Wednesday was a difficult day for The American Independent News Network, which is the larger entity that operates The Iowa Independent. Our chief executive and founder announced two of our sister sites would close and their content would be moved to The American Independent.
A recently introduced bill could have far-reaching impact on the U.S. sugar industry, including American Crystal Sugar, a farmer-owned cooperative that locked out 1,300 Midwest workers on Aug. 1.
The chairman for Herman Cain’s Iowa effort says the campaign “relied more on the word of farmers than Washington regulators” in deciding to run an ad containing claims the Environmental Protection Agency says are false.
The Iowa Senate will remain under the control of a slim 26-25 Democratic majority when it reconvenes in January 2012.
Despite a recent flap over a post on the social networking site Twitter criticizing the president for a comment on health care, Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley said he will keep on using the site to communicate with his constituents.
“I’ve tried to use every latest technology to keep in touch with constituents. Representative government is a two-way street,” he said. “I’m one half of that, my constituent’s the other.”
When President Barack Obama told Congress that “it’s time to deliver” on health care reform while traveling oversees, Grassley made headlines by telling the president “you got nerve while u sightseeing in Paris to tell us ‘time to deliver’ on health care. We still on skedul/even workinWKEND.”
The team at Gawker, a Web site of dedicated to gossip and news, were particularly hard on Grassley, publishing an article titled “Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley Uses Twitter to Exhibit Insanity, Illiteracy.”
Grassley said he met with the president Wednesday and joked about the issue.
“I think he joked something about, Chuck, I thought it was important that I be in Normandy or something like that as a recall,” he said. “And I agree with him that he should have been there.”
He never intended to criticize the president for spending time with his family, only for criticizing Congress when he knew members were working hard on health care legislation.
“I didn’t resent having the president have a night out with his family or sightseeing in Paris,” Grassley said. “So if that was what people thought that was all I was talking about, no. What I was trying to do is express frustration with the president who knows we’re working hard and even expressed at this meeting [Wednesday] how hard we were working — that he would say you’ve got to get it done. You know, our staffs were working those very Saturdays that he said that.”
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