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.
Brenna Findley, the Republican hoping to unseat seven-term incumbent Democratic Attorney General Tom Miller, said Tuesday that if elected she will make stopping the enforcement of federal health care reform legislation a priority.
Attorneys General from 18 states have filed lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of health reform, specifically, a provision that requires individuals purchase insurance or face a penalty. Miller called the cases “weak” and said he would not join the effort.
Republican Brenna Findley
“The federal government is claiming that it has the authority to force Iowans to buy health insurance under its power to regulate interstate commerce,” Findley said. “However if a person decides not to buy health insurance they are, by definition not engaging in commerce and therefore are not subject to the federal mandate. As Iowa’s Attorney General I would take a stand for Iowans against this abuse of power by joining other attorneys general from other states to challenge this unconstitutional law in court.”
Findley called an individual’s health “a private matter and the federal government shouldn’t be able to force you to buy their mandated coverage.” It’s an argument her former boss, U.S. Rep. Steve King, made just days earlier, borrowing the logic from advocates of legal abortion.
The rhetoric is a sharp departure from Findley’s earlier statements. In a February interview with The Iowa Independent, she simply stated her campaign was about the state going in a “new direction,” although she would not offer details on what that might look like or whether she disagrees with certain prosecutions Miller has pursued or administrative decisions he’s made.
In an interview with Iowa Public Television’s “Iowa Press,” Miller made the case that the legal argument’s being used to challenge health reform’s constitutionality have been tried before and have failed, citing challenges to social security and Civil Rights. He then turned to the idea that Congress has the right to regulate interstate commerce.
“And here when people don’t have insurance, some of them get sick, very sick,” he said. “Some of them have accidents and end up in the emergency room, and the rest of us end up paying for that. Nationwide they estimate that it’s in the billions, the cost for those that aren’t insured. That has an effect on interstate commerce. I think it’s hard to deny that it has an effect. So the case is weak.”
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