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.
Bob Vander Plaats and his newly formed organization, The Family Leader, is hoping to raise $8,000 before the end of the year in order to remove the four remaining Iowa Supreme Court justices over their 2009 ruling that legalized same-sex marriage.
In an e-mail to supporters, Vander Plaats points to the results of November’s judicial retention election, which saw voters oust three justices from the bench, as justification for the other four justices to resign. The e-mail never goes into detail about what, exactly, the money would be used for or how it would help remove the judges, but it does set a Jan. 1 deadline to raise $8,000.
“All seven justices are guilty of overstepping the line by their votes in the Varnum decision, therefore we are asking for the remaining four justices to resign in an orderly fashion,” he said. “As long as the Iowa Supreme Court is comprised of justices that abuse their authority, the credibility of our court will be compromised.”
Vander Plaats led the campaign to oust the three judges, with nearly $1 million in funding from out-of-state anti-gay organizations like the American Family Association, the Family Research Council and the National Organization for Marriage. After the election, he was named CEO and president of The Family Leader — an umbrella organization consisting of the Iowa Family Policy Center, the Iowa Family PAC and Marriage Matters.
He has consistently called for the judges left on the bench to resign, an opinion that caused the conservative editorial board of The Sioux City Journal to conclude Vander Plaats has officially “jumped the shark.”
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