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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.
(Commentary) Two A-List Democratic bloggers look at the all-inclusiveness of Sunday night’s debate and ask the same question.
It’s not so much the time factor — according to the Dodd campaign’s much distributed Talk Clock, Dennis Kucinich got nine minutes and Mike Gravel talked for five. Removing them would thus free up only two and a half minutes each in a two hour debate for the other six candidates, assuming the time was distributed evenly (which it wasn’t).Rather, it’s a matter of party message. Digby says Kucinich puts the debate in a harmful frame:
I like Dennis Kucinich and I am glad he’s in these debates to voice certain positions that wouldn’t get heard otherwise. But I really hate it that he said Iraq is the Democrats’ war. I would hope that candidates could play hardball with one another without undermining the single most important rationale for a Democratic president, which is that the Republicans are responsible for the mess in Iraq.
I don’t think it matters all that much right now — as GOP strategist Mike Murphy said on CNN, this isn’t really about the voters yet, it’s about the media and money. But still, it takes almost nothing to gain currency in the mainstream media and that particular notion is a very dangerous one.
Kos is more blunt:
So is there really a point to having Gravel, in between advocating English as an “official” language and promoting his right-wing flat tax, sit on the debates doing nothing but attack other Democrats?
He polls on the question; the no Gravel position narrowly leads.
Republicans are likely to ask similar questions about Ron Paul again after tonight’s GOP debate — which I’m planning to liveblog.
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