There are two candidates who are publicly seeking support from Republican activists for their candidacy: social conservative politico Bob Vander Plaats and state Rep. Christopher Rants.  Interestingly, both are from Sioux City.

Most recent news reports have implied that Vander Plaats is the only ‘official’ candidate, but Rants probably belongs in that category now, too.  Vander Plaats has an exploratory committee, which he needs because he has no other Iowa-based campaign account to raise and spend money.  Rants needs no exploratory committee because he already has a state legislative campaign account that can pay for a web site and other bare necessities as he weighs the idea of running.

Rants and Vander Plaats are both already traveling from one end of the state to the other to meet with activists and assess their chances of winning.  I put them in the same category because, though neither has registered a fully-fledged campaign committee, both are publicly seeking support.

Vander Plaats has run for governor multiple times, and each time he has lost.  In 2006, his Republican primary campaign was coopted by frontrunner Jim Nussle, who represented Iowa’s 1st district in Congress at the time.  Nussle used Vander Plaats mostly to reassure social conservatives during the primary and to rally the Republican base in western Iowa during the general election.  That gave Vander Plaats few opportunities to build up his name identification in the more moderate corners of the state.

If Vander Plaats has one major weakness, it is his reputation as something of a one-trick pony.  While he has spent time in recent months talking to reporters about economic issues, he built his reputation on abortion and same-sex marriage, and it remains unclear whether fiscal conservatives in his party will give him much of a chance.  In past campaigns, they haven’t.  And Doug Gross, a social moderate and fiscal conservative who defeated Vander Plaats in the 2002 GOP gubernatorial primary, has already rejected Vander Plaats’s candidacy this time around.

At this point, Rants is seen as a more mainstream candidate than Vander Plaats.  A former Speaker of the Iowa House, Rants could likely raise more money than Vander Plaats.  And, since he oversaw all Republican campaigns for state house earlier this decade, he probably has a good perspective on what it will take to win statewide.

But Rants’s political experience is both a blessing and a curse.  He launched his career in politics early, leaving him few outside-the-capitol accomplishments to run on.  If the GOP’s best hope of a 2010 victory is by running as ‘outsiders’ against entrenched Democratic incumbents, Rants might not be a good fit.  And for a party that seems unusually interested in ideological purity these days, Republicans might not be willing to overlook compromises Rants had to make as a legislative leader to get anything done.  Anyone who has taken as many votes as Rants will have at least a few chinks in his ideological armor.

Aside from Rants and Vander Plaats, there are other names that are mentioned as potential candidates, but none has taken public steps to actually run.  Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey has not made a final decision yet, but he has not spent as much time in the limelight recently as a guy who was planning to run probably would.  Market to Market and Big Show personality Mark Pearson, state Rep. Rod Roberts of Carroll, millionaire agribussinessman Bruce Rastetter, and a few others have also been mentioned as possibilities.

For Culver’s part, the plan for the next six months is pretty much the same regardless of which Republican challengers emerge to take him on: raise money.

So far, the governor is doing well in that department, but it remains to be seen how much cash will continue to roll in from labor organizations, who still feel the sting of recent, high-profile defeats.  In 2008, Culver vetoed a labor-backed bill to expand collective bargaining rights of public employees, and in 2009, he was apparently unable to whip sufficient Democratic votes for any of labor’s four key legislative priorities.

Regardless of that, though, unless someone who can self-finance jumps into the race, Culver will likely have a bigger war chest by June of 2010 than whoever wins the GOP primary that month.  Depending on how fractured the primary is, the disparity could be narrow or wide, but Culver, the incumbent, is almost certain to be ahead financially.

That makes the 2010 gubernatorial race Culver’s to lose, even if his mediocre approval/disapproval numbers remain where they are today.  The GOP still has time to build the foundation of a winning gubernatorial campaign, but it’s not there yet, and the Democrats already have a big head start.  There are many reasons why Iowa almost never unseats a sitting governor in an election, and you can expect Culver to take advantage of all of them.

The congressman-turned-failed gubernatorial candidate, who headed former President George W. Bush’s Office of Management and Budget at the end of his second term, has founded The Nussle Group, a lobbying firm.  Or, if you prefer the Des Moines Register’s terminology, it’s a “policy consulting firm” that “focuses on guiding groups and individuals through the maze of the federal government.”

Nussle told Ed Tibbets of the Quad City Times that he did not plan to register as a lobbyist himself, but it sounds like at least some of his employees will likely be required to by federal law.

This sort of work is typically lucrative for former members of Congress (when they can get it), but were it not for Nussle’s high-profile OMB appointment after he lost the 2006 gubernatorial election in Iowa, he probably would not have had the star power to strike it out on his own.

Asked by Tom Beaumont of the Register about his own political future, Nussle said that he had no plans to seek elected office (though there was no Shermanesque statement).  Given the political toxicity of lobbyists these days, if Nussle was planning to run for something, he probably would have moved back to Manchester by now.

In part, the proposal is meant to give the GOP a foothold in 2010, when they will claim that any possible plan to lease the lottery to private interests was a result of massive campaign contributions from the prospective buyers.  But perhaps Republican leaders should remember a lesson of the 2006 campaign, in which they accused Culver of putting retirees at risk for thinking creatively about how to use IPERS funds.

That year, Culver was running for governor, and he suggested a plan to use IPERS’s venture capital funds, which amount to a small fraction of IPERS’s total holdings, to support businesses in the state of Iowa.

Then-Congressman Jim Nussle, Culver’s opponent, used that relatively inconsequential proposal to foment a storm of confusion among former and current public employees, who are typically a reliable Democratic constituency.  It got so bad, Culver had to post a special letter and factsheet on his campaign’s web site in an attempt to reassure voters that his plan would not jeopardize anybody’s retirement, and he did his best to stop talking about the idea on the campaign trail altogether.

Nussle, of course, wanted to keep talking about it.  He ran a damning 30-second television ad that seemed to work, if only for a short time before bigger issues again became the focus of the campaign.  The ad closed with these words:

Politicians should keep their hands off of your retirement money. On Culver’s plan, newspapers say it best: ‘…pension funds are not the chips to gamble.’

GOP legislators might want to think back to those days and remember how easy it was to stoke the fears of older Iowans at the prospect of IPERS becoming a political football.  Even if the scare tactics rely on factually incorrect arguments, they can work.

And even if this proposal to sell the lottery to IPERS never comes up again after this week, it could go into the Democrats’ files as a good issue for a surprise direct mail attack in the days before Election Day in 2010.

“As a Republican House member from Iowa, (Nussle) was part of the Gingrich transition team that ushered in the Contract with America” in 1994, writes Mike Allen at Politico. “Nussle has to lay low for now because he’s working on the transition. Attribute all this to Nussle sources.”

“Mr. Nussle is also very close to Rudy Giuliani, who hasn’t lost his appetite for national office,” writes Marc Ambinder at the Atlantic. Nussle headed Giuliani’s Iowa campaign after losing the 2006 governor’s race to Chet Culver, until taking the Budget job.

Ambinder is pessimistic about Nussle’s chances: “If Newt runs, he’s the odds-on-favorite to win.”

Chris Cilizza of the Washington Post makes a case for placing the White House budget director and former Iowa congressman on the short list of possible candidates to chair the RNC as the party rebuilds from John McCain’s defeat and the loss of House and Senate seats in Tuesday’s election.

“Iowa — and the Midwest generally — is a central political battleground in 2010 and beyond, Cilizza writes as an argument for Nussle. But he continues: “Nussle is abrasive (at times) and has made a fair number of enemies during his political career.”

“Initially considered one of the party’s strongest candidates nationwide,” in his 2006 race for governor, Cilizza writes, “Nussle’s campaign underperformed.”

Chet Culver

Iowa Gov. Chet Culver traveled back to his football roots to lay a little smack-down on the management of Agriprocessors in the guest column he penned for the Des Moines Register. Comparing the situation at Agriprocessors with novelist Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle,” and implying that management at the kosher plant have opted to travel a ‘low road,’ Culver outlined his response and continued action in relation to the plant.

Before the federal raid, Agriprocessors already had a history of sanctions by Iowa’s state regulatory agencies for water pollution, as well as health and safety law violations. Alarming information about working conditions at the Postville plant – including allegations ranging from the use of child labor in prohibited jobs to sexual and physical abuse by supervisors; from the nonpayment of regular and overtime wages to the denial of immediate medical attention for workplace injuries – brought to national attention by the raid forces me to believe that, in contrast to our state’s overall economic-development strategy, this company’s owners have deliberately chosen to take the low road in its business practices.

I believe Iowa businesses should take the high road by following the law.

Culver writes that he has directed Lis Buck, director of Iowa Workforce Development, to prohibit Agriprocessors listing open position on state job lists because of the “unsafe working conditions at the Postville facility.” He has also called on Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller to “prosecute all alleged criminal and civil-law violations that are backed by sufficient evidence.”

Agriprocessors has every resource at its disposal to be a good Iowa corporate neighbor – one that provides a safe workplace, pays good wages and benefits, protects our environment and respects the dignity of our workers. If its owners choose to operate in this manner, they will find a skilled work force ready to join this company. I want to publicly ask Agriprocessors to “take the high road” and join the family of responsible businesses in Iowa.

To date, in public statements, Agriprocessors’ owners have denied any wrongdoing related to their business practices. They are entitled to do so. Because of Iowa’s long history of clean and fair regulatory and judicial processes, companies like Agriprocessors, if accused of wrongdoing, will be afforded every due-process right to which they are entitled under law. But, at the end of the day, they must obey each and every law that protects workers and keeps our food supply safe.

There is little doubt that Culver will take a few hits of his own for writing this piece. Amid the truckloads of political contributions shelled out by the Rubashkins, the Hasidic Jewish family that owns Agriprocessors, to Republican candidates and political organizations, there are also a handful that went to Democratic office holders and candidates. In particular, $10,000 was given by Sholom and Leah Rubashkin in 2005 to the failed Democratic primary bid by now Lt. Gov. Patty Judge. At that time she was serving as the Iowa Secretary of Agriculture and the contributions came roughly a year after she had toured the plant in the wake of allegations of animal mistreatment, providing a public and positive assessment of the ritual slaughter.

When Judge ended her gubernatorial bid and joined with Culver, Sholom Rubashkin, who was employed as the president of Agriprocessors, gave $3,000 to that ticket.

Jim Nussle, the former Republican congressman who launched an unsuccessful gubernatorial bid against the Culver-Judge ticket, was a much larger beneficiary of the Rubashkin family. In 2006, Sholom Rubashkin gave Nussle $22,500 to advance his gubernatorial bid. In addition, Abraham Rubashkin, listing both his previous Brooklyn, N.Y. and Postville addresses, provided $7,500 to the Nussle campaign.

Nussle, after being defeated by Culver, took a job as one of the top members of the Bush administration, serving as director of the Office of Management and Budget.

Last year Democratic leaders tried to tack on timelines for troop withdrawal to several versions of proposed funding bills. This year, however, they have chosen to use the new GI bill, gambling that President George W. Bush’s veto of a popular, bipartisan bill would be politically damaging.

Bush, however, has nothing to lose politically, so he renewed his veto threat against any bill that comes to his desk equipped with any add-on legislation that would require additional appropriations.“To just pile them into the troop funding bill because the troop funding bill is necessary is a cynical process that the president has already been very clear about – the fact that he would veto,” White House budget office manager Jim Nussle told the Associated Press.

Nussle, a former Iowa congressman and 2006 Republican gubernatorial candidate, told the AP that the House Democrats’ plan to add unrelated legislation extending unemployment benefits, at a cost of $16 billion over two years, and boosting education benefits under the GI Bill, at a cost that could reach $51 billion over the next decade, would provoke a veto even though they are popular politically.

In his call for fiscal restraint, Bush received help from across the aisle, when some members of the moderate Blue Dog Democrats threatened to revolt. The Blue Dogs are strong advocates of the “pay as you go” budget rules that require new benefit programs be financed with offsetting spending cuts or new taxes so as not to cause the budget deficit to spiral. They argue that the war funding bill is an emergency appropriation, but the veterans education funding is a new mandatory benefit program that’s supposed to be subject to the budget rule.

“It’s the principle involved of not putting a mandatory program of any kind on an emergency supplemental,” Rep. John Tanner, D-Tenn. told the AP.

However, not all the Blue Dogs shared this view or threatened to revolt, including Rep. Leonard Boswell, D-Iowa, a 20-year Army veteran, who was one of the 277 House members co-sponsoring the new GI Bill legislation.

Boswell’s chief of staff, Susan McAvoy, told the Iowa Independent that the Blue Dog opposition was not an official position endorsed by the coalition. “[Boswell] informed his colleagues where he stood prior to any debate on the bill,” McAvoy said. “Rep. Boswell is very supportive of veterans and would not do anything that would keep the new GI Bill from moving forward in the House.”

Nonetheless, the threatened revolt by Blue Dog members forced House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to pull the war funding bill from the House schedule. She told reporters that she is confident the impasse with the rebel Democrats can be ironed out, but the delay threatens her goal of getting the war funding bill completed by Memorial Day.

Even if Pelosi does iron matters out with the Blue Dogs, there’s still the looming threat of Bush’s veto. “Judging from what the president has said and where the Congress appears to be heading toward right now, the answer is still the same – that the president would veto,” said Nussle.

As his administration attempts to navigate the shark-infested waters of bloodthirsty Democrats before next year’s fiscal budget begins, Bush has chosen to “stay the course” and steer the S.S. Lame Duck, full throttle, toward the iceberg, Iraq. Meanwhile, the Democrat-controlled Senate has approved only one of the 12 House-passed appropriation bills to fund the new fiscal year starting Oct. 1.

Now, armed with the threat of Bush’s newly discovered weapon of choice, VETO, Nussle will have to negotiate the budget with top congressional Democrats. Bush has already threatened to veto some budgetary items bound to plunge his approval ratings even deeper into the abyss of forgotten presidents. Bush’s current approval ratings are hovering  around 30 percent, but these should plummet as GOP leaders, one by one, continue abandoning the president, who has chained himself to the budgetary elephant in the room, the war in Iraq. 

Using his Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to do his dirty business, Bush has already indirectly threatened to veto a Veterans Affairs funding bill that would give the Department of Veterans Affairs as much as $3.8 billion more than the Bush administration proposed in its budget.“If Congress increases VA funding above the president’s request and does not offset this increase with spending reductions in other bills, the president will veto any of the other bills that exceed his request until Congress demonstrates a path to reach the president’s top line of $933 billion,” the OMB said in a July statement.

Rep. Chet Edwards, D-Texas, chairman of the House veterans affairs appropriations subcommittee, responded, “This bill is about respect and honors the promises made to our veterans with historic increases in funding to provide them the health care and benefits they earned when they put on our nation’s uniform.”

If shortchanging our veterans isn’t bad enough, Bush has also threatened to veto legislation that would renew the popular State Children’s Health Insurance Program, which provides health coverage to poor children. The Senate has proposed a $35 billion boost over the next five years for the program, but Bush’s budget calls for only $5 billion, contending he doesn’t want to further expand the government’s role in health insurance at the expense of private insurance.

Even Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, who strongly supported Nussle during his confirmation hearings, implored the president to rescind his veto threat in a joint statement with Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, R-Utah, warning the president that the Democrats might seek an expansion of $50 billion or more if there is no compromise.

“Tax legislation to expand health insurance coverage is badly needed, but there’s no Democratic support for it in the SCHIP debate,” said Grassley, the ranking Republican on the finance panel. “In the meantime, our SCHIP initiative in the Finance Committee takes care of a program that’s about to expire in a way that’s more responsible than current law and $15 billion less than the budget resolution calls for.”

Grassley’s words fell on the president’s deaf ears, while the Ahab-inspired Bush fixates on the ubiquitous “War on Terror,” and his “stay the course” mentality in Iraq. Threatening to underfund wounded veterans and sick children makes one wonder: Who’s next? Senior citizens?

Enter Bush’s new messenger, OMB Director Nussle, whose job is deliver the Bush monetary mantra to Congress. Nussle has the unenviable task of trying to persuade Congress why they should scale back on domestic funding, while simultaneously convincing them why they should fund the money pit in Iraq. As he indicated in his swearing-in ceremony, Nussle has no plans of changing the president’s fiscal course and appears content with playing Bush’s rubber-stamp man.

“I believe government spending should be restrained and it should be transparent so taxpayers can see what results they are getting for their money,” Nussle said, adding that he looks forward to advancing Bush’s “pro-growth, low-tax policies that have strengthened our economy.”

After soundly losing his 2006 gubernatorial bid in Iowa against Democrat rival Chet Culver (52 – 43 percent), Nussle’s political career appeared washed up. Nussle had abandoned his First-District seat in Iowa, which was usurped by Democrat Rep. Bruce Braley. During his political interim, Nussle took refuge as a consultant in Cedar Rapids, where he landed a consultant gig with Giuliani’s Iowa campaign.

Then along came Bush, who’s no stranger to appointing good ‘ol boys who have been loyal to him. Not to mention, Bush has a soft spot for appointing those whose political careers have taken a nose dive. Take former Attorney General John Ashcroft, for example, whose career also appeared to be washed up when he lost his 2000 senatorial re-election bid in Missouri to a dead candidate, Mel Carnahan, who died in a tragic plane crash two weeks prior to the election.

And now Bush’s prodigal son, Nussle, has returned to the political nest in D.C. While other Bush appointees are jumping ship, citing a need to spend more time with family, or as was the case with former White House spokesman Tony Snow, to procure a job that makes more money.

Unfortunately, as Nussle sets sail with the S.S. Lame Duck, not only does he risk permanently drowning his own political career, but if he helps perpetuate Bush’s current fiscal policies, it’s the American people, who will ultimately suffer the consequences as we continue sinking our tax dollars into the monetary quagmire in Iraq. Although I imagine the Bush crew has mapped out its exit strategy for when the ship goes down, procuring enough life preservers for the wealthy folks on the upper deck, while the rest of us remain trapped in the lower decks as we fight for our lives, only to keep drowning in Bush’s sea of misguided fiscal policies.

Good luck, Mr. Nussle. P.S. Don’t forget to pack your PFD (personal floatation device) when leaving for D.C.

Iowa’s 2006 gubernatorial runner-up, Jim Nussle, is returning to his political nest in D.C., where he’ll serve as President Bush’s new director of the Office of Management and Budget. Nussle’s nomination had to weather an August recess, a Senatorial hold and a heated three-hour debate before being confirmed by the Senate 69-24.

Several Democrats, along with Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., saw Nussle’s confirmation hearing as an opportunity to criticize the fiscal policies of the Bush Administration. “Mr. Nussle is the wrong man at the wrong time for this position,” Sanders said during the hearing. “President Bush and his administration have become increasingly isolated and out of touch with the economic realities facing ordinary Americans,” Sanders said. “The president needs a budget director who is not afraid to tell the president the truth about these harsh economic realities, not an echo.”

As expected, Iowa’s senators, who had indicated their intentions before the recess, voted to confirm Nussle. “He is a skilled and savvy operator,” said Tom Harkin. “He is a straight shooter whose word is his bond.”In a prepared statement that Chuck Grassley read on the Senate floor, he had nothing but praise for his fellow Iowan and took issue with those objecting his nomination. “Some have chosen to use Congressmen Nussle’s nomination to take issue with the President’s fiscal and economic policies,” said Grassley. “I’d point out to my colleagues that while they portray the economy as nothing but doom and gloom, the facts suggest otherwise. Unemployment remains at historically low levels.  Most recently, the unemployment rate stood at 4.6 percent.  July was the 47th consecutive month with job gains. Over 8.3 million new jobs have been created during those 47 months.”

Some of Grassley’s rivals were less optimistic about Nussle’s ability to direct the White House OMB. Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., called the nomination an “outrage” and urged its rejection. “I would not vote for a man who put a bag over his head in the House of Representatives” because it shows “hostility to this great democracy,” said Boxer. She was referring to an episode early in Nussle’s career in which he donned a bag to protest the House check-bouncing scandal.

However, other Democrats saw Nussle’s confirmation as a chance to reach some bipartisanship, which will be needed with less than four weeks remaining until the end of the fiscal year Oct. 1. As of now, only one of the twelve annual appropriations bills has been considered by the Senate. Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, said he was ready to believe Nussle’s promises during his confirmation hearings that he would work in bipartisan fashion to repair rifts between Congress and the White House.

Wyden said bridge-building will be needed to resolve differences between Congress and the administration over the renewal and expansion of a popular children’s health insurance program. Other Democrats backing Nussle included Herb Kohl of Wisconsin, Jon Tester of Montana, Carl Levin of Michigan, Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, Max Baucus of Montana, Ben Cardin of Maryland and Jim Webb of Virginia.

Regardless of who did and didn’t vote to confirm Nussle, it looks like Mr.Nussle will have his work cut out for him when he returns to Washington.

Just before breaking for August recess, Sanders had placed a hold on Nussle’s nomination for director of the OMB.  “President Bush is completely out of touch with the economic realities facing working families,” said Sanders, announcing his filibuster. “He needs a budget director who will make him face the facts, not his fantasies.” Sanders has been an outspoken critic of Bush’s economic polices and views Nussle’s role in the OMB as a rubber stamp for Bush’s failed economic policies.After laying out his case against Bush’s failed fiscal policies, Sanders shifts his attention to Nussle and why Congress should vote “no” against his White House OMB confirmation:

President Bush desperately needs a budget director who is not afraid to tell the president the truth about these harsh economic realities, not an echo. He needs a budget director who will make him face the facts, not fan his fantasies. And, perhaps most importantly, he needs a budget director who is willing to compromise with a Democratic Congress for the benefit of all of the American people, not just large corporations, and the wealthy few. Unfortunately, I am afraid Jim Nussle is not that person.

A budget, after all, is more than a long list of numbers. The federal budget, like any family budget is a statement of our nation’s values and priorities. In fact, the federal budget is a statement of what our country is all about. We would all, I think, find it irresponsible and counterproductive if a family spent all of their money on an expensive vacation, didn’t have enough money to pay the rent and wound up out on the street. Most of us would view this as an example of misplaced priorities. The family, in this case, is spending money where it shouldn’t and not spending it where it should.

Preparing the federal budget is exactly the same process. It’s about spending taxpayer dollars where we should and not spending it where we should not. It’s about taking a hard look at the needs of our people and prioritizing the budget in an intelligent and rationale way.