad bill from reaching the Senate floor.

I have contempt for Senate Majority leader Harry Reid, who claimed to oppose the bill but voted yes on the cloture motion and did nothing behind the scenes to block this bill either.

He is acting like Joe Lieberman, who bragged about how he voted against confirming Samuel Alito for the Supreme Court, even though he didn’t support the filibuster of that nomination.

Obama wasn’t there for the FISA vote tonight, and it’s disappointing that he didn’t publicly support the filibuster effort. See this post and this one comparing what he said last October about telecom immunity to what he has said about the FISA bill in recent days.

I don’t expect strong leadership from Obama if he does get elected president. He seems too cautious on this and many other issues.  

I have been meaning to put up a post on this, and the e-mail I received tonight jogged my memory:

Dear great democrats in Polk Co.

I’m Matthew Peirce from the Iowa Democratic Party and we’re looking for people to help out at the various parades happening over the July 4 holiday weekend.

The parades we are involved in are listed below and if you could get back to me or to Tamyra Harrison with your willingness to participate, it would be appreciated by all involved!

Thanks so very much and here is the text that was sent out over the Polk Co. Dems listserv.

Apologies for duplicates.

Matthew Peirce

Field Organizer, Polk County

Iowa Democratic Party

Office:515-244-7292

Cell:  402-540-7977

Come out and show your support for Obama, Harkin, Boswell and all the other Polk County Elected Officials and Candidates up for election this year. Bring the whole family.

We will be walking in the upcoming parades:

West Des Moines – July 3rd

Line-up begins at 5:30pm

Parade begins at 6:30pm

The parade will start at 35th and Ashworth and head east, then turn on Vine and proceed to 4th St., then turn south on 4th St. and conclude at Maple.

Urbandale – July 4th

Line-up begins at 9am

Parade begins at 10am

The parade will start at City Hall and go north on 70th to Aurora and then west on Aurora to the middle school

Windsor Heights – July 4th

Line-up begins at 12pm

Parade begins at 1pm

The parade will line-up and begin at the Sherwood Forest Shopping Center on the corner of 73rd and Hickman.

To join us and get more information, please call Tamyra at 515-285-1800 or reply to this email at polkdems@polkcountydemocrats.org

No matter where you live, I encourage you to volunteer to march with local Democrats on the 4th of July. You’ll meet nice people and help our candidates make a good impression with the friendly crowds on the holiday.

If you’ve got a flag to carry, great. If you want to make your own sign, that’s also fun. In past years I have marched with a hand-made sign that says, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men (and women!) are created equal…”

I will be marching with Windsor Heights Mayor Jerry Sullivan, our candidate in House district 59.

Paul Rosenberg put up a post well worth your time if you are disturbed by the House vote on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Key point:

MapLight.org is reporting that House Democrats who changed their vote to support Telco immunity received much more, on average than their counterparts who did not change position.  This is a group correlation, of course.  Not all those who voted for immunity received more money than those who voted against.  Indeed, 11 of those who voted for immunity received nothing at all from the three Telcos.  But the group correlation is quite strong.

Click the link to find a chart listing all 94 House Democrats who voted against retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies on March 14, but voted for the FISA bill containing immunity on June 20. (Our own Leonard Boswell is in this group). The chart shows how much money each of them received in PAC contributions from AT&T, Sprint or Verizon.

Boswell is in the middle of the pack, having received $10,000. I wouldn’t assume those contributions are the only reason he has favored the telecommunications companies’ interests over protecting constitutional rights. But he does have a long history of voting with Republicans and corporate interests rather than with the majority of House Democrats on a lot of issues.

The Des Moines Register ran a strongly-worded editorial on FISA in the Wednesday edition:

Federal law authorizing secret intercepts of international communications may need amending to account for changes in technology and behavior of terrorist groups, but the job should be put off for a new Congress and a new president next year. In the current political climate, with an election looming, the temptation is to ram something – anything – through to avoid the accusation of being weak on terrorism, even if the constitutional privacy rights of American citizens are sacrificed in the process.

That apparently motivated 105 House Democrats to go along with 188 Republicans to give President Bush what the Washington Post described as “one of the last major victories he is likely to achieve.” That, along with the administration’s last-minute decision to allow the Democrats to toss in an additional $95 billion in domestic spending in a war-appropriations bill.

That’s a pathetically small price for authorizing this president, and future presidents, to ignore the 4th Amendment restrictions on “unreasonable searches and seizures.” […]

Those are just some of the problems with the House bill. It’s hard to say how many others exist, however, because there was precious little public debate. The operations of the spying program are classified secrets, and only a select few members of Congress have been clued in on how it works. Even legal experts are struggling to decipher the bill.

This is in stark contrast to 30 years ago, when the FISA law was enacted after months of public discussion, hearings and testimony. Changing the law implicating a fundamental constitutional right mandates nothing short of that same process today.

My only quibble with this editorial is where were the Register’s reporters on this issue during the third district primary campaign?

Boswell advocated retroactive immunity for telecoms in February, then changed his position in March. In early May, there was some speculation that he had cooperated with House Republicans to get this provision back on the table.

I tried for weeks to get Boswell’s office to comment on this issue and got the runaround. Naturally, they were not going to return phone calls from a blogger supporting Ed Fallon. But the Register’s Jane Norman or Thomas Beaumont could have at least forced Boswell to clarify where he stood on FISA before Iowa Democrats voted on June 3. Why didn’t the Register’s assignment editors give this issue some space this spring?

Glenn Greenwald has been writing extensively on FISA over at Salon, and I highly recommend his latest post, Chris Dodd’s speech and a glimmer of hope for stopping the FISA bill. It’s long and includes some great quotes from Dodd and Senator Russ Feingold, as well as many other links to good commentary on this issue.

Speaking of Feingold, Josh Orton of MyDD linked to the Progressive Patriots Fund Campaign Store. (Feingold is the honorary chair of that fund.) At the store you can buy t-shirts and mousepads with the slogan “Don’t Spy On Me” and a drawing of a telephone cord curled up like the famous Revolutionary War-era “Don’t Tread On Me” flag featuring a rattlesnake.

Special interests spent thousands wining and dining lawmakers during this past legislative session…

Well-heeled interest groups, businesses and some government agencies spent nearly $195,000 wining and dining lawmakers and their staffers during this year’s legislative session, according to new financial disclosure forms.

Groups ranging from the Iowa State Bar Association and the Greater Des Moines Partnership to Union Pacific spent a total of $194,848 on receptions, dinners and other social events during this year’s session, according to reports filed with the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board.

Some of the groups that spent the most were the Iowa Business Council, The Principal Financial Group, Iowa Gaming Association, the Iowa Wholesale Beer Dealers Association, and Hy-Vee Inc.

Now when you look at some of the big issues that were debated by lawmakers this past session you can see why these groups were so interested. These issues include: changes to collective bargaining, expanding health care to uninsured children, if casinos would be included in the smoking ban or not, and the expansion the bottle bill.

The article goes on to tell about the dramatic influence lobbyists and PAC's have on lawmakers and helping them get elected.

Disclosure reports for the year ending last June 30 showed that there were 610 groups who paid lobbyists a total of more than $8.5 million to influence lawmakers.

That financial influence was also shown in political action committee disclosures filed this month, with PACs having already given $872,509 to candidates this year.

I don't think I have heard a better reason for the need for clean elections and campaign finance reform in Iowa. Yet, political leaders refuse to allow the VOICE bill to come up for a vote. The VOICE legislation would bring voluntary clean elections to Iowa.

I'd love to sit down for dinner with Governor Culver, Sen. Gronstal, Rep. Murphy, and Rep. McCarthy and talk about the benefits of the VOICE bill, but I don't think I have enough money to afford it.