What's going on with the repeated secret, underhanded shadyness in Iowa state government? (Des Moines: 2014, unemployment)

[atler8]

This emerging scandal in state government is astonishing to me on several levels.
Will this be tolerated by the electorate & will they believe that there was no knowledge or culpability at the very highest executive levels?
http://http://blogs.desmoinesregiste...better/article

[duster1979]

The fact that the electorate voted our current dinosaur back into office for no good reason tells me that this won't keep him from getting re-elected even if it turns out he wrote the checks. Hell, Iowans had a chance to elect Fred Grandy - who worked hard for the state as US Representative - Republican candidate for governor back in the '90s and they still voted for Bumstead.

I can't think of a single elected official in our state government that I trust other than the representative in my disctrict. And I disagree with him on most issues so I really don't support him, either.

[mofford]

That dinosaur is the only reason we're not swimming in corruption and debt like Wisconsin and Illinois, he is holding the union demo-crooks at bay. I know WHO TV can hardly wait to get another Culver in there, but I disagree. Branstad has done so much for this state, sad to see the way the media constantly tries to tear him down. He was right to try and shut down that juvenile home, it was poorly ran, overstaffed and not needed. There is this thing known as a budget people, and this other thing known as job creation, it is related to another thing known as unemployment, which has been lower than most other states for many years now.

TERRY BRANSTAD..... GOVERNOR FOR LIFE ! May he live to be 100

I despise Jack Hatch !

[atler8]

So, corruption is bad & only to be investigated depending upon who is alleged to have done it or depending upon which political party they are affiliated with? And that party & or individual is more important than the state constitution?
And if a media outlet is investigating the alleged corruption, then it's only because they have an axe to grind?
Iowans deserve better standards than that & have usually demanded the same.
Unfortunately this new episode is not the only one or first one in what now amounts to a regularly-occurring string of exposes of irregular behavior in state government under Branstad's leadership.

[capitalcityguy]

I'm not a Branstad fan, but he has been much more fiscally responsible then his predecessors. He has also done a very good job of getting Iowa’s divided gov’t to work together including getting important education reform passed (among other bipartisan initiatives).

The other side is offering no other viable alternative.

I love what Jack Hatch has done for his community (he had developed a lot of urban infill housing in Des Moines) and he is very personable, approachable, and likable person. But he is one of the most liberal members of Iowa gov’t and the state simply can’t afford him. I would surmise (given the typical political makeup of the IA Legislature) he’d have about as much luck getting anything through the legislature as Obama does in DC.
[SIZE=3] [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]Bottom-line: things are going pretty well in Iowa now and normally that means the public isn’t interested in looking for reasons to dump the current administration. IMO, this issue just isn’t going to get the attention of the average voter. [/SIZE]

[capitalcityguy]

Originally Posted by atler8

So, corruption is bad & only to be investigated depending upon who is alleged to have done it or depending upon which political party they are affiliated with? And that party & or individual is more important than the state constitution?
And if a media outlet is investigating the alleged corruption, then it's only because they have an axe to grind?
Iowans deserve better standards than that & have usually demanded the same.
Unfortunately this new episode is not the only one or first one in what now amounts to a regularly-occurring string of exposes of irregular behavior in state government under Branstad's leadership.

Speaking of "one-sided"...(cough, cough)...looking at your DM Register:

The Register’s supposedly extensive “investigative reports” into settlement agreements with fired state employees have been exposed as completely one-sided.

Despite numerous “investigative” articles on this issue by the Register, it took a different media outlet, WHO-TV, to show that this practice is nothing new and was used almost twice as many times by Democrat Chet Culver’s administration. The were 632 settlements reached during the Culver administration, compared to 321 during Branstad’s current tenure.

Attacks Backfire on Iowa Senate Dems, Des Moines Register | The Iowa Republican

[atler8]

That's an interesting turn of events for the story.
I wonder where the next "turn" will lead?
Paraphrasing what is said a lot on the Atlanta threads, "Pull up a chair & get the popcorn ready!"

[mofford]

Originally Posted by capitalcityguy

I'm not a Branstad fan, but he has been much more fiscally responsible then his predecessors. He has also done a very good job of getting Iowa’s divided gov’t to work together including getting important education reform passed (among other bipartisan initiatives).

The other side is offering no other viable alternative.

I love what Jack Hatch has done for his community (he had developed a lot of urban infill housing in Des Moines) and he is very personable, approachable, and likable person. But he is one of the most liberal members of Iowa gov’t and the state simply can’t afford him. I would surmise (given the typical political makeup of the IA Legislature) he’d have about as much luck getting anything through the legislature as Obama does in DC.
[SIZE=3] [/SIZE]
[SIZE=3]Bottom-line: things are going pretty well in Iowa now and normally that means the public isn’t interested in looking for reasons to dump the current administration. IMO, this issue just isn’t going to get the attention of the average voter. [/SIZE]

I just don't like the way Jack Hatch is running his campaign, he runs entirely on negative Branstad ads. He beat that state trooper speeding ticket thing like a dead horse for three months straight. WHO may have ran the story that uncovered Culver doing the same thing with fired state employees, but I have noticed a marked difference in the way that station is ran since John Bachman retired. They have been promoting liberal issues and gay agenda with great ferocity this past year, hammering away on Branstad and anything republican with a near absence of good conservative guests to counterbalance, and make political talk points. Their insiders show has become the Jack Hatch and rainbow friends program. They did one good show with the tea party guy from out of town, complete with cowboy hat. If not convincing, at least he was entertaining, lol. Doug Gross is the only leftover they have from the Bachman era that has any bite, more of a nibble to be truthful. They have a Steve King complex that never quits, he's not even from this district and nobody from his district is watching WHO TV, so why waste the lib juice on him ?

So long as Branstad has all his marbles, I hope he stays put. If he dies in office, I hope they leave his corpse in the governors chair to finish out his term. It would do a better job than Jack Hatch.

[atler8]

Below find a link from the Tuesday online edition of The Register. In it, it is stated that state data shows that there were 8 confidential settlements in the Culver Administration, and the nature of 6 of them are explained in that Register update. The source of the data was identified as the Iowa Department of Administrative Services, which is obviously now a Republican controlled department. So, I would assume that if indeed there were over 600 confidential payments made under the Culver Administration, as Brandstad et al claim, that that state department would have released data to support that claim.
I'm not finding a nonpartisan source elsewhere for supportive info to corroborate the claim by "The Iowa Republican" online magazine that there were well over 600 under Culver. Can anyone who is capable of better detective work than I am bring forward such a source that is nonpartisan oriented? Don't bother linking a partisan source from either viewpoint as they are highly suspect as an honest arbiter of the truth IMHO.
So at this time is it in reality basically a comparison of 312 payments vs. 6 payments?
In the Register online update here, former Governor Culver, who is generally quiet & stays out of the limelight, gave his own response to the claims that Brandstad had advanced against his predeccessor.
I've never been a fan of Chet Culver though so I say let the chips fall honestly where they may just so that the truth becomes evident in the long run.
Given that witnesses have been testifying at the Capitol, this should continue to be an engrossing story.
In the meantime, my popcorn is just starting to pop.
http://http://www.desmoinesregister....ments/7226129/

[atler8]

Fiddlesticks! Our firewall, etc. system of protection at the office has meddled with my linking. It's not the first time that has happened so go to the Register site to find the article please.
The article was written by Jason Clayworth & posted online there last night.