Expanded from a short take for CNN

Hillary Clinton was solid and Bernie Sanders turned in his best debate performance yet in Charleston last night. Can anyone deny that Democratic National Committee leaders should have allowed more debates and scheduled them on nights when more voters would watch? The sometimes sharp exchanges between the front-runners probably didn’t change many Democratic minds, but Clinton and Sanders both delivered plenty of lines that should reinforce the inclinations of voters who are supporting them or leaning in that direction.

I suspect the following moments will particularly resonate with Iowa caucus-goers, based on my conversations with hundreds of Iowa Democrats and on how I’ve seen multiple crowds react to the candidates.

They were so close. Florida-based WellCare played the game almost perfectly to win a contract for its Iowa subsidiary to manage care for Medicaid recipients, which could have been worth hundreds of millions of dollars over the next three years.

The first sign that WellCare’s ambitions might come to nothing attracted little notice, appearing just before the long Thanksgiving weekend. More bad tidings for WellCare arrived yesterday in a late Friday afternoon dump, the classic way for government officials to bury news. Reading Jason Clayworth’s report for the Des Moines Register, it’s easy to see why the Branstad administration sought minimal attention for fixing an embarrassing oversight.

December 14 marked 7,642 days that Terry Branstad has been governor of Iowa, making him the longest-serving governor in U.S. history, according to Eric Ostermeier of the Smart Politics website. Because most states have term limits for governors, “The odds of anyone passing [Branstad] in the 21st Century are next to none,” Ostermeier told Catherine Lucey of the Associated Press.

Speaking about his legacy, Branstad has emphasized the diversification of Iowa’s economy, even though a governor has far less influence over such trends than Branstad seems to believe. Some have cited “fiscal conservatism” as a hallmark of Branstad’s leadership. I strongly disagree. The man who has been governor for nearly half of my lifetime is stingy about spending money on education and some other critical public services. He opposes bonding initiatives commonly used in other states to fund infrastructure projects (“you don’t borrow your way to prosperity”). But he is happy to provide tens of millions or hundreds of millions of dollars in tax breaks to corporations that don’t need the help, without any regard for the future impact of those tax expenditures on the state budget. Many of Iowa’s “giveaways” in the name of economic development will never pay for themselves.

Branstad’s governing style has changed Iowa in important ways. He has altered Iowans’ expectations for their governor. He has expanded executive power at the expense of both the legislative branch and local governments. And particularly during the last five years, he has given corporate interests and business leaders more control over state policy. More thoughts on those points are after the jump, along with excerpts from some of the many profiles and interviews published as today’s landmark approached.

P.S.- Speaking of Branstad doing what business elites want him to do, Iowa Public Television’s “Governor Branstad: Behind the Scenes” program, which aired on December 11, included a telling snippet that I’ve transcribed below. During a brief chat at the Iowa State Fair, Iowa Board of Regents President Bruce Rastetter asked Branstad to call Bruce Harreld, at that time one of the candidates to be president of the University of Iowa. That Rastetter asked Branstad to reassure Harreld was first reported right after the Board of Regents hired the new president, but I didn’t know they had the conversation in public near a television camera.

P.P.S.-Now that Branstad has made the history books, I remain convinced that he will not serve out his sixth term. Sometime between November 2016 and July 2017, he will resign in order to allow Lieutenant Governor Kim Reynolds to run for governor in 2018 as the incumbent. Although Branstad clearly loves his job, he is highly motivated to make Reynolds the next governor. She lacks a strong base of support in the Republican Party, because she was relatively inexperienced and largely unknown when tapped to be Branstad’s running mate in 2010. Even assuming she is the incumbent, Reynolds strikes me as more likely to lose than to win a statewide gubernatorial primary. Remaining in Branstad’s shadow would give Reynolds little chance of topping a field that will probably include Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett and Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey.

P.P.S.S.-I will always believe Branstad could have been beaten in 1990, if Democrats had nominated a stronger candidate than Don Avenson. Attorney General Tom Miller lost that three-way primary for one reason only: he was against abortion rights. Miller later changed that stance but never again ran for higher office.

A U.S. District Court ruling in August inspired today’s edition of Throwback Thursday. That ruling struck down an Idaho law making it a crime to lie to obtain employment at an agricultural facility, among other things. Iowa was the first state to adopt what critics call an “ag gag” law, aimed at making it harder for animal rights or food safety activists to obtain undercover recordings at farms or slaughterhouses. Idaho’s law went further than the bill Governor Terry Branstad signed in 2012; for instance, the Idaho statute also banned unauthorized audio or video recordings at a livestock farm or processing facility. Still, to this non-lawyer, some passages of federal Judge Lyn Winmill’s ruling (pdf) suggested that Iowa’s prohibition on “agricultural production facility fraud” might also violate the U.S. Constitution, specifically the First Amendment’s free speech clause and the Fourteenth Amendment’s equal protection clause.

Bleeding Heartland posted relevant excerpts from the Idaho ruling here, along with a brief legislative history of House File 589.

I sought Governor Terry Branstad’s comment on the court ruling and whether Iowa lawmakers should amend or rescind the language in Iowa Code about “agricultural production facility fraud.” In response, the governor’s communications director Jimmy Centers provided this statement on August 6:

House File 589 passed with bipartisan support and under the advice and counsel of the Attorney General’s office. The governor has not had the opportunity to review the ruling from the federal court in Idaho and, as such, does not have a comment on the case.

“Under the advice and counsel of the Attorney General’s office” didn’t sound right to me. When I looked further into the story, I learned that the Iowa Attorney General’s office neither recommended passage of this law nor signed off on its contents.

The Iowa Department of Revenue and Finance (IDORF) has proposed new administrative rules, effectively providing a tax cut worth tens of millions of dollars for Iowa manufacturers.  Absent a legislative response, the rule goes into effect January 1, 2016.

https://rules.iowa.gov/Notice/…

This is a serious overreach of executive power. The complexity of the issue, coupled with the unquenchable desire by the party in power to reduce taxes on business, provide the perfect climate to give a tax cut to manufacturers of some amount between $35 million to $80 million, perhaps more. This is an ongoing tax cut of increasing value. This action should be weighed against the Governor’s veto of $55.6 million of education funding….one-time education funding….because the State of Iowa ostensibly could not afford it.

And what is the stated purpose of this rule change? According to the notice, the rules are the “subject of a substantial confusion and controversy.” Furthermore, the change will eliminate “administratively burdensome distinctions…”

Periodically, a taxpayer will contest a ruling and win in court. When that happens, the Department provides a rule change that brings its practices in harmony with current law. That is not what is happening here. The Department is not losing cases in defense of the law. It simply finds the effort administratively burdensome.

How burdensome? The Department has identified 1,500 hours costing $85,000 that is required to enforce the Code of Iowa. That represents 0.24% of the revenue the Department claims to collect from this tax, and probably a lower percentage than that, for reasons discussed below. Interestingly, the Department’s budget is $17.8 million. They collect $8.4 billion in taxes. Their entire budget is 0.21% of each dollar collected. The Department should be commended for the efficiency with which it collects these complicated sales taxes owed by businesses to the State of Iowa.

A little historical context is in order. Generally speaking, manufacturers do not pay sales tax on machinery and equipment, supplies, and replacement parts that are part of the “value-added” process. Machinery and equipment was removed from the property tax roles in the late 1990s, a tax benefit of over $200 million, primarily to manufacturers. Most of this equipment is already exempt from sales tax. This latest administrative action continues the drip drip drip of the erosion of the tax base.

Normally, when the Governor wants to provide a tax cut to businesses or individuals, he makes a recommendation to the Legislature. The Senate and the House work out the details, and send a bill to the Governor to sign. That’s how it worked when they cut property taxes for commercial property owners by $200 million two years ago. That’s how it worked when they cut $200 million in property taxes for business in the late 1990s. That’s how it worked when they cut the sales tax on bailing twine, computers purchased by insurance companies with more than 50 employees, supplies purchased by greenhouses, or my personal favorite, the tax on sales of “tangible personal property sold to a nonprofit organization which was organized for the purpose of lending the tangible personal property to the general public for use by them for nonprofit purpose.”

The issues related to the tax itself are complicated. And the roles of the three branches of government in the execution of the sales tax are complicated as well. This combination makes it difficult to engage in a widespread public policy debate with anything beyond the soundbites. Soundbites, which in this case, are true. Namely, the Governor’s actions demonstrate that the State has enough money to give business a $365 million tax cut over the next ten years, but doesn’t have $55.6 million for schools, one time.

For those requiring a little more Inside Baseball, three factors need to be explored. First, do we really know how much this exemption will cost? Second, an explanation of why this rule is beyond the scope of the Department’s administrative authority. Third, a discussion of the process by which this rule will be implemented or overturned.

Governor Terry Branstad didn’t run for re-election last year on a plan to let private insurance companies manage health care for some 560,000 Iowans on Medicaid. He didn’t work with key state legislators to draw up his administration’s “Medicaid Modernization” plans. The governor’s draft budget, submitted in January, projected some $51 million in savings on Medicaid for the 2016 fiscal year. But key lawmakers like the chair of the Iowa Senate Health and Human Resources Appropriations subcommittee didn’t learn that four private companies would be selected to handle almost all Medicaid services until the Iowa Department of Human Services made its request for proposals public in February.

Recent accusations of bias and conflicts of interest, as well as allegedly inaccurate scoring of insurers’ proposals, have raised many questions about how the Iowa DHS selected the four companies now negotiating contracts to manage Medicaid for one-sixth of Iowans. Reports of campaign contributions by lobbyists and political action committees representing firms that sought Iowa’s Medicaid business prompted one watchdog to decry “pay to play” politics.

Those news stories point to a conclusion that isn’t getting enough attention: various insurance companies and their paid representatives knew what was coming down the pike long before the Branstad administration disclosed its plans to privatize Medicaid.

In the span of a few weeks, four Republicans who were heavily involved in shaping this year’s state budget have made sure they won’t be at the negotiating table during the Iowa legislature’s 2016 session. First, Matt Hinch quit as Governor Terry Branstad’s chief of staff. The weekly Business Record reported yesterday that Hinch “joined the Des Moines office of government affairs and lobbying group Cornerstone Government Affairs as a vice president.”

Days after the Branstad administration announced Hinch’s departure, Kraig Paulsen resigned as Iowa House speaker. He plans to be a back-bencher next year and will not seek re-election to the Iowa House in 2016. It’s not yet clear whether he will remain an attorney for the Cedar Rapids-based trucking firm CRST International, or whether he will seek a different private-sector job.

Last Friday, Branstad’s office announced that Jake Ketzner was leaving as the governor’s legislative liaison. I’ve enclosed the full statement on the staff changes after the jump. Yesterday, the marketing and lobbying firm LS2group revealed that Ketzner will be their newest vice president, specializing in “campaign management, government affairs, and public affairs.”

Finally, House Appropriations Committee Chair Chuck Soderberg told journalists yesterday that he will resign to take a leadership role in the Iowa Association of Electric Cooperatives, a powerful interest group.

I can’t blame these Republicans for not wanting to spin their wheels at the Capitol during next year’s legislative session. Election years are not conducive to bipartisan deal-making in the best of times. Last month, possibly influenced by Hinch and Ketzner, Branstad poisoned the well with vetoes that erased most of the House GOP’s budget concessions to Senate Democrats. Although Paulsen insisted he had negotiated in good faith, he and his top lieutenant Linda Upmeyer (the incoming House speaker) didn’t lift a finger to override the governor’s vetoes.

Newly-elected House Majority Leader Chris Hagenow told a conservative audience in Urbandale today, “I’m not as skeptical about next year as maybe some are. I think there’s a lot of good things that we can get done [in the legislature],” Rod Boshart reported.

That makes one of us. Seeing Hinch, Paulsen, Ketzner, and Soderberg vote with their feet reinforces my belief that next year’s legislative session will mostly be a waste of many people’s time and energy.

P.S.- Some grade A political framing was on display in the governor’s press release enclosed below: “During the 2015 session, Ketzner worked across party lines to secure bipartisan support for historic infrastructure investment that an economic development study called a prerequisite for economic development in Iowa.” In other words, he helped persuade lawmakers to increase the gasoline tax. Ketzner’s official bio at LS2goup likewise speaks of his work “across party lines to secure bipartisan support for significant transportation and broadband infrastructure investments.”

The Branstad administration has justified its “Medicaid Modernization Initiative” with optimistic projections about more “efficient, coordinated and high quality healthcare” and greater “accountability in health care coordination,” delivered at a savings to taxpayers.

Jason Clayworth shared a less encouraging perspective in the August 21 Des Moines Register: all four private insurance companies now negotiating contracts to manage Medicaid in Iowa have “faced serious charges of fraud or mismanagement” related to serving Medicaid recipients in other states. Some of those violations led to “hundreds of millions of dollars in fines” against the insurers.  

Annals of the absurd: Iowa’s longest-serving state legislator, who sought a ninth Senate term last year at the age of 80, is now beating the drum for term limits.

What a terrible idea, especially for a state whose governor already takes an expansive view of his own powers.  

(*Cross-Posted from Op-Ed by Mike Delaney, President of Citizens for a Healthy Iowa)

As the new year approaches, many of us resolve to better align our actions with our best selves, by supporting organizations that help to build healthier families and stronger communities, and seeking to make our world a better place. This week, against this backdrop, the Iowa Farm Bureau (IFB) hosts its annual convention in Des Moines.

(for the full report and background go to www.FarmBureauExposed.com) 

If campaign strategy is anything to go by, four-term U.S. Representative Dave Loebsack is a creature of habit. Loebsack’s debut television commercial launched late last week, and I’ve enclosed the video and transcript after the jump, with my initial thoughts about the message. The biographical information and visuals echo Loebsack’s opening commercial from his 2010 re-election campaign. The ad highlights the same public policy he led with in 2012. The same narrator performs the voice-over. The mid-September launch is precisely when he went up on the air in 2010 and 2012. (Loebsack’s not the greatest fundraiser in Congress, so he can’t afford to advertise district-wide for more than a couple of months.)

Several Bleeding Heartland readers have asked me about last week’s Loras College poll, showing Loebsack ahead of Miller-Meeks by 48.7 percent to 32.1 percent among 300 likely voters in the second Congressional district. I have a hard time believing those results, partly because Loras doesn’t have a long track record with polling. In addition, the statewide sample for the Loras poll includes too high a proportion of no-party voters for a mid-term election. Although a plurality of Iowa registered voters are independents, no-party voters comprised only about a quarter of the electorate in the last three Iowa midterm elections (click through for reports on turnout in 2010, 2006, and 2002). Perhaps most important, Loebsack defeated the less-credible challenger John Archer by a little more than 12 percent in 2012, a presidential election year. So I consider it unlikely he’s 16 points ahead of Miller-Meeks, who came fairly close to beating him in 2010.

By the same token, I don’t believe the Tarrance Group survey that the Miller-Meeks campaign hyped in mid-August, showing her trailing Loebsack by just 45 to 42 percent. Internal polls are always suspect, especially when the campaign releases almost no information about the sample demographics, question wording or question order.

Miller-Meeks and her suporters are optimistic because the district leans less Democratic than the one where Loebsack won his first three elections to Congress. The old IA-02 had a partisan voting index of D+7, whereas the current district is D+4. The latest figures from the Iowa Secretary of State’s Office indicate that the 24 counties in IA-02 contain 165,834 active registered Democrats, 139,034 Republicans, and 180,843 no-party voters. In contrast, Democrats had a voter registration advantage of nearly 48,000 in IA-02 going into the 2010 general election, when Loebsack defeated Miller-Meeks by about 11,500 votes. Notably, Loebsack’s current district includes the Quad Cities area (Scott County), traditionally more Republican-leaning than the Cedar Rapids area (Linn County), which was part of his old district. Under the previous map, Bruce Braley narrowly lost Scott County to his GOP challenger Ben Lange in 2010.

That analysis overlooks a few salient points, though. Since Iowa lawmakers adopted the current map of political boundaries, Loebsack has had three and a half years to build up his name recognition and support in the Quad Cities. He’s attended hundreds of public events there. He’s gone to bat for the Rock Island Arsenal, a major local employer. Nor are the new IA-02 counties a natural base of support for Miller-Meeks, who has spent most of her career in the Ottumwa area. In fact, her woefully under-funded opponent Mark Lofgren carried Scott County and neighboring Clinton County, as well as his home base of Muscatine, in this year’s Republican primary to represent IA-02.

I suspect we would have seen a greater sense of urgency from Loebsack’s campaign and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee if Democratic polling indicated a close race here. The DCCC swooped in to rescue Loebsack in 2010, running a couple of negative spots against Miller-Meeks in the final weeks. I’ll believe Miller-Meeks has a real shot if we see more independent expenditures for both candidates than occurred in IA-02 during the Loebsack’s race against Archer. While the National Republican Congressional Committee placed Miller-Meeks on the top tier of their program for challengers, I have seen no sign that the NRCC plans to spend significant money on this race.

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

Sunday’s Des Moines Register includes a good feature by Lauren Mills of IowaWatch.org and the Iowa Center for Public Affairs Journalism. She lays out how payday lenders are “burying Iowans” in debt. Iowa Senate Ways and Means Committee Chair Joe Bolkcom pointed out that the payday lending business model depends on “locking people into this cycle of debt.” Previous research has indicated that payday lenders cost Iowa consumers about $36 million per year. Mills reports that this industry spends heavily on campaign contributions and lobbying the Iowa legislature. Lobbyists talk a good game about jobs and helping people who need cash for emergency expenses. But think how many more jobs could be created if Iowans living paycheck to paycheck had $36 million more to spend on goods and services, rather than on outlandish “loan shark rates.”

Mills reports that legislation to regulate interest rates charged by payday lenders has been stalled. Bolkcom said Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal won’t bring up the bill unless it can pass the Republican-controlled Iowa House. House Majority Leader Linda Upmeyer called that a “convenient excuse” for the Senate not to act. I haven’t noticed her or any other House Republicans acknowledging this problem, though.

The best chance for Iowa lawmakers to address payday lending was during the period when Democrats controlled “the trifecta.” In 2007, the Iowa House and Senate approved, and Governor Chet Culver signed, a bill capping interest rates on car title loans. (Such legislation had been stalled for years when Republicans controlled the Iowa House, although it attracted bipartisan support in both chambers in 2007.) Three years later, Bolkcom and then Iowa House Democrat Janet Petersen made a major push to pass a similar interest rate cap on payday lenders. However, industry lobbyists warned that such a law would put payday lenders out of business, as had happened with car title lenders. A wide range of organizations supported the payday lending reform, including the Iowa Attorney General’s office, the Iowa Catholic Conference, the Child and Family Policy Center, and Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement. But ultimately, the House version of that bill died when conservadem State Representative Mike Reasoner sided with two Republicans to kill it in subcommittee.

Some Iowa local governments, most recently in Waterloo, have passed zoning rules to try to prevent payday lenders from targeting low-income neighborhoods. But state regulations are the only realistic way to stop the cycle of debt perpetuated by lenders who keep borrowers coming back for more high-interest loans and cash advances. Iowans on the edge are paying the price for the legislature’s failure to act years ago.

Governor Terry Branstad plans to sign a bill that would allow possession of cannabis oil for the treatment of some seizure disorders, he announced while taping Iowa Public Television‘s “Iowa Press” program today. He noted the bill will help some children with epilepsy, and he’s satisfied its “limited” scope will not increase abuse of marijuana in smokeable form.  

The governor also said he will sign a bill banning the sale of e-cigarettes to children, adding that his wife is a “militant” anti-smoker. Trouble is, that bill was backed by tobacco industry lobbyists. Many public health groups lobbied against the bill.

Branstad has not decided whether to sign the dog racing bill, which would end greyhound racing at one casino in Council Bluffs and get a non-profit casino in Dubuque off the hook for subsidizing the races. His concern isn’t the massive giveaway to dog breeders and kennel owners, which makes no sense to me. Rather, he is worried that lobbyists for horse racing interests didn’t get their cut from the bailout. O.Kay Henderson reports for Radio Iowa,

“I understand the benefits that the people in Council Bluffs and Dubuque see from this, and the greyhound industry,” Branstad says. “My concern is the horse industry was left out of this.” […]

However, the governor’s concern is over provisions in the bill that would give the greyhound industry authority to strike deals to simulcast dog and horse races at any of the state’s casinos and get all of the profit from it. Today simulcasting deals are only allowed at the casinos in Altoona, Council Bluffs and Dubuque and Iowa’s horse industry gets the financial take.

“There is some concern that I’m hearing from my friends in the horse industry. I’ve always been close with them,” Branstad says. “We have a very big and significant horse industry in the state of Iowa.”

Branstad has ’til June 2 to decide whether to sign or veto the bill.

“I’m trying to weigh all those things,” Branstad says. “I want to do something that’s fair to all the communities involved and fair to all the parties and the one group that seems to be, because of the simulcasting provisions of that bill, having some concerns is the horse industry and so I’m carefully reviewing that,” Branstad says. “I have not made a final decision.”

Environmental activists in Iowa are nervously awaiting the governor’s decision on a bill to expand solar tax credits and several spending bills that include record-high funding for the Resource Enhancement and Protection (REAP) conservation program. The governor recently said he is concerned about various parts of a supplemental spending bill that contained $5 million of the REAP funding. In 2012, Branstad line-item vetoed half a million dollars for Iowa food banks on the Friday before Memorial Day.

Iowa lawmakers advanced two bills yesterday that illustrate how effective corporate and interest group lobbyists can be. In the Iowa House, a bill allowing greyhound racing to end in Council Bluffs and become less costly for a casino in Dubuque won final passage by 79 votes to 16. I’ve posted the roll call after the jump. As Bleeding Heartland discussed here, Iowa greyhound breeders and trainers, along with their paid representatives, managed to get the state legislature to insist on a massive bailout for their industry–even though public demand for dog racing is near zero these days. According to the Dubuque Telegraph-Herald’s Erin Murphy, Governor Terry Branstad has not committed to signing the bill. But if he does, tens of millions of dollars from the Las Vegas-based Caesar’s corporation will be divided among a relatively small group of greyhound breeders, trainers, kennel owners, and rescue organizations.

Meanwhile, yesterday the Iowa Senate approved “an act relating to vapor products and alternative nicotine products, and providing penalties.” Bleeding Heartland discussed this bill in February, when it passed the Iowa House. On its face, House File 2109 looks like it is designed to protect children’s health by banning e-cigarette sales to minors. But medical and public health groups opposed the bill. Lobbyists who supported it mostly represented tobacco companies or retailers. They liked the bill because it didn’t classify vapor cigarettes as tobacco products and didn’t ban fruit-flavored e-cigarettes. Before final passage, senators rejected an amendment offered by Senator Joe Bolkcom, which would have strengthened the bill. They then approved an amendment offered by Senator Bill Dotzler, making minor changes to the definition of “vapor product.” The lobbyist declarations on the bill still show opposition from the public health community and support from the tobacco industry and retailers. On final passage senators approved the bill by 37 votes to 12. Because of the slight change in wording, this bill goes back to the Iowa House rather than straight to the governor’s desk. I doubt it will run into any trouble there, given how easily it passed in February.

Incidentally, the e-cigarettes bill is a rare example of legislation that passed the Iowa Senate with more votes from the minority party (22 of the 24 Republicans) than from the majority party (15 of the 26 Democrats). Someone please correct me if I’m wrong, but I can’t think of any similar Iowa Senate vote during the last few years. Scroll to the end of this post for the roll call.

UPDATE: On April 29, the Iowa House approved the Senate version of House File 2109, after rejecting along party lines Democratic amendments that would have strengthened the bill. The vote on final passage was 74 to 23, similar to the margin by which House members approved the e-cigarette legislation in February. I’ve posted details on the roll call after the jump.

Did you ever notice how some things that make no sense are accepted as completely normal in the Iowa legislature? Case in point: ongoing negotiations over the future of greyhound racing in Iowa, which may produce an enormous payoff for private businesses that would otherwise fail.

The working of Iowa’s state legislature is transparent in many ways. The official legislative website provides thorough, timely and permanently accessible information about bills, legislators, committees, votes, and other events. Most Iowa House and Senate members are accessible to interested constituents, even listing their home and/or cell phone numbers on the web. When the legislature is in session, members of the public can come to the Capitol during working hours and often speak to key lawmakers about the issues they care about.

Nevertheless, it can be hard for those on the outside to figure out what is really going on at the statehouse. So it was last week when the Iowa House approved House File 2109, “An Act relating to vapor products and alternative nicotine products, and providing penalties.” Following the lead of the bill’s sponsor, news headlines made this legislation sound like a step toward protecting children’s health: “Iowa House approves ban on sale of e-cigarettes to minors”; “Iowa House passes ban on e-cigarettes for minors”; “House votes to ban e-cigarette sales to minors.”

The lobbyist declarations told a different story.  

What’s on your mind this weekend, Bleeding Heartland readers? This is an open thread. I’ve been catching up on some former state lawmakers, legislative candidates, and government officials.

As you may recall, Jeff Boeyink resigned this fall as Governor Terry Branstad’s Chief of Staff for a position with a lobbying firm. About ten days ago, the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board released an opinion at Boeyink’s request on how he can be involved in “government affairs” while Iowa’s two-year ban on former officials’ lobbying is in effect. More details on that opinion are after the jump.

After interviewing six candidates for a vacant seat on the Clive City Council, the remaining council members voted 4-0 to appoint Susan Judkins to the position. Judkins has lived in Clive since 2006. She was the Democratic nominee in Iowa House district 43 in 2012, losing to State Representative Chris Hagenow by just 23 votes. To my knowledge, no Democrat has announced plans yet to run against Hagenow in 2014.

Former Republican State Representative Renee Schulte lost her seat in 2012 to Art Staed, the Democrat she had defeated in 2008. Schulte is now consulting with the Iowa Department of Human Services on mental health reform. What was originally a six-month contract has been extended until the end of this year. Schulte recently ruled out running for Congress in the open first district.

Former Alaska Governor and Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin, unofficially known as “Half-Term” or “The Quitter,” was just in Des Moines for the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition’s fall fundraiser in Des Moines. Another Tea Party favorite, U.S. Senator Mike Lee of Utah, was a featured speaker. O.Kay Henderson posted the audio and highlights from Palin’s and Lee’s speeches at Radio Iowa. Throwback Phyllis Schlafly was honored at the Faith and Freedom Coalition event. How many Bleeding Heartland readers are old enough to remember Schlafly in her heyday, railing against the Equal Rights Amendment?

During the past year, Republican governors have been split on expanding Medicaid as foreseen under the 2010 Affordable Care and Patient Protection Act. The U.S. Supreme Court made Medicaid expansion optional for states in its decision upholding most of the health care reform law. More than a dozen GOP governors were happy to opt out, but many prominent state leaders came around to supporting the Medicaid expansion, including Chris Christie of New Jersey, John Kasich of Ohio, Susana Martinez of New Mexico, Rick Snyder of Michigan, and even Jan Brewer of Arizona. Kasich has emphasized the moral imperative to give the poor better access to health care. Snyder has made a more pragmatic case, citing the over-use of emergency rooms by the uninsured and the burden that uncompensated hospital care places on businesses and insured individuals. Christie emphasized cost savings to New Jersey taxpayers.

Despite Governor Terry Branstad’s posturing against the health care reform law before and after the Supreme Court’s ruling, I figured he would eventually come around like Snyder and Christie did. Branstad used to be president of a medical school in Des Moines, so I thought he would be influenced by the Iowa Hospital Association’s case for Medicaid expansion. I expected him to return from a meeting with U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius saying he had negotiated a great deal for Iowa on Medicaid.

Instead, Branstad stuck to his guns throughout the 2013 legislative session, insisting on a more costly alternative that would cover fewer Iowans. I suspect that he promised to sign the final compromise only because Iowa Senate Democrats appeared unwilling to approve commercial property tax changes or education reform without a deal to expand health care access to low-income Iowans.

Branstad’s not a policy wonk. He’s always been strongly influenced by other people’s advice. So one question in my mind was, who kept telling him to ignore the Iowa Hospital Association, county officials and many other health care organizations and advocacy groups, which lobbied for Medicaid expansion?

This week Iowans may have gotten the answer.

Former Republican Party of Iowa Chair Matt Strawn’s name came up earlier this year as a possible candidate for U.S. Senate, but don’t expect him to be a serious contender for any statewide office in the foreseeable future. News broke yesterday that the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois has hired the firm Strawn and two prominent Illinois Republicans founded earlier this year to to lobby GOP lawmakers in Illinois to support a bill legalizing same-sex marriage. This spring, Illinois appeared to be on the brink of adopting a marriage equality bill, but supporters never brought it up for a vote in the state House. They plan to try again when the legislature returns in November. Although Strawn’s partner Pat Brady, the former Illinois GOP chair, will do the heavy lifting on this job, social conservatives who dominate the Iowa GOP’s activist base will surely hold a grudge against Strawn.

I got a kick out of Craig Robinson’s rewriting of history yesterday, saying Strawn “abdicated” the Iowa GOP chairmanship, but that “some Iowa Republicans still consider him to have been a good chairman, especially in comparison to his successor.” Robinson was the loudest voice demanding Strawn’s resignation in the wake of the 2012 Iowa caucus vote-counting fiasco. Be careful what you wish for.

Great catch by Megan Day Suhr, a onetime lobbyist and Democratic candidate for the Iowa House in 2012. Former State Representative Doug Struyk has left his position as chief executive officer to Iowa House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, a job he had held since May 2012.

Suhr noticed that as of this week, Struyk is now registered to lobby Iowa’s executive branch on behalf of about 40 clients. Struyk’s Linked In page lists his current employment as Carney & Appleby, PLC, a firm specializing in personal injury litigation and lobbying.

First elected to the Iowa House as a Democrat in 2002, Struyk switched parties shortly before the 2004 filing deadline for candidates. He was re-elected to the legislature as a Republican three times and retired in 2010. He then served as an adviser and legal counsel to Iowa Secretary of State Matt Schultz until joining Paulsen’s staff last year. Although he is not registered to lobby the legislative branch, it seems very soon for Struyk to move from a government position to lobbying.

By the way, Struyk’s departure from the Iowa House staff is another hint that Paulsen is planning to run for Congress in the first district.

Former Iowa GOP Chair Matt Strawn and two prominent Illinois Republicans have formed Next Generation Public Affairs Inc, Jennifer Jacobs reported for the Des Moines Register today.

The firm will provide strategies in government affairs, issue advocacy and media relations, as well as strategies in sourcing capital and structuring large-scale public-private partnership projects, Strawn said this morning.

It will have an upper Midwest focus and initial offices in Chicago and Des Moines.

“Too often comprehensive public affairs strategies for transactions that require both public and private resources are an afterthought, or used defensively in attempt to rescue failing or stalled deals,” [Chicago-based business owner] Fitzsimmons said in a written statement. “The ability to develop sophisticated advocacy campaigns, source capital and navigate complex transactions to completion truly is the next generation of public affairs.”

Strawn and [former Illinois GOP state party Chair Pat] Brady became close friends during their tenure on the Republican National Committee.

The concept for the firm has been in the works since last year, Strawn said. He will lead the company’s social media engagement and data capturing technologies.

Strawn may have felt that he was criticized unfairly over problems with reporting the 2012 Iowa caucus vote, but in retrospect he probably benefited from stepping down early as state party chair. He can still claim credit for rebuilding the Iowa GOP while riding the 2010 wave and registration gains related to the 2012 caucuses. At the same time, Strawn doesn’t get the blame for Iowa Republicans’ subpar early GOTV in the 2012 general election. I believe President Barack Obama would have carried Iowa in any event, but turning out more Republicans and identifying more GOP-leaning independents would have kept things a lot closer. Strawn can say those failures didn’t happen on his watch.

I am seeking comment on whether Strawn will remain involved with the 527 group GOPAC. Last year the troup tapped Strawn to chair its efforts in down-ticket Iowa races.

P.S.- Here’s some free advice for Jennifer Jacobs: see how easy it is to provide a link and a mention when you first saw a story on someone else’s website? If the Des Moines Register were more willing to do the same where appropriate, people like Kevin Hall might not ridicule you so much about getting scooped.

I’ve never been a fan of former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, but until this morning I didn’t take him for someone who would kick a friend when he’s down. Today’s breaking news is Pawlenty resigning as national co-chair of Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign in order to become CEO of the Financial Services Roundtable.

Yesterday the U.S. Senate approved an amended version of the Jumpstart Our Business Startups (JOBS) Act, which is supposed to make it easier for entrepreneurs to start small companies. All five Iowans in the U.S. House voted for this bill two weeks ago, but Iowa’s senators split on party lines.  

The U.S. House overwhelmingly approved the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act today, but House leaders amended the bill U.S. senators passed last week. An amendment offered by Republican Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa will be at the center of negotiations on the House-Senate conference committee charged with reconciling the two versions of the STOCK Act.

The Iowa House Ethics Committee unanimously dismissed an ethics complaint against Republican House Majority Leader Linda Upmeyer today.

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

This post was supposed to be about Governor Terry Branstad interfering with the Iowa Board of Regents. News broke on Monday that the governor leaned on the Regents’ elected president and president pro-tem to resign as board officers early, so that Branstad appointees could take charge right away.

That’s inappropriate and unprecedented, but it’s not even the most outrageous Branstad power grab of the week. The governor urged Iowa Workers’ Compensation Commissioner Chris Godfrey to resign four years before the end of his appointed term. When Godfrey declined the request, Branstad had his staff ask again for Godfrey’s resignation. When Godfrey refused, Branstad slashed his pay by a third.

When asked to explain his actions, Branstad passed the buck to the Iowa Association of Business and Industry. Details are after the jump.

The Iowa House and Senate finally passed a budget and got out of town yesterday with only about eight hours remaining before the end of the fiscal year.

Every legislative session has its own dynamic, and I’ve been thinking about what surprised me most about this year’s maneuvering in the capitol.  

The Iowa House Appropriations Committee passed House Study Bill 1 on January 12, by a party-line vote of 15 to 10. Republicans call the bill the “Taxpayers First Act” and claim it would save the state more than $500 million over three years, while refunding some money to taxpayers and allocating an extra $25 million for mental health services over the next 18 months. As Bleeding Heartland discussed here, the potential savings in the current budget year are far smaller. The Democratic-controlled Iowa Senate is unlikely to approve some of the big-ticket spending cuts, such as complete elimination of the voluntary preschool program for four-year-olds. The full text of the bill as introduced is here (pdf file). The Legislative Services Agency analysis of how much various provisions would cost or save is here (pdf file).

Looking through the lobbyist declarations on HSB 1, so far only Iowans for Tax Relief, the National Federation of Independent Business, and the Washington-based 501(c)4 group American Principles in Action have declared support for it. The bill’s opponents include the Greater Des Moines Partnership, the Iowa City Area Chamber of Commerce, the Iowa Association of School Boards, the Iowa chapter of the National Association of Social Workers, major labor unions (AFSCME and the Iowa State Education Association), the State Bar Association, and many organizations that advocate for public health and environmental causes. Numerous lobbyists haven’t taken a position on the bill; influential organizations still undecided include the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation, the Iowa Association of Business and Industry, the League of Cities, the State Association of Counties, the Iowa Medical Society, the Cedar Rapids Chamber of Commerce, the Iowa Chamber Alliance, and the American Association of Retired Persons.

UPDATE: The “deappropriations” bill was renamed House File 45. Click here for a bill summary.

The Associated Press is reporting that President Barack Obama has selected William Daley as his next chief of staff. It appears that Howie Klein is right: Obama was able to pick an even worse top staffer than Rahm Emanuel. After running the White House staff for nearly two years, Emanuel recently resigned in order to run for mayor of Chicago.

Open Secrets posted a “Revolving Door” profile on Daley showing his employment history in government and as a lobbyist. More background on why Daley’s a terrible choice can be found after the jump.

Last Thursday, the Iowa Senate approved a bill that would improve the health and well-being of Iowa working mothers and their children. In addition, this bill would reduce many employers’ health care costs while lowering employee turnover and absenteeism. Unlike legislation that pits business interests against the needs of working families, this bill would be a win-win.

Nevertheless, almost the whole Republican caucus voted against Senate File 2270, which promotes workplace accommodations for employees who express breast milk.

Follow me after the jump for background on this bill and Republican opposition to it.

What happens when you fracture your ankle and no one checks on your wound or changes your stocking for 25 days? Ruth Louden, an otherwise healthy 89-year-old, developed gangrene, leading to the amputation of her leg. Her health went downhill quickly, and she died within months. Federal officials hit the Friendship Manor nursing home in Grinnell with a fine of $112,650. But the owner, Tim Boyle, appealed the fine and has settled for $75,397.

If management had brought Friendship Manor into compliance with all regulations on patient care during the past year, reducing the fine might be justified. But according to Clark Kauffman of the Des Moines Register, another patient died last year because of an accident linked to an unsafe walkway at the facility. That’s not all:

• In November, state inspectors compiled a 45-page list of deficiencies at the home, including:

• Improper use of physical restraints.

• Failure to meet a professional standard of care.

• Failure to provide incontinence care.

• Failure to prepare food under sanitary conditions.

• Failure to adhere to infection-control guidelines.

Current protocols for nursing home inspections and fines don’t appear to be compelling this facility’s managers to meet reasonable standards of care. It may be cheaper for owners to accept the occasional federal fine (after appealing to get it reduced) than to bring conditions up to par.

Iowa nursing homes have less to fear than ever from state regulators. During last year’s legislative session, lawmakers voted unanimously to eliminate “a broad range of fines against Iowa nursing homes that fail to meet minimum health and safety standards.” Friendship Manor owner Tim Boyle heads the nursing home industry’s main lobbying group, which provided a a textbook case of how to buy influence at the Iowa statehouse.

Even now, some Iowa legislators think regulators are too tough on nursing homes. What a sorry state of affairs in a state with one of the highest proportions of elderly people in the population.

Following up on my review of news from the first half of last year, I’ve posted links to Bleeding Heartland’s coverage of Iowa politics from July through December 2009 after the jump.

Hot topics on this blog during the second half of the year included the governor’s race, the special election in Iowa House district 90, candidates announcing plans to run for the state legislature next year, the growing number of Republicans ready to challenge Representative Leonard Boswell, state budget constraints, and a scandal involving the tax credit for film-making.

There aren’t many political events during the second half of December, but there’s plenty going on during the next couple of weeks. Event details are after the jump. Post a comment or send me an e-mail (desmoinesdem AT yahoo.com) if you know of something I’ve left out.

If I can shake this cold I plan to attend the Culver-Judge holiday party this Saturday. Any other Bleeding Heartland readers going?

State Representative Chris Rants and Jonathan Narcisse have already started their debate series. You can view the schedule and download mp3s of the debates here.

Representative Tom Latham has enjoyed some nice weekends on the dime of his For America’s Republican Majority PAC, I learned from a must-read piece by Jason Hancock at Iowa Independent.

A golf outing in West Virginia and a weekend getaway to Atlantic City, N.J., are just two of the trips taken this year by U.S. Rep. Tom Latham of Ames that have garnered the attention of campaign finance watchdogs.

That’s because the trips were paid for by Latham’s political action committee and touted as fundraising events, a practice that is legal but that government reform advocates contend turns the PAC into little more than a slush fund designed to skirt campaign finance law.

Go read Hancock’s piece for details on Latham’s fundraising trips to the Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort in Atlantic City and various high-end golf resorts in West Virginia and California. Latham’s PAC “raised $205,447 during the 2008 election cycle, with almost all of it coming from lobbyists, PACs and corporate leaders.”

A new report by ProPublica explains how leadership PACs function:

Legally, lawmakers are free to spend the leadership PAC money pretty much as they wish.

Lobbyists and lawmakers can — and do — use it to travel together to play golf at Pebble Beach, ride snowmobiles in Montana’s Big Sky Country and go deep-sea fishing in the Florida Keys. The lobbyists don’t pay the costs directly. They contribute to the leadership PAC, which then pays the lawmaker’s resort and travel bills.

Leadership PACs have grown steadily since they began cropping up in the 1970s. What separates them from campaign committees is that lawmakers are supposed to pass along the bulk of the money to other members of their party for their campaigns. That way, lawmakers with leadership PACs can earn their beneficiaries’ support when it comes time to divvy up committee chairmanships and other party leadership posts.

This system helps party leaders spread money to candidates with less money or tighter races. On the other hand, it also fuels the Washington money chase, allocates power in Congress based on fundraising prowess, and encourages lawmakers and lobbyists to mingle socially and recreationally as political money changes hands.

In this tough economy, couldn’t Latham encourage his corporate lobbyist buddies to golf, gamble and spread political money around in Iowa?  

In case you’re wondering whether everyone in Congress does what Latham’s been doing with his PAC, ProPublica’s report has lots more information on hundreds of leadership PACs. But Hancock notes that Iowa’s other members of Congress have used their leadership PAC money for campaign contributions and various expenses, as opposed to trips to high-end casinos and golf resorts.

Cedar Rapids Gazette columnist Todd Dorman published his take on the first statewide radio ad from Republican Christian Fong. Dorman’s not buying into Fong’s promise to “end the use of taxpayer money to fund lobbyists.” He makes some excellent points:

For starters, I don’t think leaving the lobbying playing field to non-government interests only is smart. I’m not sure how the public interest is advanced by allowing, for example, a corporation to lobby for loosened pollution rules while barring state regulators from pushing the other way.

Second, lawmakers would lose a pretty important resource. I can’t tell you how many times I saw members of a legislative committee get stuck in the complex details of a piece of legislation before turning to the audience and finding a department lobbyist who swiftly cleared up the confusion. Walling off one branch of government from another is going to slow down a process that’s already painfully slow.

Third, it really doesn’t bother me that state departments pursue legislative agendas. It’s not OK for the attorney general to lobby for tougher criminal penalties? The Department of Public Health should be barred from advocating for pandemic preparedness funding?

I agree totally, and Fong should be prepared to refute Dorman’s points if he is a serious thinker about policy, as opposed to a candidate taking cheap shots.

My only problem with Dorman’s column is that he cites this Des Moines Register report as saying that “state departments spent $1.8 million on lobbying state lawmakers” during the past year. In fact, the Register arrived at that figure by including lobbying expenses of “state agencies, municipalities, county agencies and associations where member dues are paid by taxpayers, such as the Iowa League of Cities.”

Ask anyone who has spent time at the statehouse; the League of Cities and State Association of Counties are forces to be reckoned with. It’s not hard to see why, since a lot of bills considered by the legislature affect city and county governments. I wonder whether Fong really thinks the governor should ban cities and counties from making their voices heard with state legislators.

In related news, Fong still hasn’t corrected his ad’s demonstrably false statement about the I-JOBS bonding initiative. He knows how financial markets work, and it doesn’t reflect well on him that he would mislead voters by claiming the state of Iowa is borrowing money to pay our bills.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Christian Fong is introducing himself to Iowans with a 60-second radio ad (audio here). Like Fong’s campaign website and early media interviews, this ad focuses on restoring “the Iowa dream” his family has lived.

Fong reads the script himself, beginning with a few details about his father’s life. Fong says, “After tax cuts in ’61, the U.S. was booming. Nelson Fong, a Christian in Hong Kong, was drawn by the promise of freedom to the United States in ’63.” By the way, tax rates after those 1961 cuts were still substantially higher than today’s rates, which didn’t slow down the U.S. economy during the 1960s. But I digress.

About halfway through the ad, Fong shifts from his family’s story to how he sees the American dream slipping away. Echoing the false talking point we hear from other Iowa Republicans, Fong claims, “We have a state government that borrowed almost a billion dollars to pay its bills.” Of course, the I-JOBS bonding initiative was for infrastructure projects, not for ongoing government programs. Like national credit analysts and institutional investors, Fong should understand the difference between borrowing for capital investments and borrowing to pay bills.

Fong then promises that as governor, he would “end the use of taxpayer money to fund lobbyists and veto any budget that is not balanced.”  

The first point refers to a recent Des Moines Register report showing that  government (“state agencies, municipalities, county agencies and associations where member dues are paid by taxpayers”) spent approximately $1.8 million of at least $13.7 million paid to lobby the Iowa Legislature during the past year. A lot of that expense is for state employees who answer legislators’ questions about various proposals. Republicans would be happy to let business groups spend unlimited amounts lobbying the legislature, with no opportunity for state agencies to discuss the broader implications of industry wish lists. Sounds to me like a prescription for more giveaways like Iowa’s new nursing home law.

Fong obviously doesn’t want anyone to view him as the moderate in the GOP field. This ad ends with a female voice saying, “Paid for by Iowans for Christian Fong, conservative Republican for governor.”

UPDATE: Iowa Democratic Party chair Michael Kiernan called on Fong to take down this “materially false and misleading” ad. I’ve posted Kiernan’s statement after the jump.

Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement on Wednesday filed an ethics complaint against the Iowa Pharmacy Association, which entertained Governor Chet Culver and numerous state legislators in February but did not disclose the reception until after journalists started asking questions five months later. State Representative Kerry Burt, who attended the event, was arrested later that night for drunk driving. From an August 5 Iowa CCI press release:

Iowa CCI’s initial research has uncovered 26 additional late-filing disclosure violations by lobbyist groups during the 2009 legislative session.  This amount represents nearly one-third of the 90 reports that were filed in 2009.

“Today we are focusing on the Iowa Pharmacy Association because its disclosure violation is the most egregious example of abuse of the law by special-interest lobbyists, particularly because they only filed after they were caught,” [Iowa CCI’s State Policy Organizing Director Adam] Mason said.

This emerging and growing political scandal raises new questions about the ability of the House and Senate Ethics Committees to accurately monitor and regulate these types of events.

In 2005, state lawmakers voted to strip oversight powers from the nonpartisan State Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board and task the House and Senate Ethics Committees with oversight responsibilities.  Since then, the number of reported filings have gone down, as has the reported amount of money spent at lobbying events.

I called Mason today with more questions and learned that Iowa CCI filed the complaint with the secretary of the Iowa Senate and the chief clerk of the Iowa House. According to Mason, the Iowa House and Senate Ethics Committees cannot investigate this kind of disclosure violation in the absence of a complaint filed by a third party.

The trouble is, no third party would typically be in a position to set this process in motion. If not for Burt’s bad judgment and bad luck, the public would never have known that the Iowa Pharmacy Association wined and dined policy-makers in February. Iowa CCI has been comparing the disclosure reports filed against the social calendar for legislators from the 2009 session, but Mason told me that not all details about entertainment offered to state legislators are available to the public. Some industry groups provide free travel, food or drinks to lawmakers when the legislature is out of session.

More disturbing, no one on the House or Senate Ethics Committees seems to be taking responsibility for enforcing the disclosure rules. In April, Senate Ethics Committee Vice Chairman Dick Dearden admitted that no one checks the reception disclosures against the legislators’ social calendar. The Des Moines Register reported at the time that Dearden “does not recall any organization ever being punished for not filing reception disclosures properly.”

Legislators should stop pretending to care about money in politics and start addressing real problems with our current system of campaign finance and lobbying. A good start would be to give oversight powers back to the State Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board.

I’ve posted Iowa CCI’s full press release after the jump.

UPDATE: Forgot to link to Jason Hancock’s piece on this subject at Iowa Independent.

Groups that throw receptions for Iowa legislators are supposed to file a disclosure report within five business days of the event, but the Iowa Pharmacy Association filed paperwork for its February 10 reception only this week. Why now? Journalists have been asking about the event that preceded State Representative Kerry Burt’s drunk driving arrest around 2 am on February 11. Burt told an Ankeny police officer that he’d been drinking with the governor that evening.

I agree with Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement; the Iowa Pharmacy Association’s disclosure violation once again demonstrates the need for campaign finance reform. I’ve posted a press release from Iowa CCI after the jump. Excerpt:

Several years ago, state lawmakers voted to strip oversight powers from the nonpartisan State Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board and task the House and Senate Ethics Committees with oversight responsibilities.  Since then, the number of reported filings have gone down, as has the amount of money spent at lobbying events.

“What other profession in the state is allowed to regulate themselves,” asks Ed Rethman, Iowa CCI member from West Des Moines.  “Are doctors allowed to license themselves?”

The Des Moines Register reported in April that many interest groups are providing free food and drink to legislators without properly disclosing how much they spend on these events. Usually, the public never finds out about these events, because no one gets arrested afterwards.

Wining and dining legislators is only one of many ways to buy influence at the Iowa statehouse. Many interest groups hire expensive lobbyists. Some pay legislators’ expenses for out of state trips. Then there’s good old-fashioned contributions to political parties and campaign funds, which are unlimited in Iowa. These methods bury a lot of good ideas and get some bad ideas signed into law.

Meanwhile, what passes for campaign finance reform in the Iowa legislature is a joke.

Any suggestions for making progress on this issue are welcome in this thread.  

Such as the revolving door between Congress and corporate lobbyists:

The nation’s largest insurers, hospitals and medical groups have hired more than 350 former government staff members and retired members of Congress in hopes of influencing their old bosses and colleagues, according to an analysis of lobbying disclosures and other records. […]

Nearly half of the insiders previously worked for the key committees and lawmakers, including  Sens. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and  Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa), debating whether to adopt a public insurance option opposed by major industry groups. At least 10 others have been members of Congress, such as former House majority leaders Richard K. Armey (R-Tex.) and Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.), both of whom represent a New Jersey pharmaceutical firm.

The hirings are part of a record-breaking influence campaign by the health-care industry, which is spending more than $1.4 million a day on lobbying in the current fight, according to disclosure records. And even in a city where lobbying is a part of life, the scale of the effort has drawn attention. For example, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) doubled its spending to nearly $7 million in the first quarter of 2009, followed by Pfizer, with more than $6 million.

So corporate groups are spending $1.4 million a day on lobbying to block a real public health insurance option, which most Americans want.

That’s on top of the millions of dollars the same corporate groups have donated directly to Congressional campaigns. Iowa’s Senator Chuck Grassley has taken hundreds of thousands of dollars from the industries with the most at stake in health care reform.

Members of Congress claim lobbyists and campaign money don’t shape their opinions, but Grassley should know better. He understands that big money from pharmaceutical companies can influence the conclusions of medical researchers–why not elected officials?

Nate Silver has found strong evidence that special-interest money affects Democratic senators’ support for the public option in health care reform.

By the way, I wasn’t too cheered by Senator Chuck Schumer’s promise over the weekend that the health care bill will contain a public option. The current draft in the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions excludes lots of people from choosing the public option over their current health insurance. That will limit competition for the private insurers that have near-monopolies in many markets.

Back in 2003 all the Democratic presidential candidates talked a good game on health care. Now Dick “this is a moral issue” Gephardt is lobbying for a pharmaceutical company. I’ll stand with Howard Dean and hope that John Edwards was wrong about the system being rigged because corporations have too much power in Washington.

Final note: Moveon.org is organizing health care rallies this Thursday, July 9, at senators’ offices in their home states. Sign up here to attend a rally near you.