Three weeks after her re-election victory, Governor Kim Reynolds continues to avoid unscripted interactions with journalists. She has not held a news conference for 20 weeks, and her public appearances since the November election have not even built in “gaggles” where reporters could informally ask a few questions.

Reynolds cut off press conferences about four months before the 2018 midterm election as well, but during that year’s campaign, she participated in three televised debates and pledged to hold weekly news conferences if elected. Though she didn’t keep that promise, she provided several opportunities for reporters to ask about her plans soon after winning the 2018 race.

This year, Reynolds agreed to only one debate with her Democratic challenger and made no commitment regarding future news conferences. The governor’s spokesperson Alex Murphy has not replied to Bleeding Heartland’s questions about plans for media availabilities.

Dan Piller was a business reporter for more than four decades, working for the Des Moines Register and the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. He covered the oil and gas industry while in Texas and was the Register’s agriculture reporter before his retirement in 2013. He lives in Ankeny.

The windowless Office Lounge bar on Grand Avenue nestled across a narrow alleyway from the Register and Tribune Building in downtown Des Moines was a hopping place in the early morning hours of Wednesday, November 6, 1974.

Longtime Office Lounge owner Dorothy Gabriel continued her election-night tradition of keeping the Register’s semi-official bar open after hours (to the apparent indifference of the Des Moines police) so that the newspaper’s staff could blow off the heat and tension of election night.

Fake newspapers designed to drive Illinois voters away from Democratic candidates are being printed at the Des Moines Register’s plant, Gannett staff confirmed to Bleeding Heartland.

At least eleven printed publications, which are part of the conservative network Local Government Information Services (LGIS), have been distributed to Illinois residents since August. Sometimes known as “pink slime” journalism, such publications combine political advocacy with stories resembling neutral coverage of local news or sports. The material has the look and feel of a newspaper, but the content is more like political advertising.

Jem Bartholomew of the Columbia Journalism Review was first to report in early October that Gannett had taken over printing of the LGIS products. The previous publisher, which also owns the suburban Chicago newspaper Daily Herald, canceled its commercial printing contract with LGIS in late September, saying “Many critics cannot or refuse to differentiate between a commercial printing operation” and the Herald’s “editorial mission to be unbiased and fair.”

The Des Moines Register’s executive editor, Carol Hunter, had no comment beyond confirming in a November 4 email that “these are commercial print clients.” She provided a statement from Gannett’s corporate communications staff: “We do not discuss our commercial print clients and have no further comment.”

Herb Strentz was dean of the Drake School of Journalism from 1975 to 1988 and professor there until retirement in 2004. He was executive secretary of the Iowa Freedom of Information Council from its founding in 1976 to 2000.

“It could be worse.”

At the start of 2022, friends may have uttered those four words to console or comfort us.

As the midterm elections approach, those four words may be prophetic.

Every election in a democracy —from township to presidency — is threatened by voters who are ill-informed, misinformed, and/or uninformed.

“If elected, will you commit to weekly press conferences?” a moderator asked during the first debate between Iowa’s candidates for governor in October 2018. “I do it all the time,” Governor Kim Reynolds replied.

Asked again during that campaign’s third debate whether she would hold weekly press conferences, Reynolds claimed to have already made that commitment, adding, “If there’s any ambiguity, I will.”

Bleeding Heartland’s review of the governor’s public schedule reveals she has not come close to keeping that promise for most of the past four years. After a period of greater accessibility during the COVID-19 pandemic, Reynolds held just four formal news conferences during the second half of 2021. More than 40 weeks into this year, she has held only ten news conferences, the last occurring on July 12.

Reporters with access have sometimes been able to ask the governor a few questions at a “gaggle” after a bill signing or another public event. But most weeks, Reynolds has not scheduled even an informal media availability.

Avoiding unscripted questions on camera gives Reynolds greater control over news coverage of her administration, and keeps awkward moments mostly out of public view.

Herb Strentz laments how little news media content is geared toward having an informed electorate capable of self-government.

If the politics of the day make you uneasy or concerned with journalism aimed at entertaining, not informing, please join in this therapy session.

In the grand sweep of things, we start when, according to Shakespeare, a fatally wounded Julius Caesar uttered, “Et tu Brute?” and we end in contemporary times, as those upset with accurate reporting scream “fake news.”

Herb Strentz: The essence of copy editing was not catching errors in spelling or grammar, but making the news more understandable.

When writing posts for Bleeding Heartland, I’ve learned that if you don’t have a good way to introduce a topic, you can find someone who does.

This commentary is about how much we’ve lost as many newspapers have all but eliminated copy editors—people who helped reporters provide the answers and clarity you expect to find in news stories, and saved them from publishing work that raised questions and confusion.

How to sum it up? Consider Michael Gartner’s recollection from when he had just begun working at the Wall Street Journal. (This was some fifteen years before he became editor of the Des Moines Register and Tribune; later he was president of NBC News and won the 1997 Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing as an owner and editor of the Ames Tribune.)

He recalled: “The setting is early July 1960 in the newsroom of the Wall Street Journal:

Herb Strentz: Treating obituaries as news cemented ties between the newspaper and the community, and was great training for young reporters.

People may pay from hundreds to thousands of dollars these days to have loved ones’ obituaries published in local newspapers. But few if any ponder the impact “paid obits” have had on the newsroom.

As an old man (83) who grew up in a newsroom that routinely ran an obit as a news story, and published obits on everyone who died in town, I want to share some costs of today’s approach to obituaries.

All three U.S. House Republicans from Iowa voted this week against a bill that would provide a federal guarantee of access to contraception.

But if Iowans encounter any mainstream news coverage of the issue, they may come away with the mistaken impression that GOP Representatives Ashley Hinson and Mariannette Miller-Meeks took a stand for contraception access.

The episode illustrates an ongoing problem in the Iowa media landscape: members of Congress have great influence over how their work is covered.

Herb Strentz, a frequent contributor to Bleeding Heartland, wrote his Northwestern University PhD dissertation on press coverage of flying saucers/unidentified flying objects. He also was a research associate with the Defense Department project on UFOs conducted by the University of Colorado in the late 1960s.

I offer some bits of UFO trivia and story telling as part of the 75^th anniversary of the onset of the flying saucer phenomenon. That’s generally taken to be June 24, 1947, when Kenneth Arnold, a private pilot from Boise, Idaho, reported seeing disc-like objects over the Cascade Mountains.

Bleeding Heartland user dbmarin is a musician, former Register reporter and sound designer. His collaboration with video artist Oyoram (7even Stories High) is currently featured at The Des Moines Art Center’s IMMERSIVE installation.

I’ll start with the good news.

It looks as if Matthew Smith, deputy superintendent for the Des Moines Public Schools, has been tapped as the interim superintendent while the district searches for Tom Ahart’s successor.

Marcia Rogers divides her time between Cedar Rapids and Hyde Park in Chicago. A version of this column was first published in the Carroll Times Herald.

This wasn’t the planned first article of a three-part series I was intending to write. 

After all, what would a 2021 Nobel Peace Prize journalist from the Philippines, or a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and The Atlantic contributor on Ukraine and Russia, along with a former U.S. president — or finally my supremely qualified seatmate — say that would completely upend my opinion going into today about something so very Iowan as the caucuses.

Why would anything these four shared in their remarks during Day 1 of “Disinformation and the Erosion of Democracy” conference at the University of Chicago turn my world of thought on this topic upside down?

Ira Lacher‘s open letter to Lucas Grundmeier, opinion editor or The Des Moines Register.

Dear Mr. Grundmeier,

Ordinarily, I would submit this to you as a guest opinion essay. But you’ve announced that the Register, once counted among America’s great newspapers, will no longer consider unsolicited opinion pieces. CORRECTION: The newspaper will continue to consider unsolicited guest columns but will “accept far fewer” of them in the print edition.

So I share my views on this blog, which now exists as apparently the sole outlet for members of the Des Moines community wishing to make their opinions known, civilly and responsibly.

In the print edition dated March 13, 2022, you commented about the addition of a new columnist, saying: “I believe this demonstrates the Register’s continued commitment to providing forums for robust discussion of community topics.” My response, to you and the other top executives of the “media company,” which you now call yourself: No. It doesn’t. More about that later.

Steve Corbin is emeritus professor of marketing at the University of Northern Iowa and freelance writer who receives no remuneration, funding, or endorsement from any for-profit business, nonprofit organization, political action committee, or political party.

Most citizens don’t know that Republican leaders in Iowa, Utah, Kansas, and Florida are limiting journalists’ access to open-to-the-public legislature and gubernatorial sessions. Their actions raise the question: “What issues and policies are GOP elected officials trying to hide?”

Furthermore, what is there about the First Amendment to the Constitution – specifically freedom of the press – Republicans don’t understand? Maybe GOP’ers are demonstrating their anti-democracy intentions, giving favor to control the media as witnessed by fascists countries such as Russia, China, North Korea, and Venezuela.

State Representative Bobby Kaufmann gained extensive media coverage in January for raising his middle fingers at the end of a speech to a conservative audience at the Iowa capitol. At the time, Kaufmann told reporters he was trying to convey widespread frustration with federal government policies and national problems.

But the Republican lawmaker told a different story at a recent meeting with constituents. Now he is claiming his “double-finger” was directed at specific individuals who have supposedly threatened his family.

Herb Strentz draws inspiration from three Americans who spoke truth to power when McCarthyism was ascendant.

Edward R. Murrow was among America’s greatest 20th century journalists. He helped see the nation through World War II, mostly through his broadcasts from Nazi-bombed London. He also helped the country get through the “Red Scare” of the 1950s.

Both episodes are distant memories now, even for those who are old enough to remember. But some of us still cling to those memories, and rightly so.

U.S. Representative Ashley Hinson tried to pull a fast one on Iowans this week.

After the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers approved funding for two lock and dam projects along the Mississippi River, Hinson took credit for the spending. “We secured $829 million in federal funding to upgrade locks & dams along the Upper Mississippi River,” she tweeted on January 19, describing the projects as “game-changing for Iowa’s agriculture industry & our Mississippi River communities!”

The trouble is, Hinson voted against the bipartisan infrastructure bill that provided this “game-changing” funding.

Steve Corbin is a freelance writer and emeritus professor of marketing at the University of Northern Iowa.

Few people would argue with the nonpartisan Pew Research Center’s October 2020 finding that “political polarization is more intense now than at any point in modern history.” Resolving the strife starts with truly knowing your political beliefs, understanding other political values, listening (vs. preaching) to others, expanding (vs. restricting) political news sources, compromising (vs. convincing) and accepting intellectual humility.

When registering to vote, citizens must declare whether they are Democrat, Republican, or affiliated with no party (independent). However, there are several gradations of belief within each political stance. Three sources can assist individuals better realize their – and others — political viewpoints.

Herb Strentz reflects on the Iowa legislature’s moves against the press, Senator Grassley’s obliviousness, and the 2024 Iowa caucuses.

Let’s tackle a troika of nightmares, one at a time.

During the five years of their trifecta, Republican lawmakers shredded a 43-year-old collective bargaining law and overhauled a judicial selection process that had been in place for nearly six decades.

Now Iowa Senate Republicans are tossing out more than a century of precedent by refusing to seat any journalists on the chamber’s press bench. For the session that begins on January 10, they are relegating reporters to public galleries far removed from the action.

Why should anyone care where reporters sit at the Iowa capitol? Take it from someone who has never been allowed to work on the press bench: losing access to the chamber will greatly hinder news gathering in the Senate.

This post first appeared on Julie Gammack’s Potluck Column on Substack.

There’s an Iowa connection to the film “Don’t Look Up,” a satire about society’s blindness to our planet in peril. 

A Des Moines Roosevelt High School graduate, Staci Roberts Steele, co-produces the star-studded film. In addition to her job description, the actress/producer/writer also played the assistant to a tech titan character in the movie. 

In the spirit of “Giving Tuesday,” I want to encourage Bleeding Heartland readers to support one or more nonprofits that help make quality journalism available to Iowans at no charge to readers or listeners. The entities listed below are 501(c)3 organizations, so donations are tax-deductible.

If you aren’t in a position to give money to any organization right now, you can help spread the word about solid reporting by sharing links through e-mail networks or social media feeds, or telling friends about sites you enjoy reading.

In the spirit of the gift-giving season, Ira Lacher offers a few pointers to see you through our ever-increasing spate of less-than-credible news.

November 22 passed last week, not with a bang but a whimper. It seems no one cares to remember that on that date fifty-eight years ago, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated.

Fifty-eight years ago, Mark Zuckerberg wasn’t even a zygote, so the rash of conspiracy theories circulating around the shooting in Dallas — “the Mafia did it, with the help of Cuban guerrillas and the CIA!” — had to depend merely on the number of book authors attempting to take advantage of Americans’ chronic abdication of reality.

Today, of course, social media is to conspiracy theorists what steroids were to Barry Bonds. And for good reason. We know the companies who administer those platforms do so with the idea of magnifying shrillness. It’s like substance addiction: The more you ingest, the more your body wants it.

PBS will premiere the movie “Storm Lake” on Monday, November 15 at 9:00 pm Central as part of the public network’s documentary series Independent Lens. If you miss it Monday night, you can catch it on IPTV World at 6:30 pm on November 17, 7:30 am on November 18, or 11:00 am on November 20.

I loved everything about the documentary film “Storm Lake.”

I loved seeing editor Art Cullen at work, getting “real uptight about deadlines,” and out in the community. (One local commented, “A lot of people disagree with him, but they sure read the paper.”)

I loved watching photographer and feature writer Dolores Cullen hustle for scoops on the “happy beat,” like Emmanuel Trujillo’s success on the show Tengo Talento Mucho Talento, a Spanish-language singing competition.

I loved watching founder and publisher John Cullen reconcile accounts and deliver papers to gas stations and restaurants.

I loved watching sales and circulation manager Whitney Robinson pitch ads to locally-owned businesses–a job that (amazingly) “got more difficult” after Art won the Pulitzer Prize, because some conservative locals weren’t happy to see a liberal voice honored.

And I loved watching lead reporter Tom Cullen take on all kinds of political stories, from interviewing a city council candidate in Alta (population 2,087) to asking Senator Chuck Grassley and presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg about immigration to writing up the massive Latino turnout for Bernie Sanders on Iowa caucus night.

But nothing impressed me more than the film’s final fifteen minutes, when directors Jerry Risius and Beth Levison turned their attention to how the Storm Lake Times dealt with the COVID-19 pandemic.

U.S. Representative Ashley Hinson gives a lot of television interviews. The first-term Republican is comfortable on the air, thanks to her broadcast journalism background. She is guaranteed friendly treatment from conservative networks like Fox News and Newsmax, and Iowa stations usually let her set the agenda with questions like, “What are you most proud of?” or, “You introduced a bill in the House. Just tell me more about that bill and what it does.”

Last week, KWWL’s morning anchor Daniel Winn went beyond pitching softballs to amplifying Hinson’s talking points. More troubling, Winn twice characterized a controversial Biden administration initiative as “crazy.”

The “We All Want Clean Water” podcast is available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

About us:

Silvia Secchi is a Professor in the Department of Geographical and Sustainability Sciences at the University of Iowa.

Chris Jones is a Research Engineer at IIHR-Hydroscience & Engineering at the University of Iowa.

This two-section essay (each of us communicating our own perspectives) outlines some of our thoughts on Iowa water quality within the context of production agriculture, and why we are beginning a regular podcast on this topic.

I’ve been covering Iowa politics on this website for more than fourteen years, and I can truthfully say this adventure never gets old. But I’ve been meaning to let Bleeding Heartland readers know about two relatively new projects I’m enjoying as well.

Herb Strentz reflects on stories that have been in the news lately. -promoted by Laura Belin

Readers of Bleeding Heartland have much to be grateful for in the state government reporting of editor Laura Belin and in her conscientious editing of what others post here. But sometimes our thoughts don’t merit or need the 700 or more words that occupy Bleeding Heartland space and readers’ time. 

Here are five quick takes on recent events, each of whose urgency, impact, or nature can be handled in fewer than 170 words.

Herb Strentz challenged Senator Chuck Grassley to correct his false statements about Georgia’s new voting restrictions. -promoted by Laura Belin

When providers of information and commentary publish a “correction”— or the euphemism “clarification” — conventional journalism protocols call for saying, “We regret the error.”

Well, here’s a clarification that does not regret an error, but reflects the need to make a disappointing revision.

Governor Kim Reynolds promised early this year that she would have her staff respond “in a timely manner” to requests for public records.

Two and a half months later, the governor’s office continues to delay action on numerous requests for documents subject to Iowa’s open records law.

In a nationally televised interview this week, Former Governor Terry Branstad joined the ranks of prominent Iowa Republicans who still refuse to debunk Donald Trump’s Big Lie about fraud in the 2020 election.

Herb Strentz reflects on the transfer of power and the reaction from leading Iowa Republican politicians. -promoted by Laura Belin

While President Donald Trump engaged in no traditional “welcome” protocols to greet his successor at the White House, he left something even more important for President Joe Biden and for the sake of the nation. What Trump left us is a bestowal of relief, of trust, of hope and of opportunity that could serve us all well for years to come.

For the second year running, January will bring big changes to Iowa’s media scene.

Jason Clayworth and Linh Ta will write the Axios Des Moines newsletter, set to launch during the first quarter of 2021. Clayworth is a longtime Des Moines Register reporter who has mostly done investigative work in recent years. Ta covered several beats for the Register before joining the Iowa Capital Dispatch reporting team in early 2020.

Herb Strentz reflects on Donald Trump’s ongoing influence over the news media and his “cult” of supporters within the Republican Party. -promoted by Laura Belin

As the electoral college has done its work, joy and relief at the outcome of the 2020 election is tempered by recollections of the 2008 and 2016 elections and three recent commentaries in the Des Moines Register and the New York Times.

After months of planning, journalists announced the creation of the Iowa Capitol Press Association on November 30. The group’s mission “is to support robust coverage of Iowa state government for the benefit of the public and to promote policies that encourage transparency and access” as well as safe working conditions for reporters.

Association president Erin Murphy of Lee Newspapers said in a news release, “Our members have enjoyed a respectful working relationship with our leaders in state government. We look forward to working with them to foster a climate of transparency and accountability, for the benefit of the people of Iowa.”

For now, Republican legislative leaders and their partisan appointees will have the final say on who can participate in the association.

Small Business Saturday originated as a way to promote holiday gift shopping at locally owned retailers. I hope Bleeding Heartland readers will consider investing in independent Iowa journalism as well.

Herb Strentz explores rhetoric from Iowa’s 2014 and 2020 U.S. Senate campaigns and finds parallels between our two Republican senators. -promoted by Laura Belin

Labor Day in even-numbered years usually brings more public interest in politics and the final stage of hopeful campaigns for Congress or the presidency.

This time around, many are driven by dread — dread of elections past, and, oh yeah, fears for the one coming on November 3.

Small wonder, given what “We the people” have inflicted upon ourselves.

Mary Weaver is an active citizen, rural health advocate, farm wife, mom, grandmother, retired nurse, and former administrator at the Iowa Department of Public Health. -promoted by Laura Belin

“We are living in an age when communication has achieved fabulous importance. There is a new decisive force in the human race, more powerful than all the tyrants. It is the force of massed thought–thought which has been provoked by words, strongly spoken.”

–Robert Sherwood, originator of the Voice of America 1939 

Lost in the ever-evolving news cycle was President Donald Trump’s recent appointment of Michael Pack as the new administrator of the United States Agency for Global Media. This appointment was quickly followed with the dissolution of the advisory boards of Middle East Broadcasting, Radio Free Asia, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, and the Open Technology Fund.

This project started with the goal of clearing up some confusion surrounding Iowa’s novel coronavirus (COVID-19) death statistics.

Specifically, I wanted to debunk a conspiracy theory making the rounds on Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit.

I also planned to explain why the number of deaths for a given day on the state’s official website (coronavirus.iowa.gov) didn’t always match the number of new deaths that had been announced on that date. Many readers had asked about the discrepancy.

I was almost ready to publish in early July, but I needed to nail down one detail. Did the total fatalities on the state website (793 at this writing) reflect all of what the U.S. Centers for Disease Control describes as “multiple cause” COVID-19 deaths, or only what the CDC labels “underlying cause” deaths?

After asking that question more than half a dozen times over two and a half weeks, I still haven’t received an answer. So much for the Iowa Department of Public Health’s supposed “transparency” and “constant communication with media” on the pandemic.

Herb Strentz was dean of the Drake School of Journalism from 1975 to 1988 and professor there until retirement in 2004. -promoted by Laura Belin

After almost 60 years of coping with the concept of “objectivity” in journalism, it finally dawned on me that a key problem is a lot of folks are not objective in discussing “objectivity.”

Consider: The New Yorker magazine offered a 2,026-word essay on why the concept of “moral clarity” might replace “objectivity” in assessing press coverage. The Economist magazine followed a week or so afterward with a 1,530 word essay on today’s status of “objectivity.”

But in those 3,500 words — get this — “Fox” or “Fox News” is nowhere to be found.