# Radio Iowa



Casual sexism in the Iowa House becomes easy clickbait for Radio Iowa

The Iowa House Government Oversight Committee wasted more time today arguing over efforts by some Republicans to investigate last year’s Governor’s Conference on LGBTQ Youth. For background on the controversy surrounding the annual event organized by the non-profit Iowa Safe Schools, see reporting by Iowa statehouse correspondents William Petroski and James Q. Lynch, as well as Mark Joseph Stern’s article for Slate. Committee Chair Bobby Kaufmann could be directing his oversight energy toward the governor’s hasty privatization of the Medicaid program, which will affect health care for one in six Iowans. But no, Kaufmann asserts “it would be a dereliction of my duty if we did not have an investigation” of the Governor’s Conference on LGBTQ Youth, attended by roughly a thousand people last year. (I am a longtime supporter of the conference but play no role in planning it.)

Iowa Safe Schools Executive Director Nate Monson has declined invitations from Kaufmann’s committee to testify about the conference. Today Democratic State Representative Mary Wolfe, a defense attorney by trade, and Republican State Representative Dawn Pettengill, occasionally prone to paranoid fears, disagreed over whether Monson should be compelled to appear. I’ve enclosed below excerpts from their remarks at the latest committee meeting.

House Republican Clel Baudler interrupted the exchange to declare it a “catfight,” “eliciting laughter from some committee members, including Pettengill,” by Lynch’s account.

It’s disappointing but not surprising that an Iowa lawmaker would belittle two of his female colleagues by reducing their substantive disagreement to a “catfight.”

Equally disappointing and much more surprising: O.Kay Henderson validated Baudler’s assessment by elevating his description to the headline and lede of her story for Radio Iowa. Putting the word in quotation marks signified that the label came from someone other than the journalist. Nevertheless, a story called “Committee ‘catfight’ over panel’s subpoena power,” with the opening sentence “One committee member today used the word ‘catfight’ to describe this debate,” gave Baudler’s interjection more importance than it warranted. Henderson’s reports reach thousands of Iowans, not only online but also through more than 50 affiliate radio stations.

In contrast, Lynch played it straight with his title (“Iowa lawmakers clash on scope of oversight in LGBT case”) and lede (“Members of an Iowa House committee that reviews the performance of state agencies clashed Wednesday over the scope of its authority to compel testimony from members of the public”). He mentioned Baudler’s comment near the end of the story, where the colorful detail belonged.

I don’t expect Baudler to provide enlightened commentary on legislative happenings. I do expect one of Iowa’s most accomplished and respected female journalists not to seize on a sexist cheap shot as clickbait.

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Favorite online sources for Iowa news

I’ve been reading news and analysis at Iowa Independent daily for more than a year, but since they recently added an Iowa News Feed to the front page I’m checking the blog even more often. The news feed links to mainstream media reports and blog posts covering a wide range of topics.

IowaPolitics.com also provides lots of links to mainstream media stories, politicians’ press releases and blog posts, plus some original reporting.

CoveringIowaPolitics.com has original reporting on the biggest statewide political stories.

Radio Iowa also has a mixture of original reporting, including interviews, and press releases.

For stories and angles that can be off the beaten path:

Blog for Iowa publishes action alerts and press releases from various progressive organizations.

The Public News Service releases Iowa-related stories several times a week, which often have an environmental or public-health focus.

E-mail lists run by various non-profit organizations are another way to find out what’s going on in the state. I subscribe to several of these, and I often see stories or press releases that I wouldn’t have found in any newspaper or blog.

I look forward to reading about other Bleeding Heartland users’ favorite online sources for Iowa news.