Hillary's 'Hart To Hart' Act Falls Flat On Kodak Stage As Night Goes To Obama

Commentary -- With a conversational, inviting style, as well as a more presidential bearing, Barack Obama tonight upstaged Hillary Clinton on the Kodak Theatre stage in Los Angeles, just days before Super Tuesday.

In the LA Democratic Presidential Debate Obama explained his policy proposals on topics ranging from immigration to Iraq to health-care in a manner this was simply more accessible. What's more, he was far less canned than Hillary, and warmed the audience with sponteneous shots of humor. He did all of this without setting her up for a command performance of the crying game we witnessed (winced) at about this stage in New Hampshire.

In his key moments on offense and defense, Obama hit the right buttons. First, he successfully made the case that if warrior John McCain is the Republican standard-bearer (which looks to be more imminent minute by minute) that an Obama candidacy can claim a clear distinction on Iraq -- that the GOP spin machine will lob the rhetorical grenade at Clinton, that she was in fact for the war before she was against it.

"I don't want to just end the war," Obama said. "I want to end the mindset."

On health-care, he won the argument on what Clinton has long sought to claim as her home turf. Obama, whose plan seeks to make it affordable but doesn't mandate insurance for adults (it does for kids) asked the legitimate question of Hillary's compulsory health-care system: What happens to people who don't get insurance? Are they fined? Or otherwise punished?

Clinton's best line of the night is one she appears to have come to Los Angeles armed with and ready to fire. When asked about the Bush (VP)-Bush(POTUS)-Clinton-Clinton-Bush-Bush-Clinton-Clinton dynastic possibility (32 years straight in White House) she argued that it took a Clinton to clean up George H.W. Bush's shortcomings.

And .... drum roll ...

"It might take another one to clean up after the second Bush," Hillary Clinton said.

Near the end of the debate, though, when pressed about her husband's at times incendiary role in her campaign, Hillary Clinton said she's the boss. Will she call off the Bill dog, or like Michael Vick, just stand back and profit from his bites?

"The fact is, I'm running for president and this is my campaign," Hillary Clinton said.

The Clinton marriage of convenience is complete, apparently. She runs to his record in the 1990s, practicically rolls up her wedding dress (presuming she didn't burn it in a post Monica rage) and wraps it around the Clinton years, as if Hill and Bill were some kind of Jonathan-and-Jennifer team from the 1980s TV show "Hart To Hart."

But when the topic of his role emerges today she suggests Bubba is like the dude married to queen of England.

There are more reasons this is a good night for Team Obama.

If the Obama campaign was listening closely, they could hear the echoes of the Bush administration case for the war in Iraq as Hillary Clinton defended her vote on authorization -- noting that the following all seemed reasonable to think about life there in 2003: there could be a "a lot of bad stuff" there, you had a leader who was a "meglomaniac," all of which added up to "legitimate concerns" -- and a Hillary "yes" vote on the military charge.

Whether she was duped or just made a bad call, Obama, correctly, is having none of it.

"Part of the argument I am making is that it is important to be right one Day 1," Obama said.

This commentary is cross-posted at Iowa Independent.com.

As Pols Posture, A Reality Check On Immigration In Iowa

A Des Moines attorney who works primarily with Hispanic clients in Iowa says the Legislature should stay out of the immigration-enforcement business as the discussion of bills is having a negative impact withn an ethnic community vital for the state's future.

"It's a matter the state should leave alone. It's a federal matter," said Jamie Byrne, a bilingual attorney with Max Schott& Associates.

In conjunction with La Prensa, a western Iowa Spanish-language newspaper, Byrne presented a program earlier this week in Spanish on workers' rights in Denison at the St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church. After the forum, Byrne talked with Iowa Independent about the current debate on immigration the Hawkeye State.

A native of Cedar Rapids who is white, Byrne said the bills he's read about would have the practical effect of making all Iowans with brown skin into suspects.

"I think too many people believe that if you speak Spanish you're not legal," Byrne said.

Iowans seeking to go back to a racially homogenous time are in denial if they think the state can sustain a workforce without immigrants, Byrne said. New laws could result in a exodus of the people, the sheer numbers of living, breathing and working folks, Iowa so desparatley needs, he added.

"It's certainly going to hurt the smaller towns that have a large Hispanic population and feed off it," Byrne said.

Meanwhile, in Des Moines, Democrats and Republicans appear to be playing to big business and labor, the xenophonic and muliticultural celebrants on the respective wings, with little recognition of the reality in rural western Iowa. We need people.

“Future growth of the workforce should be through legal immigration," said Jim Gossett, a development official with Western Iowa Advantage and the Carroll Area Development Corp. "We need to be sure that new legislation does not go too far. Penalizing those who were never stopped from coming here in the first place and now are a productive part of the economy seems unfair to me.”

Western Iowa Advantage includes heavily Latino Crawford County.

At the statehouse Iowa Independent's Jay Wagner reports that Republicans are concerned about a Democratic-sponsored immigration bill that would level hefty fines on people who repeatedly employ illegal immigrants.

"The Democrats have proposed a fine for businesses that hire illegals but have attached it to pro-union legislation that businesses hate," State Sen. Jeff Angelo, R-Creston, told Iowa Independent. "My thought is that they will try to pass it knowing that Republicans will vote against the pro-union stuff and then have them on record voting against the immigration stuff. It is a pure political ploy."


A Republican plan that emerged from Angelo's own immigration task force proposed cutting off state assistance to undocumented people in Iowa (except in cases of emergencies) and a beefing up of enforcement.

House Democratic Leader Kevin McCarthy of Des Moines tells The Register the GOP plan amount to "an amnesty bill for corporate CEOs."

The story is cross-posted at Iowa Independent.com, where it first appeared.

Why Legislature Should Leave Smoking Debate To The Marketplace

Or go with local control ...

The Des Moines Register just published a commentary I wrote on the smoking debate in Iowa.

If Iowans are still reading Mark Twain these days, they may remember one of the American humorist's more famous lines: "Nothing so needs reforming as other people's habits." In the discussion of smoking in contemporary America, that seems to be the primary motivation of many.

If the Legislature does wade in to the issue then a local control bill is preferrable.

Clearly, cities with casinos and the tens of thousands of smoking patrons attendant with those businesses or the shot-and-beer towns in rural Iowa with blue-collar rhythms of life would have a different take on smoking than the effete Des Moines suburbs, communities in which Pottery Barn and Gap-shopping conformists opt for lattes and spinning classes over cigarettes to deal with the stresses of the day.

Ted Kennedy Endorses Barack Obama

Barack Obama Victory Speech In South Carolina

In Storm Lake 'Woebegone' Things Above Average

The provocative progressive editor of the Storm Lake Times, Art Cullen, has penned a piece that simultaneously blasts the Bush Administration's stimulus package and calls attention to some remarkable growth in his northwest Iowa community.

Back in Storm Lake Woebegone, things are above average. Last year saw $42 million in new construction, much of it commercial. But there were 133 housing unit starts in The City Beautiful in 2007, a boomlet like we have not seen here in many years — if ever in our lifetimes.


We did not see the housing boom that other markets had since 1990. Dickinson County enjoyed a surge in construction that was steady over the decade. Now there are 400 housing units on the market in the wake of the housing bubble burst. Omaha and Des Moines are hurting. Storm Lake is not. As a banker from Estherville told one of his chums, “We’ve been in a recession for the last century, so we are immune from it.” There’s a grain of truth in that.

And here is Cullen on the Bush stimulus package:

The subprime housing mess has the world financial markets in a roil, and Congress has jumped in to make things worse. The latest news is that Washington wants to cut everybody a check for at least $300, so they can make a down payment on some electronic gadget that is made in China. This should rescue us, for sure.

JUNO Trailer

Tensions Flare Between Obama and Clinton at SC Debate

Alliant Energy Boss: Four-laning U.S. 30 Across Iowa 'Right Answer,' U.S. 20 Project 'No Justification'

Tom Aller says 'no justification for four-laning Highway 20'

The president of Interstate Power & Light, the former chairman and long-time member of the Iowa State Transportation Commission, says four-laning U.S. 30 through Iowa is the "right answer" while a plan to do the same with U.S. 20 is a project backed by more political arm-twisting than common sense.

Tom Aller, president of Interstate Power and Light Company and senior vice president of energy delivery for the Alliant Energy Corporation, which owns IPL, talked about the state's transporation future in a wide-ranging interview with Carroll Daily Times Herald reporter and Iowa Independent fellow Douglas Burns.

"When you run the models, four-laning Highway 30 is the right answer," Aller said. "It diverts that traffic off (Interstate) 80 to a different route. When I was on the commission I advocated for that solution. What I advocated also was that we didn’t spend another dime on (U.S.) 30 or (U.S.) 20 until we made that decision. My position on 30 was not anti-Carroll or western Iowa or pro-eastern Iowa. It was 'let’s make a decision what we’re going to solve the I-80 problem.' I could never get the commission to do that, including the last two years when I was chairman because of the enormous political pressure in northwest Iowa to four-lane 20. I’m not on the commission anymore. But there is no justification for four-laning Highway 20. There is no computer model. If it was built tomorrow there would never be any traffic on it."

Aller served on the Iowa State Transportation Commission from 1995 through 2003, including serving as the chair from 2001-2003.

"The issue on I-80 east and west is probably the single most important problem we have facing the transportation system in Iowa," Aller said. "It’s overloaded. It’s continuing to be overloaded. It’s dangerous to drive on. It’s increasing truck traffic. There are two potential solutions to relieving I-80. One is four-laning Highway 30. The other is four-laning Highway 20."

According to the U.S. Highway 30 Coalition of Iowa, the Interstate 80 corridor has the most population (947,010) with U.S. 30 next at (524,562) and U.S. 20 (473,812).

One of the more divisive battles in western Iowa is over the priority in funding for U.S. 30 and U.S. 20.

This story is cross-posted at Iowa Independent where it first appeared.

King Compares Himself To Joe Namath, Blasts Culver

King attempts to link Chet Culver with Nancy Pelosi. Is it a sign he has sights set on Terrace Hill?

Seeking to play the role of colorful, loveable underdog, U.S. Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, is comparing himself to 1960s football great Joe Namath.



The reason: King sees a parallel between Namath's 1969 New York Jets win over the favored Baltimore Colts in and the western Iowa Republican's efforts for the taxpaying "underdogs", notably King's opposition to certain relief funding in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and a child health-care bill King thinks would line the pockets of illegal aliens.

Here is King in his most recent column:

In 1969, on the eve of Superbowl III, the brash quarterback of the underdog New York Jets, Joe Namath, famously said, “We’re gonna win the game. I guarantee it!” The brash statement set off a media frenzy, and the highly favored Baltimore Colts were soundly beaten by Namath and the upstart Jets, 16-7. The historic victory brought about the merger of the old NFL and the upstart AFL. Namath, after the game said, “There are a lot of underdogs in the world. Maybe it meant something to the underdogs in life.”

The taxpayer is always the underdog. When I voted “NO” on $51.5 billion of wasteful spending on Hurricane Katrina, because there was no responsible plan, others said it was heartless. The history of the money going to Gucci bags and massage parlors speaks for itself today.

In the column, King argues that an 18-month extension of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) is superior to a bill he and President George W. Bush opposed.

King, the subject of much speculation about a possible challenge to Democratic Gov. Chet Culver, used the column, which is sent to newspapers and posted on his Web site, to attempt to link Culver -- who supported Bush-killed bill -- with U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. King did so in trademark fashion.

Speaker Pelosi and Governor Culver tried to push SCHIP bills through Congress that reflected her San Francisco agenda and values; not Iowa Midwestern common sense.

This article is cross-posted at Iowa Independent.com.

Ann Selzer's Political Time Machine: Learning From The Woman Who Called Iowa

Ann Selzer hasn’t exactly invented a time machine.

But with her recent spot-on predictions on the highly visible presidential campaign stage, this Des Moines pollster can make as strong a claim for clairvoyance as any earthly being today.

Selzer Co., the Des Moines Register’s pollster of record, called the Iowa caucuses for U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, a Republican, only four days before Iowans made her call official.

In the days before the caucuses, Camp Clinton trashed the poll that ended up being right.

Then, just days ago, working for the Detroit Free Press, Selzer called Michigan for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney before voters there proved her correct yet again.

“I wish there were magic and mystery to it, but it is basic science," Selzer said.

So what does this Kansas girl turned Iowa poll company president see that others don’t? Why was she so right and her colleagues in New Hampshire so dead-in-the-street wrong only days later?

“People like to look at past events to predict future events,” Selzer told the Iowa Independent.

That can be treacherous in polling. Using 2000 and 2004 turnouts in Iowa to predict this cycle would have been terribly misleading. So she didn’t. Selzer compared what she was seeing with the Iowa electorate to a famous "M.A.S.H." episode in which Hawkeye Pierce (Alan Alda’s character) staged a mess-hall rebellion of “we want something else.”

Obama and Huckabee best represented that, according to the data Selzer collected.

Selzer said the Clinton campaign was based on a collection of issues, not an overall theme, as was Obama’s.

Many voters were tired of the enmity between the Republicans and Democrats — something that Selzer saw in polling and that was borne out on caucus night,as large numbers of independents and Republicans voted for Obama. In terms of the gender gap difference between Iowa and New Hampshire, Selzer said she is at something of a loss to explain it.

Obama did well with women in Iowa, but suffered as a gaping gap opened to Clinton’s benefit in New Hampshire.

“She didn’t really run as a woman here,” Selzer said.

Iowa has never elected a woman to Congress or as governor. Did that play a role at all in the Iowa vote?

“I’m rather stymied by Iowa’s failure to elect awoman,” Selzer said. She chalks it to lack of strong candidates of that gender so far rather than any deep-seeded sexism among Iowa natives.

Her bigger-picture explanation for the Obama-Clinton split in Iowa and New Hampshire is the compressed window of time between the two events.

“He (Obama) got some of this bounce, but it wasn’t afirm grip,” she said.

A native of Topeka, Kan., Selzer, who earned hermaster’s and Ph.D. at the University of Iowa incommunication research and theory, now lives in Des Moines. On caucus night, as she drove past sites and large turnouts, she saw the first game-night evidence that her predictions were about to be right.

“That made me feel pretty good,” Selzer said. She said friends gave her a wide berth that night soshe could either field press calls or “throw up” when the results came in after the caucuses.

“You’re either golden or a goat, and you don’t want tobe a goat in public,” Selzer said.

Taking a long-term view, she sees Obama’s win as a boost for the integrity of the Iowa caucuses.

“It sort of in my mind calms the concerns about minority representation in Iowa,” Selzer said.

Why 'Ugly Betty' Is Latino 'Cosby Show'

A leading Latino actor tells Iowa Independent ABC's wildly popular program "Ugly Betty" is doing for his community what "The Cosby Show" did for African-Americans in the 1980s.

"Absolutely," Tony Plana said in a phone interview from his car in Los Angeles. "It is the first true Latino crossover hit and it has humanized Latinos in a way that no other program ever came close to doing."

In the hit program, Plana plays Ignacio Suarez, a widowed father of Ugly Betty, played by critically acclaimed actress America Ferrera. The final two episodes of this season will air tonight at 7 p.m. CST and next Thursday -- with the future of programming (there were supposed to be 23 episoddes this year) tied up with the writers' strike.

Plana notes that the show has 10 million to 12 million and earned 11 Emmy nominations in its first year, more than any other network show and any program with the exception of "The Sopranos."

"It sets the bar and creates a model for successful ethnic programming in the future in that it is diverse in its own nature and focus," Plana said.

Just as Bill Cosby's popular NBC program of 20 years ago transcended race and debunked stereotypes, "Ugly Betty" showcases the richness of the Latino community, and connects characters with the American public because of a commonality of life experiences, pain and joy, that crosses racial and economic lines.



"I believe television is the most powerful communication instrument on the planet and it can be the most powerful in beginning to evolve more harmonious relations between races and cultures in this country," Plana said.

He said it is vital for America to have a show like "Ugly Betty" in which Latinos are portrayed as complex, muli-dimensional human beings.

"This is one of my proudest moments as an actor in over 30 years of service," Plana said. "I feel very honored to be part of this program."



As an actor Plana has starred in more than 70 feature films, including JFK, Nixon, Salvador, An Officer and a Gentleman, Lone Star, Three Amigos, Born in East L.A., El Norte, 187, Primal Fear, Romero, One Good Cop, Havana, The Rookie, Silver Strand and Picking Up the Pieces with Woody Allen. He recently appeared in the action thriller Half Past Dead with Steven Segal, Morris Chestnut, and JaRul; The Lost City, with Andy Garcia, Bill Murray, and Dustin Hoffman; and Disney’s highly acclaimed GOAL, The Dream Begins! His soon-to-be-released feature film projects include El Muerto starring Wilbur Valderama, Justified, Towards Darkness, and AmericanEast with Tony Shaloub.

Here is how the Internet Movie Database describes "Ugly Betty":

Betty Suarez is smart, sweet and hard working. The only problem is that she's not thin and beautiful like all her coworkers at Mode, the high-fashion magazine where she works. The only reason the publisher hired her to be his son's secretary, is that he thought Betty was someone who Daniel would never sleep with. Betty's hard work and determination earns Daniel's respect, as she helps him find his way through the shark infested waters of the fashion industry. Ugly Betty is based on a Colombian telenovela "Yo Soy Betty La Fea."

The is cross-posted on Iowa Independent.com.

The Rural Blog Focuses On CDTH/Iowa Independent Obama Coverage

The Rural Blog, published by noted Kentucky journalist Al Cross, has an interesting post reviewing some of the Carroll Daily Times Herald and Iowa Independent's coverage of presidential politics.

HBO - The Wire - Season 5 - Trailer

Full Coverage Of Immigration Forum In Denison

DENISON -- A well-known immigration attorney, JoAnn Barten of Ames, recently presented a forum on immigration issues that was sponsored by La Prensa, a western Iowa Spanish-language newspaper, and filmed by Iowa Independent.



Barten reviewed a number of issues, ranging from a dicussion of jurisdictions in which court decisions tended to favor immigrants to new laws regarding reporting of undocumented workers to highly specific questions about the intersection of criminal backgrounds and citizenship paperwork.

The full forum is presented in both English and Spanish and be accessed by clicking here for the video post on Iowa Political Alert.com.

Carroll's Douglas Burns on Sky TV In Europe

Sky TV in Europe filmed in Carroll and ran the following piece during the Iowa caucuses.

Breaking Down The Rural-Urban Results In Iowa Caucuses

Bill Bishop of the Center for Rural Strategies has crunched the county numbers for the Iowa Caucuses to give us a picture of rural and urban trends Thursday, useful information for campaigns as they move on to future battegrounds.

Republican Mike Huckabee and Democrat Barack Obama won the Iowa caucuses last night. That's what they have in common. They differed in the support they found in rural Iowa. Huckabee, the former Baptist preacher and governor of Arkansas, did considerably better in rural Iowa than in urban parts of the state. Obama, the young Illinois senator from Chicago, won rural Iowa, but he did considerably better in the cities.

You can read the full report at the Center for Rural Strategies Website.

Iowa Caucus 2008

Sonia Walsh of Carroll, who is a Libertarian, participated Thursday in the Ward 1 caucuses in Carroll. She shot the following video of her experience. Walsh, 35, a mother of four and Internet entrepreneur, started out as uncommitted but moved to the Barack Obama camp as the numbers showed that with her support and that of a few others, the Illinois senator could pick up one more county delegate.

This first video is of Walsh reviewing numbers after an initial presidential preferences count:

The Obama people react here to the first count showing them with a commanding lead in this key ward.

Former Iowa Department of Economic Development executive director C.J. Niles chaired the Carroll Ward 1 caucus for the Democrats. Niles supported Hillary Clinton.

Top Iowa Republican: Obama's Crossover Appeal

A top Iowa Republican says he's hearing evidence that Barack Obama's crossover appeal will play a role in tonight's caucuses.

"I continue to run into Republicans becoming open about supporting Obama this evening," said David Oman, a top staff member with Iowa's last two GOP governors, Terry Brandstad and Bob Ray.

Oman notes that the Register poll picked up some of this and other campaigns dismissed it.

Oman predicts will be one of the stories tonight.

"This is real," Oman told Iowa Independent.