On the Campaign Trail with Ed Tibbetts

U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley, D-Iowa, is among 13 House Democrats being targeted with radio ads and phone calls following up the vote last week on the climate change bill.

The National Republican Congressional Committee is criticizing the bill and the legislators who voted for it.

Braley is a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and he’s talked up the bill for weeks.

Here’s Politico’s story on the matter.

UPDATE: Media Matters, the left-leaning media watchdog, just emailed its take on the ad. Here’s a link. In sum, it says the NRCC isn’t telling the truth.

The Quad-Cities’ two congressmen have signed on to a bill that would reverse the cuts General Motors and Chrysler are making to their dealer networks.

Reps. Phil Hare, D-Ill., and Bruce Braley, D-Iowa, are co-sponsoring the Automobile Dealer Economic Rights Restoration Act of 2009. Here’s the bill’s text.

Backers say the dealers are an asset that come at virtually no cost, and that they’re needed to protect the federal government’s investment in the manufacturers. They also say cutting the dealer network will hurt the economy.

“Closing local auto dealerships would have a devastating impact on my constituents,” Hare said today. “These critical small businesses provide thousands of good-paying jobs in my district. Rebuilding the auto industry should be done in tandem with these dealerships, not despite them.”

Braley and Hare also have signed a letter to the White House complaining about the cuts.

Chrysler said last month it would drop two Moline-based dealers from its dealer network, part of a nationwide restructuring plan. So far, no Quad-City area GM dealers have said they were being dropped as part of that company’s paring of its dealer network.

The manufacturers have defended the cuts. GM chief executive Fritz Henderson told a Senate committee last week that dealers cost $1,000 per vehicle in services, advertising and other exenses, according to the Detroit Free Press.

The auto dealers have fought the cuts. In fact, there’s a House subcommittee that’s meeting Friday in Washington, D.C., to get testimony about the cuts. Scheduled to speak is Clinton dealer John McEleney, who is president of the National Automobile Dealers Association.

Former U.S. Rep. Jim Nussle announced today he’s formed a government relations and consulting firm with a pair of ex-staffers.

Nussle says the group will draw on his expertise “in the federal government and budget process.”

Its mailing address is Alexandria, Virginia.

Nussle had been the White House budget director toward the end of the Bush administration. He also was the chair of the House Budget Committee when he represented the Quad-Cities.

The Republican congressman vacated his seat after 16 years to run for governor in Iowa, a race he lost to Chet Culver.

Here’s an excerpt from the press release sent out this morning.

The Nussle Group will assemble experienced teams on behalf of clients to compliment Nussle’s experience not only in the budget area, but also in fields such as health care, tax and finance, regulation, energy, higher education and non-profit, agriculture and rural development, telecommunications and technology and national security.

“I’ve met and worked with some very talented people throughout my career”, Nussle continued, “and I see an opportunity to bring some of them together at various times to custom design solutions to achieve results for people.”

Barbara Snitker, who worked for Nussle in the Office of Management and Budget and in his congressional office, is part of the group, as is Chris Bliley, who was Nussle’s congressional chief of staff. Bliley also worked as an administrator in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Jim Leach, the former congressman from Davenport, “may be edging toward the top of the ever-changing list of those being mentioned for the critical post of ambassador to China,” reports Al Kamen of the Washington Post. You can find the story here.

Leach, who represented eastern Iowa for 30 years, is now a professor at Princeton University.

He backed Obama during the general election (much to the chagrin of local Republicans), and from time to time his name is thrown out as a possible nominee to an administration post. (It happened during the Bush administration, too).

The former congressman is as a seasoned voice on foreign policy matters. He put in years on the U.S. House’s International Relations Committee, including chairing a subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific.

Amid the Tax Day tea party protests going on around the country, a new Gallup poll has an interesting result:

The country’s less angry over the federal income tax bite than it’s been in years.

The poll, which was released Monday, said 48 percent of Americans say thei federal income taxes they pay is “about right,” while 46 percent say they’re “too high” and 3 percent say they’re “too low.”

Gallup says the poll shows “one of the most positive assessments Gallup has measured since 1956.”

The most positive Americans have felt was in 2003, when 50 percent said their federal income tax burden was about right. That occurred after a pair of Bush administration tax cuts.

Here’s the Gallup report.

Here’s early coverage of the tea party protest in Des Moines, with demonstrators saying they’re angry about more than just taxes, but also bailouts, etc..

Local protests are going on at 2nd and Main streets in downtown Davenport now. From 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. another tea party will be near the Moline office of U.S. Rep. Phil Hare, D-Ill.

Iowa Gov. Chet Culver, four days after the state Supreme Court overturned a ban on same-sex marriage, comments.

The full statement is below. Here’s the part that jumped out at me: “…after careful consideration and a thorough reading of the Court’s decision, I am reluctant to support amending the Iowa Constitution to add a provision that our Supreme Court has said is unlawful and discriminatory.”

Culver says he still believes marriage is between a man and woman, but calls that a “tenet of my personal faith.”

With Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal also opposing a constitutional amendment, this just raises the bar for those who want one. It also obviously creates a clear issue for the 2010 campaign and a rallying cry for social conservatives wanting the GOP nomination.

Here’s Culver’s statement:

“I have carefully reviewed the Iowa Supreme Court’s unanimous decision on civil marriage and discussed it with the Attorney General.

“Let me begin by saying that I recognize that the issue of same-gender civil marriage is one that evokes strongly held beliefs and strong emotions both for and against. These beliefs and feelings need to be respected. I hope that the views of those on all sides will be treated respectfully and will not be subjected to name-calling or fear-mongering, but instead will lead to rational discussion.

“At the outset, I want to emphasize that the question before the Iowa Supreme Court was one of civil marriage only – a state-recognized legal status constituting a civil contract. Civil marriage always has been, and will continue to be, separate from religious marriage that takes place in churches and places of worship.

“As I have stated before, I personally believe that marriage is between a man and a woman. This is a tenet of my personal faith. The Iowa Supreme Court’s decision has, in fact, reaffirmed that churches across Iowa will continue to have the right to recognize the sanctity of religious marriage in accordance with their own traditions and church doctrines. The Supreme Court’s decision does not require that churches recognize marriages between persons of the same gender or officiate over such unions. The Court does not have, nor should any court ever have, that kind of power over our religious lives. Our churches and places of worship are free to decide for themselves, as they were before, who may enter the sacred covenant of marriage. As the Supreme Court’s decision states, ‘The sanctity of all religious marriages celebrated in the future will have the same meaning as those celebrated in the past.’

“Yet, the Supreme Court of Iowa, in a unanimous decision, has clearly stated that the Constitution of our state, which guarantees equal protection of the law to all Iowans, requires the State of Iowa to recognize the civil marriage contract of two people of the same gender. The Court also concluded that the denial of this right constitutes discrimination. Therefore, after careful consideration and a thorough reading of the Court’s decision, I am reluctant to support amending the Iowa Constitution to add a provision that our Supreme Court has said is unlawful and discriminatory.

“As Governor, I must respect the authority of the Iowa Supreme Court, and have a duty to uphold the Constitution of the State of Iowa. I also fully respect the right of all Iowans to live under the full protection of Iowa’s Constitution.

“I urge Iowans who hold beliefs on all sides of this issue to exhibit respect and good will. Our state faces many serious challenges. We are in the midst of a serious economic recession. Tens of thousands of our fellow Iowans are without work. We have suffered the worst natural disasters and most difficult recovery our state has ever faced. We must join together and redouble our efforts to work toward solutions that will help Iowans in this time of uncertainty. That is where, I believe, my focus and energies should lie.

“Let us not lose sight of the fact that we are all Iowans, all neighbors, united in the promise and faith of a brighter future for our state. Let us all work together toward that common goal.”

Here’s a pair of videos of debate on the floor of the Iowa Senate yesterday over the state Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage.

The first is Senate Republican Leader Paul McKinley of Chariton asking Majority Leader Mike Gronstal of Council Bluffs to co-sponsor a measure on a constitutional amendment outlawing gay marriage.

The discussion begins a couple minutes into the first video.

Gronstal’s response can be heard in that video, and you can seem him delivering it in the second video.

The Iowa Supreme Court’s groundbreaking decision Friday to allow same-sex marriage is generating a lot of discussion, and not just inside state’s borders, of course.

I found two Facebook groups that have popped up since the decision.

One group, called I Support the Unanimous Iowa Supreme Court Ruling - Gay Marriage, already had more than 8,800 members this morning and is growing.

A separate group, No Gay Marriage in Iowa, had 85 members.

Another group, based in California, is called CA - legalize gay marriage so we can be as cool as IOWA.

To think, all these years Iowa political types have been trying to figure out a way to get people to stop moving to California. Now there’s some folks from San Francisco who think we’re cool.

People are complimenting Sen. Chuck Grassley all over the place these days.

On his conference call today, fellow Iowa senator Tom Harkin praised Grassley, who is about to cast his 10,000th vote in the Senate. In fact, Harkin said, the Republican hadn’t missed a single vote since 1993, when he had to be in Iowa during the floods.

Harkin noted that ex-Baltimore Orioles shortstop Cal Ripken was called the Iron Man for his consecutive game streak, which ran to 2,632 games.

“I guess Sen. Grassley has also earned the title ‘Iron Man,’ and I congratulate him for it,” said Harkin.

I’m taking some time off, so there likely won’t be much to see here for a couple weeks.

See you then.