But Civic Skinny, the anonymous gossip columnist for Des Moines’ Cityview, says the contest is as much about revenge and staking a claim on 2012 as it is about who gets to challenge incumbent Democratic Gov. Chet Culver.

[According to a source] “A part of this is settling scores, another part is Iowa caucus related and, yes, [part is] the contest on the ballot,” this person said. He, or maybe she (“Keep my name out of the mix,” she, or maybe he, said) continued: “There was bad blood between Doug Gross and Bob Vander Plaats during the ’02 GOP gubernatorial race [which Gross lost to Tom Vilsack], especially at the end. The two ripped one another, nearly allowing Rep. Steve Sukup, as the good guy, to win a razor-thin, three-way primary race. As it was, Gross barely exceeded the minimum threshold of 35 percent to avoid the battle going to a state convention. Since then, Gross sided with [loser Jim] Nussle in his poorly run ’06 [gubernatorial] effort that saw Vander Plaats join the ticket after dropping his primary candidacy.”

There’s more: “Differences continued during ’07 and early ’08 with Gross leading the Mitt Romney effort in Iowa and Vander Plaats chairing the Mike Huckabee campaign, which won. Both former Governors are quietly preparing encore efforts. Huckabee will deal with high expectations; unclear yet what commitment Romney would make to Iowa a second time around. Huckabee has endorsed Vander Plaats in the ’10 GOP primary, as you know. With a ’10 victory, a newly re-inaugurated Terry Branstad would be in the thick of the action with governors and former governors dominating the field — possibly including Sarah Palin, Tim Pawlenty, Bobby Jindal, Haley Barbour, even George Pataki, who made early stops in Iowa in ’05-06, only to defer to Rudy Giuliani when he made his candidacy clear. A governor Branstad would likely remain neutral, but not necessarily his political team with a data base of updated names.”

In other words, Gross is still pissed, and one reasons he’s backing Branstad is so he can settle a few scores.

Gross, who served as Branstad’s chief of staff when he was governor, has become a controversial figure for Iowa social conservatives thanks to a series of Op-Ed columns he penned earlier this year calling on his party to be more inclusive and focus less on social issues that are turning off a younger generation of voters.

Former Gov. Terry Branstad

However, from the reaction of two people who attended the meeting, the former four-term governor did little to help his cause.

Mike Demastus, a pastor at Fort Des Moines Church, said the meeting took place Wednesday morning and was attended by several Christian pastors, conservative blogger Shane Vander Hart, Chuck Hurley of the Iowa Family Policy Center, Kim Lehman of Iowa Right to Life, Steve Scheffler of the Iowa Christian Alliance, and former Des Moines School Board member Jonathan Narcisse.

Demastus wrote on his blog that Branstad made it clear he would not focus his campaign on social issues. Instead, he will spotlight what he believes is incumbent Gov. Chet Culver’s poor job of managing the economy.

What Branstad hopes to accomplish in these back-room meetings with pastors and other socially conservative Iowans is to appease us in some way by saying something like this: “We’re on the same team. I think the same way you do about these issues. Even if you don’t hear me talk about them, they are important to me privately.”

But that is NOT leadership. Definitely not the leadership we need.

Demastus said he asked Branstad if because of their ruling legalizing same-sex marriage would he openly campaign against retaining the Supreme Court Justices who are on the ballot in 2010.

He said that privately he feels that way but he cannot publicly do something like that. WEAK!

Following the meeting, Vander Hart blogged that Branstad made a point to remind the group of the good things he did in office, including cutting income taxes, opposing collective bargaining, and passing the Defense of Marriage Act, among others. However, when asked about his position on same-sex marriage, Vander Hart said Branstad made it clear that will not be an issue in the 2010 campaign.

He said it is “not going to be a central issue” and that we “have to use finesse, and not overplay our hand.”  He also said that in order to win the election we ought “not wear our conservatism on our sleeve.”  I can understand wanting to make the economy a central theme, but an unwillingness to address restoring traditional marriage at all in his campaign is a mistake.

Branstad also refused to discuss what role Des Moines attorney Doug Gross would play in the campaign, Vander Hart said. Gross has drawn the ire of social conservatives for a series of Op-Eds arguing that for the Republican Party to regain control of state government it must focus on fiscal matters and avoid divisive social issues.

In all the meeting, in my opinion, didn’t go well for him.  Social conservatives are looking for tangible ideas on items of concern for us.  He was unwilling to provide them.  We are looking for principled leadership, and instead we saw political maneuvering.

Demastus agreed with that sentiment.

All in all, if Branstad wins reelection, he will simply be a Republican version of Culver. He is a politician through and through.

The people in this state need to take a stand and not keep getting force-fed candidates who don’t have a backbone. We need leadership. We need someone who will be a true champion of conservative values.

We need a strong stand on moral issues (not back-room meetings)! We need someone to fight those who have brought same-sex marriage to this state. Someone who will not be afraid to speak out against rogue justices who have ignored our state’s constitution!

Basically what we need in gubernatorial leadership in Iowa is something that Terry Branstad is not able to deliver.

James Lynch of the Gazette caught up with Bob Krause and Tom Fiegen, who have both been official candidates for the Democratic senate nomination for months.

Fiegen said the Democratic base is “not that interested” in Conlin, going as far as to compare her to Doug Gross, the unsuccessful Republican nominee for governor in 2002, who is a member of former Gov. Terry Branstad’s inner circle. Krause accused Democratic insiders in Des Moines of playing ‘political games’ with the Democratic senate primary.

“The grass roots are not excited about her,” Clarence attorney Tom Fiegen said while driving home from a Thursday night meeting with Winneshiek County Democrats. He’s been talking to Democrats about the rumor of either Conlin or former Iowa First Lady Christie Vilsack joining the race for the 2010 nomination.

“Frankly, they’re not that interested,” Fiegen said about those Democrats with whom he has spoken.

[...]

Conlin’s comments come after Iowa Democratic Party Chairman Michael Kiernan promised a mystery candidate would come forward to challenge Grassley. Krause dismissed that as political theater.

“It’s easy to play political games in Des Moines that might not play as well around the state,” he said.

[...]

“People look at her and say, ‘been there, done that,’” [Fiegen] said. “One analogy I heard is that she’s our party’s Doug Gross — rich, intelligent, well-connected, but can’t talk to rural Iowans. People say she’s already proved that.”

English, who serves as spokesman for the influential social conservative group, said the last thing the party needs is Republican wolves in  “conservative sheep’s clothing.” The focus of the blog eventually turned to a recent Op-Ed in The Des Moines Register written by Doug Gross, the former chief of staff to Gov. Terry Branstad who has argued for more than a year that Iowa’s GOP needs to be more welcoming and less divisive in order to regain power in Des Moines.

The GOP lost Iowa by “driving away voters who share the Republican philosophy of limited government, but grew tired of a preachy, old party that reminded them of their grouchy, old uncle,” Gross said.

English criticized this line of thought, saying it is people like Gross who are damaging the party.

“Never once was there any reference to the political damage done to his party by secular ideologues who insist that people of faith abandon their core principles in order to participate in the party,” English said. “He completely ignored the large chunk of former Republicans who held their nose and voted for [Republican In Name Only] candidates like John McCain, and then left the party in disgust having realized that they compromised their principles and got absolutely nothing in return but a guilty conscience.”

If the “grouchy, old uncle” Gross refers to is English and the social conservative movement, then Gross represents the “frat boy who has never been as popular or successful as his drinking buddies thought he was back in college. He becomes increasingly irrelevant as time goes on, he continues to refuse to grow up, and people quit listening to how great things were ‘back in college,’” English said.

Gross has become a lightening rod on the political right for his calls for the party to end the politics of “cultural and ideological wars.” Leaders in the social conservative movement and right-wing bloggers have turned the man who was his party’s flag-bearer in the 2002 gubernatorial campaign into public enemy No. 1. So far in 2009, Gross and his organization, the Iowa First Foundation, have commissioned two polls that he says offers clear evidence that voters are more interested in candidates who focus on economic issues rather than social issues like same-sex marriage and abortion. Social conservatives argue that line of thinking only alienates the party’s most loyal voters.

Ultimately, the line of attack against Gross could eventually be turned on his former boss. Branstad has said he will decide whether to enter the 2010 gubernatorial campaign by next month, and social conservative leaders have already predicted his re-entry into politics could turn the GOP primary into a “blood bath.”

Noting that it will take “deft footwork” to move from a successful primary campaign to a successful general election campaign, the anonymous gossip peddler for the capital city alt-weekly ticked through reasons for the Rants prediction.

Those reasons include, among others, Rants being the “least offensive” candidate to the GOP’s moderate wing; being well versed on the issues; his ability to raise money; and the fact that Culver is vulnerable. The biggest of all, though, could be what Skinny considers a lack of competition for the nomination.

On the right, Bob VanderPlaats is a proven loser. No one has heard of Jerry Behn. Rod Roberts can’t get traction. Yes, there’s Congressman Steve King — a darling of the right but a guy who seems to be too coy by half as he drops hints about whether he’ll run. And Rants is more knowledgeable on Iowa issues. The efforts of Doug Gross and his band of check-writers to find a moderate candidate aren’t getting anywhere. The group has met at least four times to go over a list of a score or so of possible candidates, but no consensus has emerged. The top names have said “no.” As of last week, those folks were talking about Farm Bureau president Craig Lang (“he’s rounded second and heading toward third” in his decision to run, says one moderate), Barnstormers owner and former legislator Jeff Lamberti, longtime party operative and small-town lawyer Mike Mahaffey, and name-from-the-past Rand Fisher. But Lang has to run again for his Farm Bureau job and would have to give up a nice salary to go into politics. Lamberti, who lost to Congressman Leonard Boswell in 2006, has flatly said no. Mahaffey has indicated he’s rather take on Boswell — who barely beat him in 1996 — than Culver. And Fisher, who now is president of a trade association of electric cooperatives and municipal utilities, is unknown to most Iowans under 50.

As always, though, Skinny hedged his/her bet.

All that being said, remember: You get what you pay for. And Cityview is free.

Former Gov. Terry Branstad and Vermeer Corp. CEO Mary Andringa both scored highly in a recent poll commissioned by the Iowa First Foundation, a group organized by former GOP gubernatorial nominee Doug Gross. Respondents were given descriptions of different candidates and asked to rank how appealing each sounded, and Branstad and Vermeer’s descriptions ranked the highest. That led many Republicans to believe both were considering a run.

However, Branstad told the Register he didn’t want to “give anyone the impression that I’m thinking about it, because that would be not really correct,” and Vermeer said she is “not pursuing the Republican nomination for Iowa’s next governor.”

The paper also spoke with Jeff Lamberti, a former state senator who currently co-owns the arena football team the Iowa Barnstormers, along with current Republican Party of Iowa Chairman Matt Strawn. Lamberti said he is in the early stages of making a decision on whether to run. His most recent campaign was an unsuccsessful bid in 2006 to defeat Third District U.S. Rep. Leonard Boswell.

It’s a question that doesn’t have an easy answer. Social and evangelical conservatives have gained more and more power within the state party for years, slowly building their influence both in Iowa politics and nationally due to the first-in-the-nation presidential caucuses.

The Republican Party of Iowa used to be defined by its moderates and pragmatists, said former Lt. Gov. Joy Corning. Republican Govs. Robert Ray and Terry Branstad helped the party hold on to Terrace Hill for nearly 30 years, she said, but now many who consider themselves centrist Republicans feel abandoned.

“I hear it all the time,” said Corning, who runs the Iowa chapter of the centrist Republican Leadership Council. “I have had so many people say to me personally, ‘I did not leave the party, the party left me.’ What has happened is some moderates have opted out instead of staying and trying to be part of the party structure and make a difference. This started years ago.”

During his four terms as governor, few would have considered Branstad a moderate. But in today’s party, the former governor would certainly fall into that category, showing how far to the right the GOP has drifted, Corning said.

Social and evangelical conservatives have a powerful voice in the Republican Party of Iowa because they participate, said Steve Roberts, a former chair of the Republican Party of Iowa who for many years represented the Iowa GOP on the Republican National Committee.

“The Republican Party, like the Democratic Party, is dictated by who shows up and participates,” Roberts said. “Frankly, the more conservative Republicans, the social evangelical conservatives, not only show up but they are organized. The more moderate folks are frustrated and don’t want to spend the time that it takes to make a difference.”

Roberts has seen the evolution of his party first hand. At last year’s state party convention, Roberts, a relatively moderate Republican, was replaced as a male representative to the Republican National Committee by Steve Scheffler of the Iowa Christian Alliance. The female representative position was won by Kim Lehman, director of Iowa Right to Life. Many saw these moves as the evangelical base asserting its authority within the party.

“There is no question the party has gotten more conservative,” Roberts said. “But that’s because they’ve been the ones showing up and working.”

The problem many within the party point out is that, as the party has grown more conservative, it has seen its numbers dwindle in the statehouse. In the last three election cycles, Republicans have watched as Democrats took control of both chambers of the legislature and the governorship.

A cause for hope

Iowa Republicans have a lot going in their favor as the 2010 elections get closer, Roberts said.

“I think we are in a really good position following the legislative session,” he said. “Issues like spending, the Democratic plan to end federal deductibility on state tax returns, various pieces of labor legislation and gay marriage have put us in a good position in terms of having hope of election success in 2010.”

Republicans successfully fought off several pieces of the Democratic agenda during the legislative session, despite being in the minority, and the Iowa Supreme Court’s ruling on same-sex marriage has energized the social conservatives.

“But we need a strong gubernatorial candidate to articulate our beliefs,” Roberts said. “There have been a lot of names come up, but no one has stepped forward or chosen to pursue it.”

But while the gay marriage issue is an opportunity, it also poses a potential pit fall for the party, Roberts said, if it ends up being the main issue associated with GOP candidates. He cited the 1998 campaign for governor between Republican Jim Ross Lightfoot and Democrat Tom Vilsack. Lightfoot focused his attacks in the closing months on Vilsack’s voting record in the legislature on the issue of restricting or banning nude dancing.

“It backfired on him,” Roberts said. “People had other issues that were more important to them. I think gay marriage is something that is an important issue for a lot of people, but with the economy the way it is, focusing solely on social issues could be a mistake.”

Not holding the governor’s office for more than a decade has contributed to making the GOP more conservative, said Dennis Goldford, a professor of politics at Drake University.

“The more Republicans are a party defined by state legislative districts, which are by nature more homogeneous than the statewide population, so you can ignore people who think differently, the more conservative the party will be,” he said. “With no executive, it’s going to get more conservative.”

Searching for the moderate’s candidate

Civic Skinny, the anonymous gossip columnist for Des Moines alternative newsweekly Cityview, reported rumblings of a group of moderates, headed by Branstad, Ray, Roberts and former GOP gubernatorial candidate Doug Gross, who were trying “to settle on a moderate candidate to run against Bob Vander Plaats and Steve King and Christopher Rants and all those other very conservative Western Iowans who want to be governor.”

Roberts denied being part of a secret plan to choose a gubernatorial candidate.

“That conversation is happening, but is not limited to me, Gov. Branstad, Gov. Ray and Doug Gross,” he said. “There are a lot of people discussing it. Ray, Branstad, Gross and I have no official position in the party, so none of us are out there picking candidates. I find that many places I go the question does come up ‘Who are we going to get for a candidate?’”

However, Gross announced Thursday that he will speak to the press about a recent poll he helped commission that shows “that the Iowa Republican electoral base is large enough and cohesive enough to form the foundation for a winning electoral collation in Iowa in the 2010 election.” He will also lay out a plan for his party to emerge from the political wilderness.

Since last November’s elections, which saw Democrats expand their majorities in both legislative chambers, Gross has been calling on his party to be more inclusive and focus less on social issues that are turning off a younger generation of voters.

“Our party needs to enunciate a message that’s attractive to them,” Gross said during a taping of Iowa Public Television’s “Iowa Press” just after the election. “But when our party has litmus tests associated with abortion and homosexual rights or issues such as this we drive the young people away.”

Gross is both anti-abortion and against same-sex marriage but said he believes a person’s stance on those issues alone should not disqualify them from the party. It’s a position that has won him no friends in the social conservative community, as many in the conservative blogosphere have labeled him a a “RINO,” or “Republican in Name Only,” and conservative talk radio host Steve Deace saying he “doesn’t think about [evangelical voters] any differently than the Democrats do.”

“We all know what Mr. Gross’ poll is going to say — that the Republican Party needs to free itself of Christian influence if it wants to win elections,” Deace said Thursday on his drive-time program on Iowa’s largest radio station, later adding that many are going to believe the polling is simply a way for Gross and his cohorts to regain control of the party apparatus “that they lost a long time ago.”

Deace went on to predict that because of the same-sex marriage issue ,the 2010 GOP gubernatorial primary would be one of the ugliest in memory.

But with the right candidate at the top of the ticket, the GOP can overcome any differences and be in a good position to win in 2010, Corning said.

“We need a gubernatorial candidate who embraces the big tent and is not focused on the divisive issues but on the main issues Iowans care about,” she said. “Iowans care about education, the economy, the environment and fiscal responsibility. I think a Republican candidate who runs on those issues could be elected.”

The party can’t win without social conservatives, she said. “But it can’t win without moderates either.”

The key, Roberts said, is to find someone who can bridge the gap.

“We used to say the conservatives in the Republican Party and the radicals in the Democratic Party don’t have anywhere else to go,” he said. “You can’t lose them cause they aren’t going to go vote for the other side. But they do have a place to go. They can stay home and not work to get out the vote. We saw that in 2000 when Bush and Gore virtually tied versus 2004 when Bush got out the conservative vote and won. “

While it would appear a strong social conservative candidate would easily win in the GOP primary, which is dominated by those voters, it all depends on who exactly enters the race, Roberts said.

“That’s how Bob Ray got in 40 years ago,” he said. “He was running against two conservatives, and either one of those two individuals would have won the nomination if they both hadn’t been running. They split the vote and Governor Ray went on to win.”

The rumor started on “The Insiders,” the Sunday political talk show on Des Moines NBC affiliate WHO-TV. This week’s show featured former Republican gubernatorial candidate Doug Gross, who in the course of making predictions said Conlin  has “a huge cache of money, that she’s bored and she wants something to do and I think she will do that.”

But later the same day, Conlin, who ran unsuccessfully for governor in 1982 and has built a reputation as one of the country’s leading civil rights attorneys, told The Des Moines Register there no truth to Gross’ prediction.

“I really think this is a fundraising ploy for Grassley,” she said. “That is the only reason I can possibly think Doug would have said such a thing because it’s not based in fact.”

The Des Moines Register reported this morning that Judge Karen Romano ruled the effectiveness of public schools is a question better suited for state lawmakers.

Rozanne King of Mondamin, Dacie Houston of Des Moines and Brandy Drake of Des Moines, along with their children, sued in April. Their lawsuit said Culver and Jeffrey stood by as the quality of Iowa’s schools eroded and left high school graduates without the skills to get through college or training programs that lead to well-paying jobs.

Instead of money, the families called for strict statewide standards. They also wanted teacher training and a pay structure that rewards teachers on merit rather than seniority.

The suit was also backed by the late Marvin Pomerantz, a former head of the Iowa Board of Regents and a well-known donor to the Republcian Party who passed away in August. Doug Gross, a former GOP gubernatorial candidate, represented the families. Gross told The Register he will appeal to the Iowa Supreme Court.

Des Moines attorney Doug Gross.

Doug Gross, a Des Moines attorney and the GOP’s 2002 gubernatorial candidate, continued his tour of local media to promote his vision for the future of the Republican Party of Iowa by appearing this week on Christian conservative radio host Steve Deace’s drive-time program on WHO 1040.

On Deace’s program, as he has in recent weeks on Iowa Public Television’s “Iowa Press” and WHO-TV’s “The Insiders,” Gross said the GOP’s job is to win elections, something that is becoming increasingly harder with the power being wielded by social conservatives.

“Social conservatives are a minority group within a minority party,” he said. “If we aren’t broad enough the interests of social conservatives will never be in governance.”

The Republican Party, both nationally and in Iowa, has become perceived as the party of excessive bigotry, “whether that be bigotry associated with immigrants or gay rights. We are not that party and we should not be that party. It turns people off.  We can be a party of tolerance and respect other people’s views and still further our values.”

The discussion was civil until near the end of the two-hour segment, as Deace seemed to grow upset with what he perceived as the scapegoating of his fellow social conservatives for the misfortunes of the party.

“Your whole argument is a red herring,” Deace said. “Nero again blames the Christians for the fire he started… The people you’re crapping on are already doing what you want them to do.”

Gross said social conservatives would be able to accomplish their goals more easily if they have a broader tent and “aren’t as judgmental as Steve Deace appears to be.”

“I’m tolerant enough to allow people into our party that may not agree with me on [social issues,” Gross said. “If others did as well we’d have a better chance of winning elections and furthering our interests.”

“So what Doug just basically said is the best way to win is to be a hypocrite,” Deace said.

Gross, a self-proclamed social conservative himself, denied Deace’s interpretation. The two then argued for a few more minutes before Deace went to commercial, ending the discussion.