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.
If U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had defended Trent Lott back in 2002 then he wouldn’t need to step down from his leadership position today because he was speaking the truth, U.S. Rep. Steve King, R-Kiron, said Monday on his Twitter account.
“If Harry Reid had defended Lott, he should not resign for his remarks about Obama,” King said. “Every word was true. A pass for truth?”
Rep. Steve King, R-Kiron
Reid is facing calls from Republicans to step down for his comments regarding then-candidate Barack Obama revealed in a book chronicling the 2008 campaign. According to the book, Reid said the country “was ready to embrace a black presidential candidate, especially one such as Obama — a ‘light-skinned’ African American ‘with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one.’”
Back in 2002, then-leader of Senate Republicans Trent Lott was forced to resign his position after telling a crowd that a Strom Thurmond presidency would have prevented “all these problems over all these years.” Thurmond had based his presidential campaign largely on an explicit racial segregation platform.
The Washington Independent’s Dave Weigel points out that comparison between Reid and Lott, and the call for Reid’s ouster, have been echoed by numerous Republicans throughout the weekend. But King appears to be the only Republican publicly saying that Reid’s comments are true.
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