(AP photo)

U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley says we need to amend the Constitution to make Congress fiscally responsible.

He took to our opinion pages Sunday to argue for a balanced-budget amendment. It’s an election year, so I understand why Braley, a Democrat, would seek some inoculation from that old tax-and-spend label. Whichever Republican wins the right to face him this fall also will be pushing for an amendment. Better to soar with the deficit hawks than be a sitting duck, I guess.

But as policy, it’s a turkey. And God as my witness, I don’t think that turkey can fly.

Basically, I’m unimpressed with any pitch for a balanced-budget amendment that isn’t attached to a list of what, exactly, the brave pitcher would carve up to make spending and income balance. Backers want us to believe the amendment is a magic wand that makes only bad, wasteful or unpopular spending disappear.

It’s not a wand, it’s a big ol’ butcher’s knife. And any politician intent on wielding it for political gain, while hoping to keep his or her apron white as snow, isn’t really serious. The amendment would force deep cuts with real, lasting impacts. Where do you start slicing and dicing, congressman?

It’s one thing to endorse a mechanism designed to balance the budget. It’s something else entirely to endorse the actual cuts needed to make the mechanism work. And I seriously doubt his GOP opponent will do any better.

And in return for all that pain, will we really get a more responsible and responsive government?

Braley and other backers point to states for proof of budget-balancing virtues. But the truth is, state budgets get balanced using some really lousy, dishonest tactics — off-budget scooping, dipping, smoke and mirrors galore. States also depend heavily on federal funding, bucks that an amendment would make scarcer. State responsibilities, however, would likely grow.

And in trying to make Congress more responsible, it might become even less responsive. The scramble for a more limited federal pie would only intensify the lobbying stampede and campaign cash onslaught. Average Americans hoping to have their problems addressed would have an even tougher time getting heard. K Street still routs Main Street. And the notion of threatening members with a pay cut if they fail to balance the budget would ring pretty hollow in a Capitol filled with millionaires.

The amendment Braley supports would allow a two-thirds vote to break spending limits in the event of a “crisis,” creating yet another mechanism that places the fate of critical legislative decisions in the hands of an agitated minority with the power to endlessly stall or block. Call it the crisis filibuster. And although the amendment clamps down on spending, it places no limits on tax cuts, which can be just as ill-conceived and reckless.

America has had leaders who balanced budgets without a constitutional mandate. It takes tough compromises and sacrifices, not political gimmicks dusted off every election year.

(Nikole Hanna/ The Gazette)

Without a miracle, First Christian Church is seeing its last Sunday morning.

The nearly 100-year-old church at 840 Third Ave. SE is probably coming down this week. The building and land are owned by St. Luke’s Hospital, where its affiliate, Physicians’ Clinic of Iowa, is building a new medical pavilion. The church property is one small notch in that sprawling project. Its demolition creates 40 parking spots.

It’s sad, disappointing and unsettling.

For the last few months, a group called Save C.R. Heritage has been trying to convince St. Luke’s to reconsider. They’ve brought in experts who say the property can and should be saved. They’ve found evidence in an actual program from the church’s 1913 dedication ceremony that Louis Sullivan was the building’s consulting architect. St. Luke’s is still skeptical of Sullivan’s role, although I’m not sure why the good Christian folks of 1913 would fib to the future.

To the hospital’s credit, it listened, accommodated inspections and paused demolition. This is not some biblical story of good versus evil. It’s a group of gritty, dedicated folks up against a big institution with other plans. We’ve seen movie this before.

But to me, this saga changed May 4 when Mayor Ron Corbett asked St. Luke’s leadership to consider donating the church to preservationists, while also pledging that the city would put $300,000 toward its redevelopment. Add in state historic tax credits, and you’ve dented the $2 million St. Luke’s claims it would cost.

So the city’s top elected official, who speaks for the broader community, made it clear that the community would like to see the church saved. St. Luke’s thought about it, but said no. Hospital spokeswoman Laura Rainey says the offer was all hopes, but no concrete plans. Corbett said he was told a donation would be too legally complicated.

Closing a major street to accommodate the medical mall was also pretty complicated, along with crafting that large pot of TIF incentives and plans for a city-financed parking garage. City leaders have invested a lot of hope, not to mention political capital and millions of bucks, in the project’s potential. They made very tough calls with hopes that the community would benefit. They bought into PCI’s hopes, which are now becoming concrete.

Now, asked by the city to make its own tough call on behalf of the community, St. Luke’s sticks to its own interests. The same folks who were telling us not so long ago how the medical mall would be a great catalyst for development now say they seriously doubt that the church can be redeveloped. It doesn’t add up. Why would a great historic building sit empty and rot in the midst of this dynamic new development that we had to stop from moving to Hiawatha?

It’s also clear that the medical mall debate cost its backers some community good will. This would have been a great chance to mend fences. Perhaps they don’t think good will is worth all that much. But they may feel differently some day when their institutions, inevitably, must come back to the community with a new request for assistance.

It’s still possible some good may come of this. Corbett says the city may create a fund to help redevelop other threatened historic properties. So this sad saga may have a positive legacy.

But it’s Sunday, the most hopeful day of the week. The church still stands. And as is sometimes said from the pulpits on this day, it’s never really too late for redemption.

If I could sing, and boy can’t I, I’d urge mamas to also avoid allowing their progeny to become governors who make outlandish job creation promises that will eventually make them look silly. They’ll end up all depressed, sitting in some Godforsaken honkey tonk, spilling rotgut on their spreadsheets. Trust me.

This week, Gov. Terry Branstad was grilled about Iowa’s progress toward his whopper of a campaign promise to create 200,000 jobs in five years. The governor contends he’s ahead of schedule, with nearly 70,000 jobs created.

Trouble is, the governor is using “gross” instead of “net,” as in the net number of jobs created after subtracting jobs lost. Any economist will tell you that net is the thing when it comes to tracking job growth. Any first-grader will tell you 7 minus 5 is not 7.

Between January 2011, when he took office, and March 2012, Iowa’s seasonally adjusted, non-farm employment has grown by a net 15,400 jobs, according to figures compiled by Iowa Workforce Development. A healthy clip and a welcome improvement over recent years, but quite a ways from 70,000, and well behind the pace for a 200,000-job explosion.

’Tis a puzzlement that our governors cannot seem to resist the temptation of making a massive job creation promise that later requires statistical gymnastics to appear remotely plausible. Is it something in the Statehouse coffee?

Gov. Tom Vilsack bragged that the Iowa Values Fund would create and retain 50,000 jobs. Gov. Chet Culver vowed that I-JOBS infrastructure bonding would create 30,000. Nope, and not even close.

Now, we have Branstad’s 200,000. Maybe our next governor will vow to create 1 million jobs. Why not?

Well, for one thing, it’s really stupid politics. Voters don’t buy it. There are ambitious, optimistic moonshot goals that stir public imagination. Then there are hollow haystacks of hype. We know the difference.

And while Branstad is seeking to explain a 200,000-job science fiction story, he’s not talking about some positive, but less flashy, realities. Doubts about his big goal overshadow smaller but significant signs of progress. The jobs issue becomes all about failure instead of success.

Since he took office, the state added a net 14,400 manufacturing jobs, 2,400 in the education and health care sector and 1,200 in trade and transportation. Not too shabby.

Should a governor get full credit? Nah. Can he take some credit? Absolutely. It’s a proud political tradition, after all, to proclaim how government doesn’t create jobs and then praise the success of government job creation efforts.

Sure, you might also have to mention the loss of 5,900 construction jobs, 3,100 professional and business jobs and 1,800 retail trade jobs. Government employment is down 5,000, including a loss of state jobs the governor did have a hand in slicing.

Not all good news. But at least we’d be trading bravado for candor.

(Miranda Meyer/The Gazette)

Before the 2012 Iowa Legislature’s session ended last week, lawmakers approved far-reaching, landmark legislation allowing bars and restaurants to create infused liquor blends for use in cocktails.

Maybe you disagree with “landmark,” but I bet you’ve never tasted bacon-infused bourbon. Neither have I, but it is now possible, thanks to our adventurous, thirsty legislators.

That got me thinking, admittedly while drinking, what sort of cocktails did the 2012 session inspire?

A few possibilities.

The Property Tax Reform — Fill your best, most hopeful glass with a healthy pour of 34-year-old Scotch. Swirl it in the light. Admire its potent possibilities. Sniff its bouquet. Think how great it will be to finally drink it in after all these decades sitting on a shelf. Raise the glass slowly, haltingly toward your lips. Then stop. Dump it, and go home. Add several dashes of bitterness.

Education Reform Rickey — Omit the booze, mixers, garnish, ice and glass. Wait a year.

Gas Taxitini — Place good-quality gin and a hint of vermouth in a cocktail shaker with ice. Drive down an aging, crumbling Iowa roadway, shaking, bouncing and jolting vigorously. Serve in a deep pothole.

Red Rushin’ — Speed to the liquor store. Run a red light. Say cheese.

Banhattan — Mix together whatever it is these damn reckless kids are doing these days along with several shots of adult astonishment. Scowl deeply. Shake your head vigorously. Pour into the Iowa criminal code.

San-no-agree-a — Mix grudges, gripes, swipes, accusations and partisan bickering with whine. Spin. Spin some more. Serve on the campaign trail, red hot.

One reader suggests I switch sides:

I read most of your articles and Im disturbed that you favor same sex marriage since you claim to be a Christian. Do you think God accepts same sex marriage? If you read the bible its clearly stated what God thinks about this. I challenge you to Google this subject and see what the bible says. I dont want my grandchildren thinkin its okay to marry the same kind. And Obama just lost my vote for sure.

PS. Being influencial as you are you could be a great advocate for banning same sex marriage.

Very doubtful…that I’m influential or would ever advocate for a ban. Another:

You can’t be serious that our boy president who is the least qualified person in any room he enters, did something admirable by reversing himself yet again on same sex marriage. You write as if this was a nice linear progression up to his moment yesterday when he came out in support of it. If you were not so lazy and would look back a little farther you would find that he did support it before he came to the national stage, then he came out against it when he decided to seek national office so it was not a nice linear progression or growth as you imply, his decision was driven only by politics and I find nothing admirable about that!

Then you say “But how long does the right thing….” which is another point we do not agree on. For you to call it the right thing means you find the continuing moral decay of our culture to be a good thing, and that makes you one sick puppy! The concept of marriage came from God via the Bible so I take great offense when these messed up people want to use the term to try and clean up and receive approval for their perversion! Call it something else if you must allow them legal status but don’t call it marriage, that is a biblical term and its meaning should not be expanded. There are so many more things in your article I could comment on, such as “…it’s a path that leads forward…”, read above, but what is the point! If you think this is a parth the leads forward, again you are one sick puppy! I will pray for you!

Woof. Another:

Obama “evolved” on the debt ceiling too didn’t he Todd? He evolved on the Middle East when he kept all of Bush’s defense and military leaders. He evolved in Gitmo. He’s done a lot of evolving. I believe in November he’ll get to evolve back to other employment. Maybe someday he’ll get a clue about the economy. 31% believe country on right track according to Rasmussen. That’s a lot of confidence. Maybe he can take another Bin Laden victory lap. Don’t you love by the way when Dems still talk about water boarding being torture and this chump of President is whacking people right and left. I’d rather be water boarded than outright whacked. How is that not a human rights violation? Oh yeah when a Crat does it the media is fine with it.

Whacked or water-boarded. Is there a third option?

If supporting same-sex marriage is what now passes for political expediency in this country, I say that’s progress. I also hope Romney flips on the issue in a cynical ploy to get my vote. More cynical ploys for equality, please.

Keep those emails coming.

“I have to tell you that over the course of several years as I have talked to friends and family and neighbors when I think about members of my own staff who are in incredibly committed monogamous relationships, same-sex relationships, who are raising kids together, when I think about those soldiers or airmen or marines or sailors who are out there fighting on my behalf and yet feel constrained, even now that Don’t Ask Don’t Tell is gone, because they are not able to commit themselves in a marriage, at a certain point I’ve just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married,” Obama told Roberts, in an interview to appear on ABC’s “Good Morning America” Thursday. Excerpts of the interview will air tonight on ABC’s “World News with Diane Sawyer.”

President Obama’s “evolution” officially ends, but it’s not exactly being replaced by a revolution. The president still says this is a state-by-state issue. He is still a politician, you know. That’s why this took so long.

But it’s a big moment. An American president whose climb to the White House is considered a civil rights achievement is now embracing this fight for civil rights. The very first sitting president to do so.

Since Vice President Joe Biden got this party started as only he can, I’ve been reading all about the sound political reasons for not doing what the president did today. Swing state polls and the suburbs and North Carolina, etc. Mighty risky.

But how long does the right thing have to stare you in the face before you just do it?

The president is running against an opponent whose principal weakness is supposedly a lack of principle. You don’t win that contest by dancing around an important issue of principle like this one.

I’m sure Obama will be dubbed a flip-flopper, too. But his evolution from opponent, to supporter of civil unions to support for full marriage is the same path followed by many other Americans in recent years. And it’s a path that leads forward, not backward.

Still, it was well past time to end the evolution. It was tarnishing an otherwise very strong record on gay rights. The veep’s inability to stop talking for one dang minute probably did the president a favor. And history.

Because, at some point, you have to stop scanning the polling and lead the country. Today’s the day. And the political risks actually make it more admirable.

Beyond those risks, which we’ll be debating about from now until cows return home, it doesn’t really change much. This is still an issue headed to the U.S. Supreme Court. In Iowa, legislative elections hold the key to whether equality endures. The president’s practical ability to impact the issue is limited.

It’s largely symbolic, but symbolism does matter. It will energize supporters of civil rights. It may also energize his opponents, but it seems like they’re already plenty mad. Maybe it costs votes, maybe it also gains a few.

And, most importantly, it tells thousands of families fighting for equality that the president of the United States is now on their side. Finally.

It seems education “reform” is on its way to the governor.

So, can we call this a good first step?

Rep. Cecil Dolecheck, R-Mt. Ayr, wouldn’t even concede that the bill represented a step forward. Rather, he said during the closing debate on the House floor, it was more like the uncertain tottering of a child standing up for the first time, still too afraid to take a step.

OK, well, at least it’s still bold, right?

Sen. Herman Quirmbach, D-Ames, the other conference committee co-chairman, praised the panel for finding “appropriate” compromises. He declined to speculate whether it would meet Branstad’s standard for “bold” reform, telling reporters: “I don’t like the word bold. That implies a certain macho swagger. I would prefer to do smart and effective reform and I think that is what this is.”

Huh. Not a step, but a stagger. Not bold, and no swagger. Got it.

Well, it’s not a total loss. There must at least be some additional funding next year for the bill’s new third grade literacy requirements. Right?

The program — contingent on funding by the state — would not be implemented until the end of the 2016-17 school year and would apply to students entering kindergarten in the 2013-14 school year.

“I think that’s a good compromise and it puts the onus back on the parent a little bit to make sure that they’re involved in their child’s education,” Chambers said.

Quirmbach said he was disappointed there was not adequate funding in the bill to fund early literacy support in fiscal 2013, making overall funding for education reform a major focus of the Legislature next year.

The standings appropriations bill this year includes $2 million for the reform effort — a level far short of the $17 million Branstad requested.

So no funding next school year. And $17 million is now $2 million.

Also, lawmakers axed an attempt to boost K-12 school aid by 4 percent next fall, up from the planned 2 percent.

So while the golden dome brain trust goes back to the drawing board to craft a set of a brand new big ideas that won’t pass, school districts are expected to continue circling the airport, running on fumes. No worries, we’ll gas you up when we’re through tinkering with our grand plans. Until then, it’s all up in the air.

Please hold. You’re kids are very important to us.

I’m certainly in favor of transforming education, although I have serious doubts that the Statehouse is capable of doing it. Change is needed. But the notion that districts can keep operating on low-ball funding while this glacially takes shape is a strategy decoupled from reality. Sure, the 2 percent increase in school aid for this fall sounds totally reasonable, until you realize most schools are dealing with shrinking enrollment and rising costs. Last year, it was zero. Before that, cuts.

That state funding picture clearly played a role in the closure of Polk Elementary here in Cedar Rapids, so this is not without consequence. We lost a quality school in the name of “stabilizing general fund reserves.” Meanwhile. the state’s sitting on record reserves. Seems like more could have been done for schools while they watch our leaders stagger non-boldly toward reform.

In the wake of plant closings announced this week by BPI, manufacturer of Lean Finely Textured Beef, aka pink slime, U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley points the finger of blame at the USDA and FDA:

Grassley says the U.S.D.A. and the FDA should have defended the product, but didn’t. Grassley says, “They immediately said hot lunch programs didn’t have to purchase it and so that sent a signal if it wasn’t good enough for the hot lunch program, it wasn’t good enough for this supermarket and that supermarket and they all jumped on board.”

After the U.S.D.A. and FDA’s actions, criticism of the beef product on social media went viral. The actions caused irreversible harm to BPI, Grassley says, and the plants — which were temporarily closed in March — are now closed for good.

Except for the fact that the slime story really broke years ago, and the social media virus was spreading well before the USDA gave schools the option of going LFTB free.

There was the January story about McDonald’s abandoning the product. There was the ABC News Story in early March. And other stories around the same time about the USDA ordering a bunch of LFTB for school lunches, a move the USDA defended. And then the petition drive.

In mid March, the USDA said schools could choose, while still insisting the product is safe. And yet, Hy-Vee decided to go further and yank the product completely several days later, before reversing that call to give its customers a choice.

All through this, it’s been basically the government and government leaders defending LFTB, at all levels, including the USDA. So the notion that this is somehow government’s fault, or that a government action caused the slime virus to take root, is a stretch.

Actually, like it or not, this was the free market doing its thing. It was not fair, fully fact-based, neat or tidy, but these are the actions, reactions and overreactions that drive it. Top it with layer after layer of hyperbole from an endless media loop, and it’s tough to hold back the deluge.

Pink slime hit the news fan, the public registered displeasure, social networks carried that displeasure at blinding speed and the market reacted. The government tried to keep up. In the end, consumers got choices. But it also appears to have cost jobs.

Still, no self respecting politician can assail the verdict of a free market, even a cruel one. So it’s gotta be the government. Round up the usual suspects.

So last week’s “historic” property tax deal is this week’s absolute mess.

There’s now trouble in the Senate, where the Register says a Cedar Rapids Democrat is breaking ranks on a property tax plan backed by his party leadership:

Sen. Rob Hogg, D-Cedar Rapids, voted against the bill in a committee meeting this afternoon saying governments are already not meeting their basic obligations to protect the public in such areas as flood mitigation. He says cutting their future revenue collections is wrong.

“You know what destroys businesses? When government fails to do its job and protect people and property from basic things like natural disasters,” Hogg said, noting that 31 feet of floodwater in 2008 caused the city to lose more than 200 businesses.

Meanwhile, the Republican House, led by Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, who called the Senate Dem property tax plan is a “a piece of junk,” is in adjournment mode. Not deal-making mode.

And urban mayors, led by Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett, think the potential deals being floated are lousy for local governments, especially a provision sought by Senate Dems slicing taxes on apartment buildings:

Corbett said the big-city mayors that are part of the Metropolitan Coalition have spoken in favor of some property-tax relief for commercial and industrial property owners as part of a job-creation strategy and as long as the relief comes with a state mechanism to help local jurisdictions fill the revenue gaps caused by the loss in property-tax revenue.

“Now at this eleventh hour, the property owners are having the largest tax break in this piece of legislation for a group that won’t create any jobs,” Corbett said. “So now the focus has gone from creating jobs to a special-interest tax break. It’s seriously off track and needs to get back on track to discussing about creating jobs and focusing on the commercial rates.”

So with sand running swiftly out of the legislative hour glass, nobody seems to like anything. Which means this is a textbook property tax debate.

What happens if they do nothing? The stakes are probably higher for Democrats hoping to beat long odds and hold the Senate. They need some accomplishments to tout.

Republicans figure they’ll run the whole works next year, after grabbing the Senate, so why compromise? I think the governor wants a deal, but if it fails, he’ll just blame Democrats and argue everything will be great with a new Senate.

It’s not over, clearly, but this issue is starting to smell dead.

David Baker, Michael Streit and Marsha Ternus came to Boston to receive awards from Caroline Kennedy at the presidential library named for her father. Speeches were given and many photos were snapped. I watched it online. A nice ceremony.

“I was surprised,” Ternus said of learning she would be a recipient. “Because when we cast our vote in Varnum, we weren’t thinking of being courageous.”

It was the court’s unanimous ruling in Varnum v. Brien, striking down Iowa’s ban on same-sex marriage, that led them off the bench and onto the stage Monday. They heard the arguments, weighed the facts and found that the state could not provide a rational constitutional basis for denying marriage rights to same-sex couples. So they ruled accordingly and honored their oath. For that, Iowa voters rejected them, and the John F. Kennedy Library honored them. Baker said he’d rule the same way again, even after it ended his judicial career.

At first I winced a bit at the notion of bestowing lofty honors on people who, basically, did their jobs. But it’s clear that the award ceremony was not really about deifying these judges.

It was meant as an affirmation of the principle the court’s well-crafted decision upheld: equal protection under the law. Our government simply cannot deny rights and privileges to some of us without real, concrete and compelling reasons. Tradition, personal discomfort, theology or fear are not enough.

And that’s a needed, bracing splash of fresh cold water in today’s heated political climate, where revving up the “base” into a froth of perpetual outrage is what passes for leadership. Believe it or not, your political scapegoats and targets of your derision are entitled to the very same constitutional protections we all proudly claim. Imagine that. Very tough for some to swallow. Always has been. So, occasionally, we need an independent judiciary to remind us.

“We will not give up. We will push forward. We will persist,” Streit said of defending the ideal of “equal protection for all.”

And the court’s ruling still stands. Cynical politicians, righteous charlatans and outside opportunists have all taken their best swings. They took down the justices, but not the ruling.

And I still think it will endure. It looks like marriage equality will take another hit in North Carolina, but, perhaps, that’s the high watermark of a cause that will undoubtedly end up on history’s scrap heap. I’m betting future profiles in courage will see to it.

There’s going to be much written about what’s in the mix — $350 million in tax relief, state money to offset some revenue lost by local governments and likely a new limit on property tax growth. Details remain fluid. And, of course, the whole thing could still fall apart. The sands may be shifting even as I type.

But I’m reasonably sure what won’t be in it. And that’s any attempt to loosen the revenue straitjacket worn by local governments that makes any attempt to significantly alter or reform property taxes a mission, virtually, impossible.

Before this deal, local governments were overdependent on property taxes to operate. When the dust settles on this “historic” moment, nothing really will have changed. The dependency and all its consequences will remain.

The state’s apparent strategy, rather than deal with the underlying problem, will be to throw wads of money at local governments in an attempt to fill the gaps left by the big tax cut. It clearly won’t be enough, so strategy No. 2 is to place much tighter limits on local governments’ ability to build a budget as they see fit. These are restraints that the state itself would never dream of operating under.

Apparently this Legislature, which very nearly shut down the state last summer, and is stuck in another overtime budget struggle this year, feels it can authoritatively lecture local governments on fiscal prudence. Note to legislators: Every city and county in Iowa is done crafting its budget for 2013. And yet, one government just can’t seem to get it together.

And that’s the big one beneath the gilded dome, with more revenue streams to tap than you can shake a stick at. The one with off-budget pools, fees to infinity and record reserves in the bank.

For local governments, the story is a whole lot different. The Legislature has been largely unwilling to entertain the notion of handing some of its revenue-raising power to its local cousins. It won’t even seriously consider giving local voters the power to pick from a larger array of tax options that could reduce property tax dependency. The same voters who wisely send lawmakers to the Statehouse apparently can’t be trusted to make the right decisions on local taxation.

Legislators, for instance, cap local hotel-motel taxes at 7 percent. Why? Nobody really knows. It just feels right in Des Moines. And allowing us to vote on a higher rate might make lawmakers look bad. So forget it. The state knows better.

Lawmakers could have used this grand bargain as an opportunity to address this nagging problem. That would have been a big deal.

Made me think of Gov. William Beardsley, as Radio Iowa’s O.Kay Henderson explains:

Iowa law requires the state’s governor to be driven by a state trooper. The law was passed over half a century ago after an Iowa governor who was driving himself was killed in a car wreck. Governor Bill Beardsley was killed on November 21, 1954, during his third term as governor.

It also made me wonder what would have happened had Wednesday’s mishap been, God forbid, worse.

To the Iowa Constitution:

Succession to office of governor and lieutenant governor. SEC. 19. If there be a vacancy in the office of the governor and the lieutenant governor shall by reason of death, impeachment, resignation, removal from office, or other disability become incapable of performing the duties pertaining to the office of governor, the president of the senate shall act as governor until the vacancy is filled or the disability removed; and if the president of the senate, for any of the above causes, shall be incapable of performing the duties pertaining to the office of governor the same shall devolve upon the speaker of the house of representatives; and if the speaker of the house of representatives, for any of the above causes, shall be incapable of performing the duties of the office of governor, the justices of the supreme court shall convene the general assembly by proclamation and the general assembly shall organize by the election of a president by the senate and a speaker by the house of representatives. The general assembly shall thereupon immediately proceed to the election of a governor and lieutenant governor in joint convention.

This succession arrangement was placed in the Constitution in 1988, as part of an amendment making lieutenant governors into running mates elected alongside governors, starting in 1990. Before that, lt. guvs were elected independently of governors and presided over the Senate.

I honestly knew nothing about the section that calls for convening the General Assembly, by proclamation of the Supreme Court, to elect a new governor and lieutenant. Very dramatic stuff, that I hope we never see.

And, hey, let’s be careful out there.

But really, that was education reform’s fate all along. Eventually, inevitably, the high hopes of Gov. Terry Branstad’s education summit last summer would be brought low by the Statehouse grinder.

This week, the governor warned that lawmakers, especially Democrats, who fail to embrace his reform package will pay a price at the polls. But let’s face it, once the governor’s team set aside a marquee debate over teacher pay, there wasn’t much left to capture voters’ imagination. Iowans are not hitting the streets to demand holding back third-graders or banishing would-be teachers who can’t earn a B-average. Not even state schools chief Jason Glasss’ ACT showdown stirred passion in the hustings.

Branstad says we need a “new Senate,” controlled by Republicans. Admittedly, Senate Democrats haven’t really offered their own compelling vision of educational transformation, to their discredit. They’ve mostly played defense. And it’s natural for Branstad to want his side in charge of things.

But be careful what you wish for, governor. It’s not 1995. This isn’t the Republican Party of Marvin Pomerantz, Doug Gross or Brent Siegrist. This is a Republican Party now being led by Ron Paul aficionados and staunch religious conservatives. These are not exactly what I’d call unshakable allies of public education.

This GOP is not clamoring for Glass’ vision of a centralized, top-down, core standards-driven, test-till-they-drop reform effort. It’s a party that seems more in the mood to eliminate Glass’ department entirely and vaporize the core curriculum. Maybe get some old-time religion back in the classroom.

Glass wants to “professionalize” teacher pay, with mentoring, assessments and incentives. I suspect the new majority would be far more interested in dramatically altering collective bargaining rights and public employee benefits. I only hope they share those plans with voters before the election, instead of planning a Wisconsin-style surprise party in 2013.

But, basically, I think the lesson of this 2012 reform push (and, frankly, some previous ones) is that real educational change in this state is not coming from beneath the golden dome, no matter who runs the joint. The Statehouse, now caught in a Gordian tangle of unyielding political alliances, old grudges and rigid ideologies, is really only capable of doing more harm than good to our schools. With that in mind, this voter may embrace this looming failure as a success.

I’m beginning to realize that the best thing the state can do is provide more flexibility to local communities to try new educational approaches. Free up some money, scrap some mandates, rip up the playbook. Let’s redeploy the school improvement effort from the tired old political battlefield in Des Moines to some fresh new scenery.

The summit is great, but I suspect real solutions are hiding in the foothills.

Salon posted a piece Sunday on the legacy of the Villisca axe murders. The 100th anniversary is on June 10.

One passage caught my eye as yet more evidence that very nasty politics is hardly a recent phenomenon. An investigator looking into the crime, James Wilkerson, sought to pin the murders on a local state senator, Frank Hernando Jones. Wilkerson accuses Jones of hiring William “Blackie” Mansfield to do the deed, with electoral implications:

In 1916 Jones runs for state senate reelection and Wilkerson (along with Ross Moore and J.T. Stillinger) hosts revivals accusing Jones of hiring a man named William “Blackie” Mansfield for the job. Mansfield is a road crew worker and union organizer who also happens to be white despite a nickname that gets black people run out of town — yet again. On lampposts everywhere Wilkerson posts hundreds of flyers of Mansfield’s face:

This is the axe murder. He

murdered the Moore family at Vil

llisca. The hypocrite whose dirty

money paid for the hellish job

wants your support for the state

senate. Will he get it?

Obviously this bothers Sen. Jones. He sues Wilkerson for slander.

So clearly, it can get worse than accusing candidates of voting for heated sidewalks and flower pots.

I’d encourage you to read the whole Salon piece. Well-written.

I visited the house where the murders took place for a story I was working on in 2007, at my old job. It was about various places in Iowa where the sites of tragedy or crime have became tourist draws. (I even shot a video. Spielberg, I ain’t.)

Of all the places I’ve ever gone to report, that afternoon in Villisca stuck with me. Touring that house was unsettling and depressing. Of the eight people who were murdered, six were children. Time can’t remove the horror of that. I went in thinking it would be no big deal, but I was wrong.

I came away uneasy, like a some townspeople, with the notion of this as a tourist site. But fascination with it is human nature, I guess. Free county, free market and all that. But I doubt I’ll be going back.

Did a Cedar Rapids doctor get a special legislative favor? The Des Moines Register Editorial Board thinks so:

Don’t like the law? Then write a check to state lawmakers and they might carve out an exception just for you.

That is what the public probably is thinking after hearing about Dr. Lee Birchansky. The Cedar Rapids ophthalmologist wants to open an outpatient surgery center there. A state board has repeatedly denied him the needed certificate to do so, and the Iowa Supreme Court has agreed with the board.

So Republicans in the Iowa House want to come to his rescue. They added an amendment to a state spending bill that would allow Birchansky’s surgery center — and only his — to skirt a process known as the certificate of need. It’s hard to imagine this is a coincidence after the doctor gave thousands of dollars to lawmakers supporting his efforts.

But the editorial doesn’t mention, as The Gazette’s Cindy Hadish reported in March, that the state also won’t let Birchansky do cataract surgery in his office:

At first glance, Dr. Lee Birchansky’s in-office cataract surgery appears to be an innovative model for lowering health care costs, but state health officials don’t see eye-to-eye with the Cedar Rapids ophthalmologist. The Iowa Department of Public Health denied a rehearing on Birchansky’s notice to perform the common procedure in his office at Fox Eye Laser & Cosmetic Institute, 1136 H Ave. NE, sending his staff scrambling last week to reschedule dozens of patients into hospital surgical rooms.

‘We are open. We’re seeing patients. We’re doing surgeries that we normally do in the office,’ said Birchansky, 53, who has practiced 21 years in Cedar Rapids. ‘What’s changed is that we are no longer doing cataract surgeries in the office.’ The issue extends beyond the doors of Birchansky’s clinic to the pocketbooks of patients and taxpayers.

Birchansky estimates saving his patients and Medicare $3 million in the three years he performed the procedure in-office.

Those savings, spread over 2,143 patients, are from the $1,000 to $4,000 in facility fees that hospitals and outpatient, or ambulatory surgical cen­ters, collect, he said.

Most patients undergoing surgery for cataracts – a cloudiness that forms over the normally clear lens of the eye – are elderly, so Medicare picks up the tab ultimately paid by taxpayers.

The state, however, considers Birchansky’s office to be an uncertified surgical center, built at a cost of more than $1 million.

State health officials fined Birchansky $20,000 and ordered him to cease performing cataract surgery at Fox Eye.

This is not a story I’ve paid attention to, until today, so I have yet to form an opinion. If you have a helpful perspective or insight that you don’t want to post below, please email me.

UPDATE — It seems the House-approved amendment to help Birchansky is going nowhere in the Senate:

“There’s no support” according to Senate Health and Human Services Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Jack Hatch, D-Des Moines, for an amendment to Senate File 2336 to let Lee Birchansky circumvent the state certificate of need process that for more than a decade has blocked his plans to operate surgical suites adjacent to his Cedar Rapids office.

Hatch called it a case of lawmakers trying to pick winners and losers. House Speaker Kraig Paulsen, R-Hiawatha, called it a matter of fairness.

Birchansky, who has given more than $18,000 to both Republican and Democratic candidates in recent years, has been denied approval of a certificate of need four times since 1996. In one case, he unsuccessfully appealed to the Iowa Supreme Court

Tom Vilsack runs the food stamp program for our so-called “food stamp president.”

Iowa’s former governor and current U.S. secretary of agriculture oversees the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. Maybe we don’t think about the ag department running the massive food assistance program. But food stamps and food producers are linked, with about 16 cents of every dollar spent on groceries going to farmers. Vilsack actually came to our editorial board this month to stick up for those farmers and for rural America, an easier task than sticking up for food stamps.

Especially now. Critics point to growing food stamps roles as proof of the president’s economic failures. They also want to cut billions from the program. So the same folks who claim the White House piloted our economy into an iceberg now want to torpedo the life boats.

But they’re such an easy target. Food stamps recipients are pretty much just lazy welfare addicts. Right?

“There is a lot of misunderstanding about those programs,” Vilsack said.

Only about 8 percent of SNAP recipients also get cash welfare payments, Vilsack said, compared to 42 percent in 1992. A new Congressional Budget Office report found that “three out of four SNAP households included a child, a person age 60 or older, or a disabled person.” SNAP aid goes to 45 million people, a  70-percent jump since 2007.

In Iowa, 191,043 households out of the state’s 1.2 million received food assistance in March, according to state figures, up 10.4 percent from 2011, with an average monthly household benefit of $259.20, or $121.18 per person. Among those who received help during the last 60 months, the average period of assistance was 31.42 months. During 2011, 35,898 people in Linn County received assistance.

There’s been a lot of talk about barring recipients from buying “junk food.” Vilsack says it’s understandable but, logistically, very tough. You can target soda, but what about sugary juices? Sweets may be unhealthy, but what about sodium? With 300,000 items on store shelves, sifting out the “junk” is a daunting task.

FYI, here’s the basic eligible/ineligible items list:

Eligible Food Items

 Households CAN use SNAP benefits to buy:

 Foods for the household to eat, such as:

– breads and cereals;

– fruits and vegetables;

– meats, fish and poultry; and

– dairy products.

 Seeds and plants which produce food for the household to eat.

 In some areas, restaurants can be authorized to accept SNAP benefits from qualified homeless, elderly, or disabled people in exchange for low-cost meals.

 Households CANNOT use SNAP benefits to buy:

 Beer, wine, liquor, cigarettes or tobacco;

 Any nonfood items, such as:

 – pet foods;

– soaps, paper products; and

– household supplies.

 Vitamins and medicines.

 Food that will be eaten in the store.

 Hot foods.

Vilsack says the department, instead, is experimenting with offering small incentives for recipients who buy fresh fruits and vegetables. The grocer still gets full price. The customer gets a discount credited to their SNAP card. With 800,000 fraud cases investigated by the department last year, offering a carrot seems smarter than unleashing the soda pop police, especially if our concern is the health of recipients, particularly kids.

Still, it seems like the concern I hear more often is that SNAP has no sting, too little shame or stigma. Some folks think the debit cards make using food assistance too easy, although they also make it easier to detect fraud.

Do I wish fewer people needed food stamps? Of course. Do I think the 31-month average stay in the program in Iowa is troubling? Yes. But I also, thankfully, haven’t experienced what each of these families are going through. It’s easy to rail against an “entitlement class.” It’s much harder to feed a family with rising prices and a tiny, stagnant paycheck, or after a job loss. The basic truth is that an economic turnaround will shrink the roles just as the recession helped fill them.

In the meantime, people need to eat. And the notion that getting help buying food is some outlandish, luxurious perk worthy of our scorn, especially in the midst of a slow-motion recovery, is hard to swallow.

Welcome to this briefing on the future of live video in the Iowa House.

Now, I don’t have to tell anyone that our ratings are low. The House is just not must-see TV. Only five people are watching right now. All prison inmates being punished for bad behavior.

But that’s going to change. Today, I’m announcing a new programming lineup sure to be a big hit.

8:30 a.m. — The Pledge of Allegiance, recited by Morgan Freeman.

9:30 a.m. — Appropriations Subcommittee! (Drama) Can a hardworking subcommittee chair hold off bucks-grabbing, sob-story-spinning bureaucrats and meet his budget target? Will anyone notice?

10 a.m. — The Amazing Page (Reality). Can a freckle-faced page from Smallerton distribute amendments, carry boxes to a lawmaker’s Cadillac and still get an ice cream sundae all the way from the basement and into a legislator’s fat little fingers before it melts?

11 a.m. — The Middle (Comedy). House Republican moderates gather in a Prius and still have enough room to pick up four hitchhikers en route to a Tea Party meeting, with hilarious results.

Noon — Top Chef Special Interests (Gluttony). Culinary heavy hitters evaluate piles of free morsels served to lawmakers at receptions sponsored by various special interest groups. Will banker-bought boiled shrimp hold a candle to scads of Chamber of Commerce smoked salmon? But don’t count out Duck confit a la Corn Growers.

1 p.m. — Extreme Makeover (Reality). House GOP hard-liners push to ban same-sex marriage and impeach the Supreme Court. With traditional family values that will warm your heart.

2 p.m. — The Voice (Reality). Minority Democrats blather on and on with only faint hope of getting even one person in the House to look up from “Words with Friends” and pay attention for 10 lousy seconds.

6:30 p.m. — Don’t Trust the TB in Terrace Hill Floor 3 (Mystery). Lawmakers think Gov. Terry Branstad agreed to a tax compromise. Or did he? He said it looks “fine.” What does that mean? Wait. He line-item vetoed what?

8 p.m. — Dancing with the Legislators (Musical). It’s legislative prom! “A Mystical Night in the Tax Increment Financing District.”

9 p.m. — CSI Statehouse (Drama). The House of Representatives is missing. The only clue: an accidentally discarded Iowa Cubs day game ticket. What could it mean?

Late night — Budget Talks (Horror). What is lurking behind that closed door? What unspeakable things are being done to our innocent tax dollars? What dead ideas will live again? “It was a frank, productive discussion.” Aieeeeeee!

Ella, a member of my family who does ride, like the wind.

Two years ago, brand new Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett floated an interesting idea: What if the Corridor Metropolitan Planning Organization, instead of scattering small scoops of its annual funding to big-dollar road projects, plowed a big share of its dollars into finishing a long-planned network of recreational trails?

It seemed a far-fetched slice of sky pie. But last week, a clear majority of MPO board members from local cities and the county voted in favor of the idea. I thought it was a good idea in 2010, and still do.

For one thing, I’m intrigued by the novelty of it. Imagine actually finishing a long-term plan — taking a three-ring binder down from a high shelf in that proverbial warehouse of nifty, but dusty, government plans and completing it. That would really be something, although I’m a little afraid that such a preposterous move might rip a hole in the time-space continuum. I say we find out.

The metro-wide trails plan has been sitting around for years. It comes with a really nice, colorful map, with trails linking metro communities, connecting tens of thousands of people with popular recreation areas and even their workplaces. But that map is disconnected from reality, just like most trails are disconnected from others.

Under the plan approved by the MPO, for the next few years, most of any unspent bucks from previously planned road projects would go for trails and bike lanes on existing roads. In fiscal year 2016, trails would get an 80 percent chunk of the MPO’s roughly $3.2 million in annual funds. Over time, that could add up to a finished trail system.

Of course, this doesn’t sit well with everyone. Some see it only as an idea that takes money away from roads.

Critics say trails can wait, but how long? At what point is all the road work done? When exactly is that ceremony where we pour the golden slurry seal into the last pothole? The answer, obviously, is never. The MPO has been spending its funding on roads for 20 years, so I think trails backers have been fairly patient.

We can’t cancel every other sort of infrastructure project because of bad roads. And this funding shift isn’t going to cancel any road projects. But the truth is this really shouldn’t be framed as roads vs. trails.

It’s about refocusing scattered regional resources on actually accomplishing something for the region, building a public asset with considerable benefits for multiple communities. I’m not much of a cyclist, but I can understand the high value of a trails system to people who live here and those who might want to live here.

And, hey, one less plan on the shelf to dust.

Quick. To the Situation Room, for some no spin Hardball, or whatever.

The Pew Research Center is out with a report on news coverage of the 2012 presidential primary campaign. As the graph above shows, campaign strategy is our favorite thing to ceaselessly chronicle:

Overall, 64% of campaign coverage examined was framed around polls, advertising, fundraising, strategy and the constant question of who is winning and who is losing. There was only one month studied, November 2011, when strategy, tactics and money made up less than 60% of the coverage studied. That month they accounted for 41% and the examination of the candidates’ personal histories accounted for another 39%. Of particular focus that month was Romney’s Mormon faith, Gingrich’s marital history and Santorum’s religious beliefs. By contrast, the focus on strategy, tactics and money reached its peak in March, when about three-quarters (74%) of the coverage was devoted to those subjects.

The candidates personal history, religion, marriages, dog transport methods, etc., got 12 percent of the coverage. Stuff like “Domestic issues,” and “foreign issues” drew less (yawn) journalistic interest.

There are some good reasons. There’s less issue difference among primary candidates, so strategy and background get attention. And not all strategy coverage is inside baseball or fluff. How campaigns operate can reveal a lot about the true nature and abilities of a candidate. Campaign finance is a big story this cycle. (And, yes, I fully realize my own proclivity for superficial politics.)

But, hey, this is an improvement. Four years ago, according to Pew, 80 percent of the coverage was about strategy.

Still, you’re much more likely to hear who’s up in the latest tracking poll than you are to hear a good, clear explanation of how dismantling health reform, overhauling Medicare or bombing Iran would affect the country. Improvement or not, I think the graph above is one explanation for why lots of people don’t find politics to be the least bit relevant to their lives. Instead of digging for more substance, some folks just tune out.

And, unfortunately, that fits perfectly with the strategies Steven Pearlstein’s recent WaPo piece says our politicians have now embraced – intensely negative campaigns that turn off many voters in the middle while ginning up base partisan outrage and the money that flows from it. And we know how that’s working out:

The irony is that the politicians who prevail in these gladiator contests inherit a system so bitter, so partisan and so ideologically polarized that they can’t accomplish anything. They know that they and their constituents would be better off if they cooperated and compromised more, but they just can’t. If they try, they face a serious risk of being run out of office, either in the next primary by someone who better appeals to the party’s political base, or in the general election by an opponent whose extremism has allowed him or her to energize the other side’s core voters.

Politics has become a tragedy — a tragedy of the commons, that is. The individual pursuit of rational self-interest by parties and politicians, which in political and economic theory is supposed to generate the best outcome, has instead led to a cycle in which extremism, partisanship and stalemate all beget more of the same. We keep thinking it can’t continue like this, but it only gets worse.

So strategy reporting plays into political strategy. Stunning. But what I really want to know is how this whole thing will play with white working class males, and whether it has implications for 2016. Kidding.

Some interesting stuff. Thoughts?

So I’m back from a 4-day weekend. I’ll pause briefly for the applause to die down. No, really, I was gone.

I see our Iowa Senate has sent Gov. Terry Branstad that bill I wrote of last week creating a state panel to investigate potential open meetings and records violations, and hand out penalties. The bill’s sixth legislative session was apparently the charm. It cleared the Democratically controlled Senate 49-0 after passing the Republican-led House 92-7 last week.

I see in the Register of Des Moines that the Iowa League of Cities, who fought hard against more openness with the help of dues paid with your taxes, had to get in a last parting shot:

Larry Pope of the Iowa League of Cities argued that the bill is unnecessary since the state’s ombudsman and attorney general are already charged with some responsibility in enforcing current law.

“We think the enforcement provisions will lead to more contested cases, and both cities and towns are at more risk of protracted litigation and fines,” he said.

The ombudsman has no power to level penalties. And the attorney general’s office has been far too busy pursuing high-profile cases of national importance to piddle around with some local school board or city council playing secret agent. Local prosecutors are even less interested. So basically, we had a virtual enforcement free zone, which is exactly what the league wanted to sustain.

But Pope is right. Now, someone will investigate, and some local officials will face penalties. Enforcing the law. What a concept. Like they say about the traffic cameras, follow the law and you’ve got nothing to worry about.

Still, the bill has flaws. The new panel can’t investigate the Legislature, governor’s office or courts. Shocking, I know. And the House added language apparently seeking to shield preliminary draft documents from open records laws. And the added language is somewhat confounding:

“Tentative, preliminary, draft, speculative, or research material, prior to its completion for the purpose for which it is intended and in a form prior to the form in which it is submitted for use or used in the actual formulation, recommendation, adoption, or execution of any official policy or action by a public official authorized to make such decisions for the governmental body or the  government body. This subsection shall not apply to public records that are actually submitted for use or are used in the formulation, recommendation, adoption, or execution of any official policy or action of a governmental body or a government body by a public official authorized to adopt or execute official policy for the governmental body or the government body.”

Seems like it’s designed to shield pre-draft drafts that have not been drafted for official use by any official decision-makers. Odd.

I guess the fighting point would be the definition of “submitted for use.” If some city council members merely have a look-see at some speculative planning documents, is that “submitted?” Or does there have to be some sort of formal submission ceremony, with a ribbon cutting and a sheet cake? Not sure. Could be an unimportant technicality. But I detect subtle a hint of mendacity.

But the good in the bill outweighs the bad. So welcome news.

My co-worker Diane Langton, as skilled an archives-digger as I’ve ever known, points out that the search for a welcome sign design I wrote of yesterday is only the latest attempt in the city’s proud history to cleverly catch the eye of outsiders.

She points to front page of The Evening Gazette of Saturday, Sept. 24, 1898, which urged one and all to come and enjoy the “SEE DER RABBITS Carnival Oct. 3-7.” (The full, zoom-able front page is also below)

See Der Rabbits. Cedar Rapids. Get it? Snort.

And if you think modern day boosters can get a tad braggy, check out the carnival pitch:

Cedar Rapids Extends a Most Cordial Invitation to One and All to Come and Witness the Greatest and Grandest Carnival ever Given in the West – Unbounded Hospitality and Unlimited Pleasure – Program of Surpassing Excellence – Wonderful and Thrilling Pyrotechnics Reproducing Dewey’s Capture of Manila and Destruction of the Spanish Elect, a Scene Never to be Forgotten – Magnificent Fireworks – Great Bicycle Races – Trotting and Running – Balloon Races, a New and Startling Innovation – Trapeze Performances Never Equalled – Do not Fail to Join in the Glorious Fall Festivities – Take a Few Days off from Business and Toil and Join in Having a Good Time, a Season of Pleasure, Profit and Joy – Remember the Place and Date and Accept this Genuine Welcome and Invitation

Grandest in all the west? Dewey destroys the Spanish fleet? Balloons, so new and startling? A Season of pleasure? Yeah, I’m there. Somebody fire up the Wayback Machine.

I can see the welcome sign now. “Welcome to See Der Rabbits. We’re Very Hoppy to See You.” It’s got potential.

It was a spring tradition that a columnist could count on, or so I thought.

About this time each year, for the last five years, I would pound out a column hammering the Iowa Legislature for failing to, yet again, create a panel, board, authority or agency to enforce open meetings and records laws. No matter which party was in charge, who was governor, the pollen count, barometric pressure, etc., somehow, the promising enforcement bill would tumble onto a Statehouse scrap heap, usually in the Iowa House.

Then I’d get all outraged and tap out a real gem of righteous indignation, arguing that lawmakers just don’t seem to care how crazy difficult it is for residents to simply see to it that local elected officials follow state law. I’ve been known to work up quite a lather lambasting legislators.

And then, wouldn’t you know it, this week the House passed a bill creating an Iowa Public Information Board with the power to investigate resident complaints and levy significant penalties when it determines the law is being broken. The board also will provide training for elected officials with hopes of avoiding transparency troubles.

Senate passage will send the bill to Gov. Terry Branstad, who is eager to sign it into law.

So now I have to give them credit. Never easy. But it’s a big deal, broadly bipartisan, good for Iowa and long overdue.

I know this bill gets panned by critics as some pesky media assistance act. But this really is about helping Iowans challenge local officials who they believe are denying them the right to witness important decisions being made and tax dollars being spent. Currently, those residents either must turn to local officials who work for or with the accused lawbreakers, or make a long, pricey trip to court.

That’s a lousy system. When local governments pass ordinances, they expect swift, sure enforcement. Residents should get the same when it comes to laws governing transparency.

Is the bill perfect? No, of course not. The board has no jurisdiction over the Legislature or Governor’s Office. That’s too bad, but, luckily, there’s no shortage of watchdogs tracking the big dogs at the Statehouse. The real need is in counties and towns where average folks need a law with some teeth to back them up.

I also hope lawmakers don’t think we’re all done with sunshine now. For starters, we’ve got an open meetings law that apparently allows unelected school superintendents to preside over months of closed-door committee meetings on critical issues, such as school closings, with no legal obligation for openness. That needs to change.

So, congrats. Now, what’s next?

Maybe you read last week that Cedar Rapids has socked away as much as $400,000 for a “City Gateways Enhancement Project.” Apparently there was an online survey of 500 or so local residents seeking guidance.

I have the results of that survey, which I posted in full below. It’s sort of interesting, although I freely admit odd things interest me.

It’s an online survey, so not a perfect sampling of local opinion, by any means. Of the 510 who responded between Dec. 1-19, 63 percent said they’re from Cedar Rapids, with 19 percent from outside Linn County and the rest scattered among surrounding communities. Of the Cedar Rapids respondents, 40 percent live on the northeast side, 29 percent on the southeast, 16 percent southwest and 13 percent are northwest siders.

Fifty-seven percent of respondents are female, 70 percent are under age 55, 60 percent have a 4-year or graduate degree, 76 percent work full time and nearly half earn more than $80,000 annually, including 19 percent earning $125,000 or more.

So what do these mostly female, employed, young, well-educated Internet poll participating types think are the main perceptions of Cedar Rapids?

There is no “consensus,” but I sense a trend. Among respondents, 18 percent said “industrial,” 15 percent said “smells” and 12 percent said “blue collar.” The “2008 flood” rounded out the double-digit picks at 10 percent.

But what image should the city project? Fourteen percent said “friendly,” 13 percent “progressive/innovative,” 12 percent “culture” and 11 percent each for “vibrant city” and “family friendly.”

So maybe we’re smelly, but we’d like to be friendly. What sort of sign should we use to project this new sweet aroma of friendliness?

One-fourth said a stone sign would be best. Lighted, colorful and metal all scored OK. There was less consensus on style or theme, with 13 percent picking “modern” and 11 percent sticking with our good old “Five Seasons.” But there is broad agreement that it should be readable from the road. Well-educated, remember?

The respondents were also shown a series of signs from other cities. The winner was Dodge City, which I posted above. It is a pretty cool sign. Other examples are in the survey results below. Iowa City’s sign made the top five.

Left unanswered in all this surveying is the question of whether it really matters if Cedar Rapids has snazzy lighted stone welcome signs that are readable from the road. We’ve already got those nice, minimalist ones from the DOT that say “Cedar Rapids.” I think those answer the question “Where am I?” quite nicely.

Beyond that, it seems like the places you see, and yes smell, along the roads into town already tell travelers plenty about the place. Midwest city ahead. Hard working. Not flashy. We like it here. Mind the speed cameras.

Don’t get me wrong, I think welcome signs have some value. But the best ones have a catchy slogan, maybe with a dash of humor. Small towns understand this, like ”Alden – Best Town by a Dam Site,” or “Jewell – A Gem of a Town in a Friendly Setting” or one of my favorites, “Knoke – Next 3 Exits.” The town is super tiny. Get it? That’s the joke.

And, really, how could anyone top Gravity, Iowa – “We’re Down to Earth…If Gravity Goes, We All Go.” Clearly, Gravity gets levity.

So how about “Cedar Rapids – Iowa’s Friendliest City, Come Smell or High Water.”

Or maybe, “Cedar Rapids – We spent $400,000 on these signs, so the least you could do is stop and buy some stuff.” A little wordy, I guess.

Yeah. Well, maybe you have bright ideas.

Read the following passage and answer the question below:

DES MOINES — Iowa Department of Education Director Jason Glass’s pretest ritual, leading up to taking the ACT on Monday, consisted of a weekend of online study followed by a test-day microwave breakfast sandwich and “lots” of coffee.

For his efforts, Glass scored a 27 out of a possible 36, putting him in the 88th percentile of all test-takers. It’s a score that would get him a second look by all but the most selective colleges and universities, before criteria such as extracurricular activities were applied.

Then there’s University of Kentucky associate education professor Scott McLeod. He took the test with Glass and a group of students at Roosevelt High School in Des Moines.

McLeod earned a 34, placing him in the 99th percentile of all test-takers. College-bound juniors with that type of score can have even their “safety school” picks among the top five in the country.

Iowa’s average statewide composite score for students in the Class of 2011 was 22.3, according to the Iowa Department of Education. The national average was 21.1. Only 61 percent of the students who can take the test in Iowa do so.

It was McLeod who challenged Glass to take the test, back in February. The two were posting back and forth on Twitter about the value of standardized tests such as the ACT.

Glass has pushed for a mandatory ACT test for all juniors in the state as part of the state’s education reform package. McLeod wasn’t sold on the idea, so he offered his suggestion — along the lines of “if it’s so good, why don’t YOU take it?”

What can be reasonably inferred from the passage about the value of Glass’ proposal to require juniors to take the ACT?

A. Students will get to enjoy the classic combination of a breakfast sandwich and steaming hot coffee.

B. Testing is an important tool, but competitions between bureaucrats and academics are lame.

C. Publicity stunts are a great way to gain the proposal’s acceptance by a skeptical Iowa Legislature.

D. You got me.

MATHEMATICS

Iowa’s Department of Education Director makes $140,000 annually, or $2,692.30 for each of 52 weeks, or $67.30 for each of 40 hours in a typical American workweek. How much did he earn while taking the ACT for 3.5 hours?

A. $235.55

B. You can’t put a price on good publicity

C. What a high school junior earning minimum wage would make for 32 hours of work, maybe hoping to buy a new iPhone, created by a company founded by a college dropout who may or may not have done so hot on the ACT. But really, in the big scheme of things, who cares?

D. It really depends on how much money Bravo pays Glass for the rights to broadcast the new standardized test showdown reality series he’s developing: “Pencils Up!” or “Say Yes to the Test!”

SCIENCE

During the course of its lifespan, Gov. Terry Branstad’s education reform bill has shed many of its original traits in an effort to adapt to the demands of a harsh legislative habitat. This process is known as:

A. Evolution

B. The thoughtful, deliberative legislative process

C. Intelligent design

D. Sausage-making

E. Horse-trading

ENGLISH

Pick the most correct way to edit the underlined passage.

The Legislature is moving swiftly toward adjournment, with a keen focus on the primary goal of transforming Iowa schools.

A. adjournment; with a keen focus on the primary goal of transforming Iowa schools.

B. adjournment. With a keen focus on the primary goal of transforming Iowa schools.

C. NO CHANGE

D. adjournment, with a keen focus on the primary goal of transforming Iowa schools.

So I’ve driven past Morgan Creek Farm’s vegetable stand along U.S. Highway 30 west of town a bunch of times. Been meaning to stop by sometime. I swear.

But until Monday morning, I didn’t know much about the place. I didn’t know that Morgan Creek Farm grows vegetables on 37 acres, along with greenhouse space for year-round production. And I hadn’t met Bill Rieckhoff, his wife, Robyn and her father, Bob Vanous, who own and run the farm. I met them at Monday morning’s groundbreaking (OK, more like a hay-throwing) for the NewBo City Market at the corner of Third Street and 12th Avenue SE.

And that’s one of the main ideas behind this year-round farmers market. When it opens Nov. 1, it will introduce people who eat to people who grow food. And both sides benefit.

“The big thing we believe in is local. Knowing the people who grow your food, knowing where it’s growing,” Bill Rieckhoff said. Morgan Creek is adding greenhouse capacity and likely some jobs at the farm in anticipation of the business boost he expects from selling produce at the market.

“We are really excited about this,” he said.

It’s tough not to get excited looking at drawings of how a former manufacturing plant will be transformed into a bright, airy market, with a large outdoor sales area and huge public plaza. The surrounding New Bohemia neighborhood is already popping with a renovated CSPS Hall, restaurants, bars and other businesses. But it’s easy to see why the neighborhood’s boosters believe the market could fuel even more growth.

I’ve heard a few jabs at this project from those who think this fast-food town doesn’t need some sort of pricey, free-range arugula stand for finicky foodies, paid for, in part, with some public bucks. But they’ve got it all wrong.

This isn’t about some sort of out-of-touch elites. This is about our community being in closer touch with what makes our corner of the globe special. And basically, that’s dirt. Soil, loamy glacial till, whatever you like to call it. The stuff this city’s food processing prosperity has sprouted from over the decades. The stuff that was still under Bill Rieckhoff’s fingernails Monday morning after planting onions and tomatoes over the weekend.

Vendors such as Morgan Creek are lining up for slots at the market. Among them are a lot of local people working hard to make a living off Iowa land. The investment in the market, both the public dollars and private donations, represents an investment in that work, and is consistent with our heritage and values.

So farmers get a great place to connect with customers, shoppers get fresh local food, and the community gets what backers say is the only public market of its kind in Iowa.

A phone rings in the governor’s office.

“Governor Branstad speaking.”

“Yeah, hi, governor. This is the Butter Cow, calling from the fairgrounds.”

“Oh, my gosh. Chris was right. I did eat too much finely textured beef … Wait a second. Chet? Is that you again? Look, it was a kinda funny the first dozen times, but this is really getting old …”

“No seriously, governor, it’s really me, 600 pounds of low-moisture, pure-cream Iowa butter. Calling from inside the cooler. They made me a butter iPhone last summer. Downloaded some awesome pats. Got that 4G now.”

“So what do you need, Butter Cow? I’m sort of busy, you know, governing.”

“Well, I just wanted to ask you to back off this whole school start date deal. You really shouldn’t force schools to start after the State Fair. It’s just not right, governor.”

“But I’m trying to make sure kids have time to go to our Great State Fair, to see you and all the other attractions.”

“Sure. I appreciate the flattery. But we already get a million people out here every year. They line up, shuffle by and gawk. They watch me and I watch them. What else have I got to do?

“And I notice things. These kids have all sorts of gadgets they never used to have. The world is changing, governor. It’s way more complex, moves a lot faster. Everything’s going global. They’ve got teriyaki beef on a stick out here now. Schools have a very big job. They need help, not new edicts from on high.”

“But Butter Cow, what about our agricultural heritage? What about tourism bucks?”

“Yeah, I get that. But our heritage is about working hard and sacrificing to make sure the next generation has it better than we did. That’s Iowa. Folks have always found time to go to the fair. It’s been around since 1854. I think it will be just fine. People spend money out here like mad cows.”

“Yes, Cow, but my own daughter is a teacher who will miss the fair due to the early school start.”

“So you change state education policy? You got a speeding camera ticket, so then you wanna ban cameras? What are you gonna do next, make everybody grow a mustache?”

“You know, Cow, I make a couple of phone calls and your cooler might get, I dunno … unplugged.”

“OK, sorry. It’s just that I’ve been studying Iowans for a while. I’ve got a lot of respect for them. Sure, they wait in line to stare at carved butter, and will eat anything you put on a stick, but they’re still smart people. And I think they’re perfectly capable of deciding when their local schools should open each August, without your help.”

“Fine, fine you’ve said your piece. Point taken. Anything else, Butter Cow?”

“Yeah, now that you mention it. I’m a little worried about where I fit into this healthiest state thing.”

Woodbury County Courthouse in Sioux City

Last week, a Sioux City jury awarded $231,000 to a state lawmaker who sued his vanquished foe for running a television ad that defamed his good name.

The ad charged that Republican Rep. Rick Bertrand “put profits ahead of children’s health” while working for a drug company. It was paid for by the Iowa Democratic Party, and clearly, dishonestly, twisted facts. The verdict is being appealed.

In the days since, I’ve read comments from politicos who insist this will put the brakes on dishonest political ads, make candidates cautious and alter the way campaigns operate. I wish it were a game-changer.

But I don’t think much will change. Maybe a candidate or two will think twice before assailing an opponent’s business or private life. That’s a good thing. But the vast majority of scurrilous campaign muck is tied to issues, policies and votes.

By all means, feel free to sue someone for accusing you of gutting preschools, supporting a government takeover of health care or heating sidewalks. Let us know how that turns out. Nice stimulus for lawyers, at least.

What that brave jury could not do is change the fact that elections, even local legislative races, can have enormous consequences. Legislative control, the fate of important issues, command of the massive state budget, can hinge on a district or two. The stakes can be very high, so the notion that party strategists are going to pull back or get cold feet for fear that someday, maybe, a jury somewhere might make them pay a defamation award seems really far-fetched. In this win-at-all-costs era, only the election matters.

We’ve also learned over the past several months that when truly dirty work needs to be done, it won’t be a candidate doing it. Outside groups, Super PACs, etc., are more than willing to level charges corrosive enough to peel paint, at arm’s length from a candidate they back. These groups, with sketchy organizations and fuzzy donor lists, may evaporate after Election Day. Good luck suing a vapor trail.

I’d love to wave this Sioux City verdict in the air and proclaim political honesty in our time. But that’s sort of tough when you’re up to your neck in bile. This is a golden age of political dishonesty.

The quaint notion that you can catch candidates or campaigns telling a whopper, and embarrass them into coming clean, is pretty much dead. Legions of unshakable partisans are willing to line up and swear the whopper is true, and shout loudly that the real culprit worthy of shame is the biased fact-checker. Add that to the apathy of folks who pay no attention, and you’ve pretty much got a license to lie. On the bright side, TVs turn off.

So kudos to the jury for striking a blow. But I fear the beast will need only a small Band-Aid.

(Cliff Jette/SourceMedia Group

Got a genuine pen-and-paper, old-school letter from a reader recently who is sick of hearing about Polk Elementary. How sick? “Your whining is enough to make a person puke,” he wrote. That’s pretty sick.

Nonetheless, I am willing to risk some reader queasiness to bring you the latest. I’ll try to keep my whining to a minimum.

Last eve, the Cedar Rapids School Board received an update on the transition process for families affected by the Polk closure next fall and other closures and boundary changes. You might remember a week ago I wrote about Polk parents who expressed frustration with a transition process they contended left some families confused and questions unanswered. They also argued that the timeline between the March 12 closure vote and an April 4 deadline to choose a new school for their children was too compressed, due to spring break and other disruptions that made it tougher to communicate with staff and set up times to tour schools.

The district mounted a lengthy defense Monday. Officials downplayed the scope of difficulties, and, a few times, made thinly veiled assertions that problems are being exaggerated for show. Executive Administrator Mary Ellen Maske explained and defended the district’s plan as being well-though-out, comprehensive and effective for most families. Superintendent Dave Benson conceded that a handful of informational packets sent to families were returned by the Postal Service. But most families have been kept up to speed.

Even if they didn’t like the criticism, district leaders, to their credit, seemed to listen to it. Officials moved the school choice deadline to April 18. Which makes sense, given that half of Polk’s 191 families had not yet made a school choice by Monday, five days after the original deadline. The extra time should give many more families a chance to ask questions and tour schools.

Last week’s informational Polk Family Picnic was attended by 255 people, which is great. But members of the School Board were not among them. President John Laverty said he didn’t want the event to be come a “media spectacle for emotions to boil over.”

I didn’t go either, so I guess I almost missed a “media spectacle.” But I also wasn’t elected to represent these folks. I think an appearance by a board member or two could have gone a long way toward mending some fences. I doubt it would have been a spectacle. Just parents armed with grilled burgers. Not so scary, really.

I wonder how this post-closure saga might have been different if that picnic were the first item on the transition agenda, instead of the last. Bringing families together with staff to get information from real people, instead of a form letter, might have softened the initial blow and got the transition off on the right foot.

Something to consider next time, I guess. Benson said the district would look at what worked and what didn’t, compiling it into a “post-event evaluative document.” And here I thought they couldn’t top “supposals.”

This was my very first visit to the new Educational Leadership and Support Center. An impressive edifice, although I was surprised how small the board room is. Just 55 seats in front of a long, raised podium where the board and superintendent sit. With 169,000 square feet to work with, I expected roomier digs. On the upside, a great view from every seat.

(AP Photo)

Instead of sugary Peeps, U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley gave us an acidic tweet over the Easter weekend.

Grassley, whose freewheeling use of Twitter is legendary, unloaded on President Obama’s suggestion a week ago that a Supreme Court ruling tossing out his health care reform effort would smack of “judicial activism.”

“Constituents askd why i am not outraged at PresO attack on supreme court independence. Bcause Am ppl r not stupid as this x prof con law,” Grassley tweeted.

This, of course, made some news.

I like Grassley’s raw, unbridled tweets, if not his grammar. And calling presidents stupid is our right, ever since they started doing stupid things, roughly 5 minutes after Washington’s oath. As a parent of young children, I might have told the president that I don’t really think he’s stupid. I just wish he wouldn’t do stupid things.

And what Obama suggested, that the high court would somehow exceed its authority by striking down reform, was dumb. The court may churn out what the left sees as a revolting stack of political hackery, but it clearly has the authority to do so. Obama knows this, and has since backtracked.

But I had to laugh when Republicans accused him of trying to “intimidate” the court. Obama may know the Chicago way of politics, but he clearly doesn’t know the Iowa way of scaring judges.

You wanna get the judges? Here’s how you get them. They pull a ruling you don’t like. You pull out “unelected, illegitimate tyrannical power-grabbers bent on destroying civilization.” They politely point to the equal protection clause. You slap their faces on a “Judge Bus” and send their judicial careers to the morgue. That’s the Iowa way.

It’s true, the untouchables on the U.S. Supreme Court don’t face retention votes, but still, Obama sounds downright wimpy compared to the scorched earth judge-hunting we do out here.

And with Grassley’s full blessing. In November 2011, he bragged to the Senate Judiciary Committee about how Iowans rose up in 2010 to throw out state Supreme Court justices who “made up a constitutional right” to gay marriage and who “ignored the constitution and applied their own views.” Sounds a lot like Bob Vander Plaats.

When a court rules in a way you don’t like, pound it into submission with baseless, even “stupid,” assertions that its ruling is illegitimate and invalid. But when a court is potentially poised to rule your way, bravely defend “court independence,” tweets a’ blazin.’

Basically, PresO and Grassley have shown, once again, just how tiresome, meaningless and hypocritical the charge of “judicial activism” really is. It’s low-brow politics not high-minded civics. And it’s about as substantive as a Peep.

UPDATE — Gov. Terry Branstad chimes in this morning at his press confab to side with Grassley:

“I thought it was incredible that somebody that is a graduate of a law school would make the kind of outlandish statements that the president of the United States said,” Branstad told reporters this morning. “…The issue of the Supreme Court being able to decide constitutionality was decided in Marbury v Madison in 1803 and anybody that’s gone to law school knows that.”

Radio Iowa’s O. Kay Henderson suggested to Branstad that maybe Obama was listening to Vander Plaats, who famously argued that court rulings in Iowa can be oveturned by gubernatorial executive orders. Branstad reiterated that he doesn’t share that view.

But I think another good question for Branstad would be, if he cares so much about judicial review and court independence, why did he remain silent throughout the fall of 2010 while BVP and his crusaders campaigned to oust three Iowa Supreme Court justices, including one he appointed.

Our editorial board asked him about the retention campaign in Oct. 2010:

Q — You chose a legal career in the beginning, and you appointed one of the (justices) that’s on the ballot this fall. Why not take a stand on this retention question?

“Because it’s a ballot issue and it’s up to the people to decide. And so I think people should vote their own convictions on this.

“And let me say this about a legal career. I recently spoke at the Drake law school. And certainly I don’t regret (chuckles) getting a legal education. But I never imagined it would lead to being president of a medical school. But, a legal education, you can be an FBI agent, you can do a lot of different things. In my case, I’ve had a wonderful career.

“But I don’t think that I should try to influence, uh…First of all, I’m running for governor. That’s a big, important office, and I’m focused on what I think is the most important issues facing the people of Iowa, jobs and restoring fiscal responsibility. And I think these other issues that are ballot issues, and there are several of them on the ballot, should be up to the voters to decide.”

Q — But it’s a pretty big public policy question. And I think a lot of folks see your silence as sort of a tacit endorsement of the effort to oust those judges…

“No. I mean, in the primary, there was a lot of pressure put on me, and one of my opponents is leading the effort against the judges, and I took the position in the primary that it should be the people’s decision on that and that I was running for governor, not to oversee the court. But I do think the people do have a right to make those decisions. I respect that, and I respect the fact that it’s on the ballot for retention and people should vote their convictions.”

Sure, but what are your convictions? Again, stick up for justices who rule the way you like. When they don’t, throw them under the Judge Bus and reap the political rewards.

UPDATE II — And under the headings small world and great timing, LegalTimes writer Todd Ruger, who was a Gazette Statehouse intern back in the day, posted this Q and A with Grassley on his unique Twitter stylings on Friday, just before the weekend developments.

(AP Photo)

Maybe you heard, as I did, about the Colorado egg hunt that wasn’t.

It was in the news recently. An egg hunt in Colorado Springs was canceled due to overzealous parenting. Parents, determined to make sure their egg-hunting kiddies got eggs, jumped a rope barrier and dove in. Organizers simply had enough of the hunt turned hockey game and called the whole thing off.

I bring this up not because I’m eager to shoot fish in a barrel, or in this case helicopter parents in the skies over the Rockies. The story made me laugh, because I thought of my mother.

We had egg hunts too, on the slow-thawing tundra of north Iowa. Maybe there was a little snow on the ground. Maybe we squished a springy muck between our sneakers. There was always a stiff wind, and Easter baskets clutched in mittened hands.

We didn’t have 80 degrees in March back then. Al Gore was a nobody.

Some civic-minded group or local business, I honestly forget which one, would cover a large grassy area with assorted candy and eggs, some real and hard-boiled. And a few of those eggs were adorned with an “X.” Find one, and you’d win yourself a real live rabbit, or a chick, maybe dyed purple or pink.

The wind howled, the pastel chicks likely shivered, noses were wiped and rewiped, anticipation rose to a fevered pitch. Then someone yelled “Go!”

My mother was right beside me as I staggered forward into the breach. But her mission was nearly the opposite of our infamous Colorado rope-jumpers. Whenever I found one of those coveted X eggs, she made darn sure I didn’t pick it up under any circumstances.

“No, you don’t want that one. That’s not a good one. Let’s find another one,” she would say. I was too cold and egg-shocked to question it. It was all a blur of screaming and running and sniffling.

Mission accomplished. We never went home with a purple pet. An Easter miracle. Bummer for our cats.

I would not fully understand the value of this parental wisdom until later. The girl down the road won a chick, and was eager to show all the neighborhood kids. Another girl down the road, older, and a little clumsy, was eager to show us what she learned at cheerleading.

The chick was running around on the ground. The cheerleader was jumping and yelling. Yeah. Sadly, both the cheer and the chick ended tragically.

So I guess my point is that close parental egg hunt supervision can sometimes save lives. Or maybe chicks and cheerleading don’t mix. Either way, Happy Easter.

Our own Iowa Legislature gave final approval to Cedar Rapids-inspired legislation that could provide dollars for flood protection and mitigation measures in communities across Iowa. Getting a bill through the legislative labyrinth still bearing some resemblance to its founding notions is no small feat, folks.

Our local leaders deserve credit for pulling it off, with bipartisan support, no less, and for sparking an idea that may leave a positive mark on our flood-prone state, pending Gov. Terry Branstad’s signature.

We also heard from Washington, D.C., that the city will get $13.8 million for flood damage to the hydroelectric dam that was originally pledged and then denied by FEMA officials. That’s money that may now be used on some other recovery project or projects, pending federal approval.

Good news.

And yet, these days, I feel a little like the bartender when the horse walked into the tavern. I look at some of our local leaders lately and wonder, why the long faces?

It’s been a month since the sales tax extension for flood protection failed. And trust me, behind the scenes, the seething and sulking continues in full force. I get it. I really do. It was frustrating. Flood protection is a very big deal. And pointing fingers after a defeat has been a proud American tradition since the domestication of scapegoats.

But let’s look at the scoreboard. On the vast majority of big decisions on the course of flood recovery, what I would call the Corbettarian wing of local politics has been victorious. Take a good brisk walk around the city core and you’ll see the evidence, from the Convention Complex to the amphitheater to infill housing projects to New Bo to the library. In terms of the sports metaphors the mayor loves, it’s been a blowout.

And yet, there are times I wonder whether the folks who made it happen can see it. It seems like all they can see are the few painful setbacks. All they can hear are the voices of their most vicious and unreasonable critics. Someone is wrong on the Internet, and they can’t get past it.

It’s like backward day. People who have basically been routed on nearly every issue are claiming some sort of new clout. People with clout who have won victory after victory are venting and lamenting. What gives?

Yeah, I know it’s no fun to get beat up. But I thought the goal was to replace the culture of delay with a culture of action. You did it. You took action. And your payoff is accomplishment, not affection.

That’s better anyway. Flowers wilt and candy melts and cheers fade. You put a mark on a city. You’re building stuff that will last. Cheer up already.

Media elites? Hollywood? Celebrity chefs? Vegetarians? Whoever it was that got this “pink slime” hysteria rolling, they must be exposed. Rarely, do we see this much passion from Branstad. Suddenly, he’s become the Braveheart of finely textured beef processing.

I was on his side while he was decrying misconceptions, sticking up for jobs and assuring us that beef is safe, and oh so tasty. I actually think the back-and-forth between backers and critics of processed trimmings has allowed consumers to make a more informed choice.

Winner, winner, hamburger dinner, I say. May now be high time to let this brouhaha simmer a spell with the lid on.

But apparently not. Congressional hearings? What would that be like?

(Cue the dream sequence harps)

Bang! Bang! Bang!

“I call this meeting of the House Committee on un-American Dietary Proclivities to order. This panel has been formed at the urging of the governor of the great state of Iowa, Terry Branstad. I will now call our next witness.

“I call Mr. Todd Dorman, columnist for The Gazette of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Mr. Dorman, do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God?”

I do.

“Mr. Dorman, are you now or have you ever been a follower of @jamieoliver on what they call the Twitter?

I currently follow Mr. Oliver, yes, among many others.

(Murmurs. Whispers. Flashbulbs)

“And is it true that you also own two of Mr. Oliver’s cookbooks, “The Naked Chef” and “Jamie’s Food Revolution?”

(Leaning in to get advice from my counsel) Uh, yes, yes I do Mr. Chairman.

“So I guess you like to eat the same sort of food as some naked English revolutionary?”

I decline to answer on the advice of counsel.

“Is it true that on June 12, 2011, you used a recipe from this so-called “Food Revolution” for something called “vegetable Jalfrezi curry” to make dinner for your family? And is it strue that the recipe at issue contained no meat whatsoever, Mr. Dorman?”

(Flashbulbs, murmurs)

I honestly cannot recall,  congressman. I make a lot of dinners. But that sounds plausible.

“And is it also true that on March 28 of this year, you wrote a cheap-shooting smear piece for your so-called blog listing derogatory alternative names for All-American-made lean finely textured beef, including BeefWhip, Soylent Pink and Fluffy Beef, or Fleef? Do you think you’re amusing, sir?”

I assure you, congressman, it was merely an innocent bit of whimsical satire …

“Answer the question. Did you or did you nor write this blog?”

I did.

“Have you at any time used the term “pink slime” to refer to lean finely textured beef?”

I have.

“Have you shared this term publicly with anyone, such as your Facebook friends?”

Yes.

“Can you name any of those friends?”

Actually, congressman, you are one of my Facebook friends. And please, quit asking me to try BranchOut.

“Ur, uh, well. Never mind. I withdraw the question. Moving on. Mr. Dorman, are you a vegetarian, vegan or free range fair trade organic activist?”

I am not.

“Are you now or have you ever been a member of an organic food coop?”

Uh, yes. But my wife signed me up, I swear it.

“Do you enjoy eating delicious USDA inspected American beef?

I do.

“Will you name the names of the various cuts of beef you have spent time with in past?”

I will not name names. I will go to jail before I name names, Mr. Chairman.

“Now, now, there’s no need for such extreme measures. But would you be willing to eat beef here, now, in front of this committee, to prove your loyalty to this nation’s bovine bounty?”

(Leaning over to speak with counsel) Normally, I would flatly reject your demand that I prove my loyalty to beef. The record speaks for itself. I have nothing to prove. It’s, frankly, insulting. And un-American in my view.

But seeing as I skipped lunch, I would be glad to.

(Flashbulbs, whispers, grumbles, stomach rumbles. The beef is served)

Wait just a minute, Mr. Chairman. I’m sorry, Mr. Chairman, but this beef is bland. Tasteless, even. There’s no salt or cracked black pepper. There’s no dry rub or au jus. There’s no pan sauce or port wine reduction. Not even ketchup, Mr. Chairman!

Have you no sense of seasonings, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of seasonings?

(Flashbulbs, shouts, applause, take out orders being phoned in)

Bang! Bang! Bang! “I move for an immediate recess.”

(Cliff Jette/SourceMedia Group)

So the Polk Elementary saga ends not with a bang, but a picnic.

This evening, at 5 p.m., is the Polk Family Picnic, where Polk parents will meet with staff from several schools where they may choose to send their children this fall. The School Board voted March 12 to close Polk.

Parents have until Wednesday to make a choice. So, for some, this is a pretty pivotal picnic.

Ideally, you might like to have a little more time to both digest your potato salad and vital information on your child’s educational future. But, based on what I’m hearing from parents, this transition has hardly been ideal.

“Not only are we grieving the loss of this successful school, we don’t even have a smooth transition to work our way through it. It amplifies and exacerbates all those feelings,” said Sue Nading, a Polk parent who has joined with others to try to help families struggling with the process.

I’ve talked with parents in recent days who expressed multiple frustrations. I’ve heard of information that never arrived, unreturned phone calls and unanswered questions. Some have lamented what they see as limited opportunities to tour schools and meet with staff. Throw in the disruptions of spring break, Polk’s two-week intercession break and a move by administrators into new offices that made them temporarily unavailable by phone and email, and you’ve got a perfect recipe for frustration. “The whole thing is just such a mess,” said Jen Hill, a Polk parent who was active and vocal in the failed effort to save the school.

I talked with just a small sampling of Polk parents. So I can’t say definitively how many are having problems. But I am struck by the fact that among those I’ve talked with, the problems they describe are consistent. Basically, this is a very big decision for these families, and they don’t believe the district has done all it can to help them make the best choice for their kids.

Talking with these folks, I don’t hear anger. It’s more like exhaustion.

“I’ve always been a big supporter of public education, but I’m starting to very much lose faith in the Cedar Rapids schools,” said Sharon Cozzolino, who still hasn’t received an answer on her request to enroll her son, Orion, in Hiawatha, where the principal and counselor know him and his special needs.

“That surprises me, that they are saying they aren’t getting the information that they’re looking for,” said Mary Ellen Maske, the district’s executive administrator for PK-8. “I guess I’m at a loss to tell you.”

Maske contends district staff has spent considerable time helping scores of parents affected by the Polk closure and other changes. And she said parents who feel they need more time beyond Wednesday will get it.

I hoped that this transition process would be redemptive for these families. But that’s not what I’m hearing, and that’s a disappointing. Perhaps families hungry for more help will find some at today’s picnic.

April 2 has been proclaimed as such by the Iowa Department of Public Health and Gov. Terry Branstad’s Healthiest State Initiative. And now, please stand by for an official explanation from the Ministry of Chuckles.

“In many ways, laughter really is the best medicine,” said IDPH Director, Dr. Mariannette Miller-Meeks, in a news release. “Science shows us that laughter is an excellent tool in building overall health. Laugh Out Loud (LOL) Day is a way to spotlight the importance of emotional fitness in health.”

A capital idea. Couldn’t agree more. I certainly enjoy a good laugh. This column has made people laugh many times over the years. It was intentional a couple of times.

But this comic communique from the highest reaches of our bureaucracy raises a few questions. First, is this some sort of individual mandate? Will there be a tax penalty for failing to guffaw? Will laugh cameras be used to catch the unlawfully grim? I’ve heard rumors of police with tickle Tasers. Can’t confirm.

And LOL on a Monday? Please. Mondays are better suited to point out the health benefits of a good cry.

Also, is this really coming from the Department of Public Health — an agency that spends the rest of the year scaring the heck out of us with warnings of dreaded diseases and perilous pathogens? The same outfit that plans for death-dealing pandemics is now telling us to slap on a rubber nose and take a pie in the face? Yes, so long as the nose has been sanitized in an antibacterial solution and the pie is properly heated to 165 degrees.

And you’ve had a flu shot. Thousands die every year, ya know. Zing!

Still good advice is good advice, no matter the source. And boy could we use a good laugh, especially around these parts. Maybe there’s been hearty local laughter I’ve missed. Tough to hear it over all the ax-grinding.

It’s not just us, of course. Scowling, sneering and brow-furrowing have become national pastimes. I’ve seen some scowls in recent weeks on cable news that I’m absolutely certain are performance-enhanced. I call for expanded testing. Polls show that we’re in no mood to be polled.

So perhaps our seltzer-shooting, floppy-shoed bureauclowns are on to something. Maybe we could take Monday as a day to not only laugh out loud but to let stuff go, put our various outrages and discontents on hold. Unclench our fists and take a deep breath. Accentuate the positive, as the old song says.

Maybe, by Tuesday, we’ll have forgotten what we were so mad about. Oh, that’s a good one. LOL.

The safety of this food is unmatched. In more than 20 years, there has not been one sickness or death associated with E. Coli or other bacteria. If lean, finely textured beef is pulled from schools in Iowa, the risks will be greater in using products deemed less safe.

Perhaps even more important is the battle we are waging against childhood obesity. First Lady Michelle Obama recently joined me at a rally where 10,000 students learned the value of exercise, eating well and taking good care of their bodies. By removing this lean product, schools will be forced to serve a fattier, unhealthier product. My goal is to make Iowa the healthiest state in the nation over the next 5 years. We will not get there if we take a step backwards by removing lean, finely textured beef.

At the Iowa Republican, Craig Robinson wonders when an effort to inform the public that a product is safe becomes a marketing pitch for that product:

 I understand the need for Branstad and other Midwest leaders to stand up and support agricultural products that are produced in their states, but is it necessary to step in and personally vouch for and stand behind one particular product? Last time I checked, most Republicans believed in something called the free market. If people don’t want their kids eating products that contain finely textured beef, that’s their prerogative.

 Maybe it’s just me, but it seems like the pro-pink slime crowd is going beyond just saying the product is safe. Governor Branstad is encouraging schools to continue to use the product. His actions might have also convinced the folks at Hy-Vee to reconsider pulling the product. I understand why Branstad and others feel like this is a smear campaign, but at the end of the day, it’s the consumer who dictates to the market not the other way around.

I also get that Iowa jobs are at stake and that Branstad is pushing to make sure they aren’t lost. That’s what governors are expected to do.

But now that a strong counter argument has been made by the government and the industry that finely textured beef is safe, I think it’s time to let consumers make the final call on what they want to eat, or what they want their kids to eat. BeefWhip doesn’t bother me, but that’s a personal choice. I am amused how pink slime has gone from dietary scourge to health food in just a few days’ time.

And if I were a school superintendent, I might write back and explain to the governor that hamburger is among the least of my pressing problems.

Politico says it’s so:

It’s been one of the swiftest shifts in ideology and strategy for Republicans, as they’ve come nearly full circle on same-sex politics. What was once a front-and-center issue for rank-and-file Republicans — the subject of many hotly worded House and Senate floor speeches — is virtually a dead issue, as Republicans in Congress don’t care to have gay marriage litigated in the Capitol.

Even more than that, Republican leadership has evolved, too. It has quietly worked behind the scenes to kill amendments that reaffirm opposition to same-sex unions, several sources told POLITICO.

Huh. Maybe the National Organization for Marriage should have spent some of its bucks, including  the $120,000 it budgeted to recruit children to denounce their gay parents on camera, on some good old fashioned GOP outreach. NOM’s “confidential” strategies that became public in recent days seem more like the desperate moves of a movement losing steam than of a political powerhouse on the rise.   

Still, I’m skeptical. One person’s swift shift is another’s momentary strategic retreat. But even in battleground Iowa, I think the hellfires are slowly dying. This year’s big Family Leader marriage rally seemed a little tame, based on the coverage I saw. Of course, our leading culture war hucksters won’t give up so long as there’s a paycheck and a microphone, but I’m sensing the thrill is gone.

I guess we’ll see what happens in this fall’s campaigns, including the ban vote in Minnesota. I still expect Iowa candidates to say how they’d vote on the amendment resolution here without waffling. But I don’t expect the issue to be the main event in many races.   

Thoughts?

Legislators and Legislatures come and go, but the debate over when Iowa schools should end summer vacation and start the school year never, ever ends. Ever.

One more time, with feeling.

Iowa has a law that prohibits districts from starting classes before Sept. 1. But the Department of Education grants a waiver to every district that seeks one, which is pretty much every district. And that’s why my kids will be going back to school on Aug. 15.

Folks who promote tourism and own tourism-related businesses hate that summer ends earlier and earlier every year, taking dollars and young workers with it. There ought to be a law, they say, while pointing out there actually is one that should be enforced.

And each year, they lose the battle to folks who argue that local schools should have the freedom to set their own calendars. And you can then depend on the whole thing to return next year, like clockwork, or the solstice.

Now there’s a proposal that would still allow waivers, but for start dates no earlier than the fourth Monday in August. And seeking that waiver would cost a district $100.

DOA, right? Well, House Speaker Kraig Pauslen, R-Hiawatha, says not so fast, according to Kathie Obradovich’s account of his appearance on “Iowa Press” today:

He said in the past, he didn’t understand why legislators would intervene in such decisions. “At this point, I sort of do — especially as we look for more opportunities for school districts to work together,” he said. “I will tell you it has, I believe, the most support in the House that I’ve ever seen in the 10 years I’ve been there.”

He made his comments on “Iowa Press. He said after the show that he believes the bill has enough support to pass.

But before anyone starts making mid August vacay arrangements, later school start efforts have passed legislative chambers before, only to melt like a twist cone in the August sun. So we’ll see.

I basically side, grudgingly, with the local controllers on this one. The state already dictates so many things that schools must do that allowing them to pick a start date seems reasonable. I think the state should repeal the Sept. 1 law, instead of doing this odd waiver dance.

That said, starting school on August 15 seems very early. At our house it’s a real scheduling hassle because my wife’s job requires that she be at the State Fair for several days. And now, school starts during the fair. But our little students be there when the bell rings, perhaps with some funnel cake powdered sugar on their faces, but ready to learn. Mostly.

Back in my day, just after summer turned from black and white to color, school never started before my birthday, August 18, which suited me just fine. But times change. And honestly, it’s possible that school reforms favoring even more calendar flexibility and experimentation will make this whole debate moot.

But it’s a certainly a worthwhile debate. For instance, I’ve realized that a funnel cake would be awesome with a big glob of twist ice cream on top.

Perhaps, because Seng made it past a challenge to his nomination petitions “just Barely” according to Radio Iowa:

“It really sounded bad that I have a felon and people from Illinois and stuff like that, but that happens in every one,” Seng told reporters after the decision.

Iowa Secretary of State Matt Schultz is one of the three panel members who voted late this afternoon to confirm that Seng’s name is to be printed on the ballots in the second congressional district.

“In no way does our decision change the fact that, you know, Senator Seng probably should have been more organized,” Schulz told reporters after the decision was announced. “But in his case it was a close call.”

Oh yeah, happens all the time. That Seng, he’s just like me. Disorganized and full of excuses.

And it sure seemed like Shultz was more of a stickler for detail when he was forcing Linn County to draw that giant doughnut of a supervisors’ district. Huh.

The Register has more details here. I guess I can see erring on the side of letting a guy on the ballot, but what a mess.

In other news, apparently Pink Slime doesn’t need my help after all. Hy-Vee has reversed its original decision to stop selling hamburger that contains “lean finely textured beef,” also known by the less delicious label “pink slime.” U.S. Sec. of Ag Tom Vilsack and Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad both defended its beefy goodness this week. The great Pink Slime Scare of 2012 may be over.

The grocery chain will now offer ground beef with and without LFTB. No word on whether beef with extra pink slime, or BeefWhip as I like to call it, will be available. Fingers crossed.

This is good. Now we get to watch the free market work. Informed consumers, making choices. Why, it’s as American as giant burgers, topped with onion rings, cheese, chili, guac, more cheese and a slice of ham. For breakfast.

And finally, the headline of the day, from AP via the DMR

“Woman uses high-heel shoe to clobber Iowa doorman”

Note the spelling. Not me. But certainly plausible.

It’s high time to dive back into the fascinating world of stormwater runoff.

Now that levees and flood walls have gone out of fashion, at least for the time being, I’ve been thinking about the sort of flood mitigation that really makes my heart skip a beat. And that’s watershed management.

It has been a while since I checked in with the Cedar Rapids Stormwater Commission, which has been spending much of the last year revising rules governing runoff from development and redevelopment projects. The goal is to slow and better control runoff, with an eye on flooding and water quality.

The panel is recommending some significant, positive changes. For example, proposed rules would require developers to use strategies that actually absorb runoff on site. Current rules require that a developed site release runoff from a one-inch rain over a 24-hour period. The new rule would require that one-third of that inch be absorbed into the ground on site, so only two-thirds of an inch would be released.

Sure, it’s not zero-runoff, which is the tantalizing pie in the rainy sky. But for the first time, developers would be required to actually curtail the flow, not just control it. That’s a step in the right direction. Other proposed changes would require that runoff from an extreme rain event be released more slowly. And developers who go above and beyond city rules could receive a credit to, for instance, build smaller detention basins.

“It’s small, baby steps to improve water quality. But I think it will make a difference,” said Stacie Johnson, commission chair.

Good stuff. But the real fight might be over a separate issue: fees.

The city currently charges a flat stormwater fee. But there is talk of basing a new commercial fee structure on a property’s impermeable surface area, such as asphalt, concrete, etc. Residential fees won’t change.

On the upside, the city could provide breaks to developers who do more to reduce runoff, especially retrofitting existing properties. The downside, of course, is that some folks would pay more.

The revised ordinance and fees issue will soon be in the hands of the City Council’s Infrastructure Committee. It’s chaired by Council member Chuck Swore and includes Council members Scott Olson and Ann Poe. The committee will make recommendations to the full council.

This process will show us if the council is serious about reducing the urban deluge that contributes to flooding, here and downstream. If any city should understand the importance of this issue, it’s this one.

Pink slime, in case you’ve been out of action having a beef-induced bypass or something, is a ground beef additive made from parts and such, spun in a centrifuge, just like gramma used to make. My colleague, Jennifer Hemmingsen explains:

First, fatty trimmings once deemed suitable only for pet food or cooking oil are heated up and centrifuged to separate the meat from fat. The lean bits are compressed, then treated with ammonium hydroxide gas to kill possible bacterial contaminates such as E. coli. The resulting pink goo is mixed back into ground meat.

Because it’s not technically an additive, manufacturers are not required to let consumers know if a product contains finely textured beef.

The trade name is “lean finely textured beef.” But “pink slime” is the far catchier moniker coined by Gerald Zirnstein, a former USDA scientist who blew the whistle on his agency’s do slime, don’t tell policy. According to ABC News, he and another scientist, Carl Custer, urged the agency to not use said slime:

The “pink slime” does not have to appear on the label because, over objections of its own scientists, USDA officials with links to the beef industry labeled it meat.

“The under secretary said, ‘it’s pink, therefore it’s meat,’” Custer told ABC News.

ABC News has learned the woman who made the decision to OK the mix is a former undersecretary of agriculture, Joann Smith. It was a call that led to hundred of millions of dollars for Beef Products Inc., the makers of pink slime.

When Smith stepped down from the USDA in 1993, BPI’s principal major supplier appointed her to its board of directors, where she made at least $1.2 million over 17 years.

Yes, sadly, pink slime is a big business, not just a misunderstood additive. And the recent hubub has been very bad for business. Thankfully, Gov. Terry Branstad and other leaders of states that make up the nation’s Pink Slime Belt have sprung into action:

The leaders of five states plan a visit to the only place where a beef product known as “pink slime” is still made, an effort aimed to support its embattled manufacturer, a company spokesman said Tuesday …

Branstad spearheaded the plant tour. He told the Sioux City Journal that by touring the facilities, the governors and lieutenant governors are showing they have every confidence in the quality of the beef.

“They’re been a victim of a smear campaign, and I think we need to do all we can to try to counter this,” he said.

But what can be done?

I’ve been eating pink slime for years, thousands of pounds of it, as far as I know. And I feel great. Sleepy, a tad bloated, occasional meat sweats, but super, really. So if you need a spokesman to sort of waddle into this mess and take the beefy bull by the horns, I’m clearly available. After a nap. Pay? Well, I do take my pink slime with melted cheese and bacon. Hint. Hint.

But I think really what we have here is a simple branding issue. “Pink slime” is trending negatively among many key demographic groups, including humans with money.

Sure, people want to be fully informed, but in a soothing, pleasant way, and in very small print, that makes them feel empowered and hungry again for “lean finely textured beef,” which is, incidentally, way too wordy. Surely we here in Iowa’s Creative Corridor can help rethink the pink and change some stubborn stereotypes about undisclosed slime in our food.  

A few ideas I fried up:

Soylent Pink

BeefWhip

Fluffy Beef, or Fleef

I Can’t Believe It’s Not Hamburger

Slime’ de Rose’

iSlime

Traditional Recipe

Bavy

New Beef

Meat Magic

Prolly Beef

Fancy Bits

Liquid Steak

Maltomeat

The Hunger Games

Still, consumers may continue to turn their snobby noses up at pink slime. But as NPR’s food blog, The Salt, notes, wherever they turn, they may find more processed bits:

From an industry point of view, however, lean finely textured beef isn’t a whole lot different from other products that end up in processed meat products, like ham or turkey.

Take, for example, deli-style ham slices — the kind of meat that a lot of Americans probably eat more often than ground beef. Edward Mills, associate professor of dairy and animal science at Penn State and a meat industry consultant, tells The Salt that processed ham also includes trimmings that are initially cut off the large pieces of muscle, and then chopped or emulsified. That semiliquid meat is then added back in “to help bind the meat pieces together so that the whole ham is nice and smooth.”

Sounds sort of like how I prepare columns. Don’t watch that, whatever you do.

Maybe you have thoughts, branding ideas or maybe even some recipes. Share.