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.
U.S. Rep. Steve King, R-Kiron, told a national radio audience Monday that a Republican congressman from Texas was right to call the Obama administration’s effort to force BP to create a $20 billion escrow account to pay claims to victims of the Gulf Coast oil spill a “shakedown.”
The congressman, U.S. Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, has been attacked from both sides of the political aisle for using his prepared statement during a congressional hearing into the oil spill to apologize to BP CEO Tony Hayward.
“I apologize,” Barton said. “I do not want to live in a country where anytime a citizen or a corporation does something that is legitimately wrong is subject to some sort of political pressure, that is again, in my words, amounts to a shakedown. So I apologize.”
Republicans immediately began to distance themselves from Barton’s comments, and two GOP members of Congress — U.S. Reps. Jeff Miller of Florida and Jo Bonner of Alabama — called for Barton’s ouster as the ranking Republican on the Energy and Commerce Committee.
King does not share that sentiment.
“I think Joe Barton was spot-on when he called it a ‘shakedown.’ That’s part of this administration’s process,” King said Monday on the Laura Ingraham radio show.
King said the Obama administration simply wants to “swallow up as many Fortune 500 companies as they can.”
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