What's going on with the repeated secret, underhanded shadyness in Iowa state government? (settlement, black)

[Meemur]

Originally Posted by mofford

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.

Oh, my! What an image! (:

I'm new to Iowa this year, so I'm trying to listen and learn. I dislike any candidate who chooses to run negative ads, so Hatch has that already against him in my book.

[mofford]

In the beginning, Robert Ray took office in 1969, while his successor, Terry Branstad, was just a young military MP arresting Jane Fonda at Arlington National Cemetery, for war protesting on the cemetery grounds. Robert Ray was a moderate and well liked governor, in office until 1983 when Terry took command of a dismal economic situation brought on by the farm crisis.

He started out a bit further to the right than Ray was on social issues, but more moderate than Ray on economics. Branstad did on occasion do some small tax increases. A few pennies increase on tobacco tax, a bump in the state sales tax, legalized gambling, all of which went towards getting the budget deficits under control. He held the line on new spending with his veto, and had good policy with state worker salaries and public worker unions/contracts. Gradually he got the budget under control, and when he had a GOP majority in the legislature, he got a balanced budget amendment passed, and showed a 900 million surplus when Vilsack took over in 1999.

Branstad was cooperative with the INS when they did raids on meat packing plants and deported illegals, something his successor, Tom Vilsack, was very opposed to, throwing a fit on the public stage, as he was looking to further his political career in Washington. Vilsack had a bit more control over his party and was not afraid to veto, but Culver never met a tax he didn't like, and was a tool for big spenders, with many scandals in state government that made Vilsack or Branstad look pretty darn good by comparison. Look at what's going on in Illinois, it's scary, they are talking about DOUBLING property taxes to fund state worker pensions and taxes are already sky high over there. What's even more scary is Chicago turning into another Detroit. We don't need that kind of leadership in Iowa or want to go down that path, just say NO to anymore liberal democrat governors like Jack Hatch or Chet Culver.

[ElleTea]

Originally Posted by Meemur

Oh, my! What an image! (:

I'm new to Iowa this year, so I'm trying to listen and learn. I dislike any candidate who chooses to run negative ads, so Hatch has that already against him in my book.

Get ready. 2016 Presidential election season will be starting in Iowa soon. Usually just before the fair 2 years out it begins...and never ends. Usually the last 3 months before the election I just give up on watching network TV. I can't take the ads. Of course, there are still the phone calls, the door knockers, and mailers. I won't miss that!

[atler8]

Is today's firing of the DAS director, Mike Carroll by Brandstad viewed as a favorable development?
I'm not on the ground in Iowa so I don't know if this unfolding story is grabbing much attention amongst the general population overall. But it looks pretty serious by historical Iowa scandal standards.
Despite the scandal, it appears that state government in Iowa still has a long ways to go to descend to the dark levels of corruption seen elsewhere in the 50 states.
By comparison the degree of utter & complete incompetence & mismanagement of state government down here in Jawga is jawdropping, not to mention the degree of commensurate corruption found here.
Iowans should be thankful that they are a true 2 party state where one party risks being punished for it's errors & replaced via the ballot box in the next election & the people largely don't simply reward crooks & failures in government with re-election to office simply because of their party.
Branstad fires DAS Director Mike Carroll | TheGazette

[Xander_Crews]

Underhanded shadyness is an identifying mark of all governments. When you centralize control over a population of people, the people who seek that power are very rarely good people.

[Movingrightalong...]

Considering that the Des Moines Register is basically a mouthpiece for the Democrat party that has seen it's readership collapse (and the size of the paper it can afford to publish collapse with it) I think that this obvious partisan trolling will be ignored by the voters.

[atler8]

That ^^^ @ 6:37^^^ smacks of shooting the messenger because you don't like the message & is a method of deflection away from the original story.
As for the Register being purely a Democratic mouthpiece, recall the Romney endorsement by that paper in 2012 please.
I think that the way the story has unfolded with new allegations of additional angles of potential corruption, riveting testimony & a high level firing, it appears very much to be a classic case of where there is smoke there is fire.
Let's just hope that the house of Iowa state government doesn't burn down figuratively speaking.

[lurtsman]

Lots of name calling here. It really lowers the quality of the debate.

I'm not surprised by the corruption, as while I lived in Iowa I often complained about the corruption. It's good to know some of the people that were bashing me, because they were wearing rose colored glasses, are now finding out from another source that I was right and they were clueless.

[capitalcityguy]

Former Des Moines Register columnist calls out former employer for shotty journalism:

[LEFT]

The scandal that has swirled around Carroll for the past month is a big misunderstanding created by reporting that’s long on innuendo and short on facts. What’s really disappointing is that Gov. Terry Branstad allowed himself to be bullied by that reporting into firing Carroll on April 8 without even giving him a chance to explain.

Read more: Business Record: Mike Carroll got a raw deal[/LEFT]

[lurtsman]

Journalist cat fight!