Deace was discussing the shootings at the Ft. Hood military base in Texas with Bob Deever, pastor at Grace West Church in West Des Moines. Deever said because alleged gunman Major Nadal Hasaan was a Muslim he did not have the proper foundation to serve in the U.S. Armed Forces.

“He didn’t have the same foundation as we have, which is the Constitution anchored in the gospel of Jesus Christ that protects us no matter what,” Deever said. “So here we have a person or people that are allowed in to our military branch that is supposed to protect the Constitution that don’t even agree with the Constitution we’re fighting for. So to me, the foundation is cracked. It’s broken.”

Deace discussed the Ft. Hood shootings repeatedly last week, first on his drive-time radio program and later on his blog. He doesn’t believe Islam is a religion, rather an ideology, and feels Muslims should not be allowed to serve in the military because they have “sworn a public loyalty to the ideology that brave men and women are fighting against.”

During his Friday discussion with Deever, Deace once again brought up a quote from Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey who said he’s worried that rumors and speculation surrounding Hasan’s motives could result in a backlash against Muslim soldiers. He also worried that the backlash could have a negative impact on the military’s diversity.

“Diversity is destructive in some aspects, because the Constitution is not diverse,” Deever said. “The Gospel is not diverse. We as a people group should not be diverse.”

Political pressure is what drives the push towards greater diversity, and it is putting Americans at risk, Deever said.

“It just saddens me to think that we should have any diversity whatsoever in any form that would cause harm to our people like that,” he said. “I think that’s just sad that we would even consider that.”

Earlier in his Friday show, Deace interviewed Dave Gaubatz, author of “Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld that’s Conspiring to Islamize America.” Gaubatz has drawn criticism for his book and for publically calling for a “professional and legal backlash against the Muslim community and their leaders.”

Islam is a violent ideology, Deace said, but Americans have constructed an alternative reality regarding what Muslims truly believe in order to find common ground.

“Have we constructed magical thinking and then sort of backtracked our strategy from that desired conclusion because we don’t want to accept the alternative that we may have to live a long, protracted confrontation like what the Israelis have had to go through?” Deace said.

Gaubatz agreed that there is a lot of violence within the Islamic ideology. Instead of fighting wars oversees he said it is time America began trying to protect itself from an attack within. America is being infiltrated by Islamic organizations, and it’s time people realized it.

“We can’t even protect our own borders and we’ve got thousands of troops sitting in Afghanistan,” Gaubatz said. “We need to protect from within first. Then we can worry about setting up in Afghanistan or Iraq.”

WHO-AM radio host Steve Deace

Deace first discussed the Ft. Hood shooting Monday on his show. In a blog post published Wednesday, Deace expanded on his ideas and offered solutions to avoid similar acts being committed in the future.

Major Nidal Hasan allegedly shot and killed 13 people at Fort Hood in Texas and wounded 29 more. While his motives are still under scrutiny, he allegedly yelled ”Allahu akbar,” or “God is great,” before opening fire.

Deace said news of Hasan’s religious beliefs proves that while America has “sold out our religious traditions for a secular enlightenment,” the same cannot be said of the Muslim world.

“Contrary to conventional wisdom, Hasan may have done America a favor if we heed the warnings after the fact that we ignored beforehand, which sadly cost 13 brave and loyal Americans at Ft. Hood their lives,” Deace said. “If we stop lying to ourselves and accept the grave determination of the religious ideology that allegedly drove Hasan, then those 13 Americans didn’t perish in vain.”

The first step is Christian churches in American must begin to clearly define the differences between the teachings of the Bible and the Koran.

“We are at war with an ideology that has an aberrant view of God and what he demands of his people, so why wouldn’t the church use this as perhaps the greatest evangelistic and apologetic opportunity of the age?” Deace said. “We can’t expect our politicians to know the truth if the people in the pews who vote for them aren’t hearing it from the pulpit.”

Step two is to recognize that “Islam is not a religion of peace.”

Third, there is a difference between private citizen and public servant, so while Muslims are allowed to believe whatever the wish in America, being a part of the military means swearing loyalty to the U.S. Constitution.

“Since this is a nation largely founded on the Judeo-Christian value system, following the U.S. Constitution doesn’t provide too many roadblocks for me as a Christian, but it obviously does for those who follow the Koran,” Deace said. “Soldiers and public servants should be held to a higher standard than a private citizen, regardless of their belief system.”

Islam is an ideology opposed to the American ideal “every bit as much as communism or Nazism,” Deace said. The war against “radical Islam” has been taking place for more than a decade, and there is a simple reason why it won’t end any time soon.

“Because we began this war on a faulty premise, the premise that we’re all the same and truth is just a matter of perspective,” Deace said.  “Our Islamic enemy doesn’t believe this, but is exploiting our belief in it, and is winning as a result.”

In the aftermath of Major Nidal Hasan’s killing spree at Fort Hood in Texas, questions of whether his actions were inspired by religious fervor are still unanswered. But because Hasan reportedly yelled “”Allahu akbar,” or “God is great,” before opening fire, Deace believes it is a clear example of political correctness getting in the way of protecting American lives.

“I haven’t said we should purge the military of every single Muslim, but I do think we should start asking ourselves a real key question: If someone has sworn a public loyalty to the ideology that brave men and women are fighting against, why are we giving them uniforms and guns?” he said.

Deace compared allowing Muslims to serve to allowing someone to serve in the colonial army who had pledged loyalty to the British crown or to a Nazi sympathizer during World War II.

The problem, he said, is that society is so worried about offending anyone that they are putting everyone at risk.

“This is the problem with political correctness,” Deace said. “I do not believe Islam is a peaceful religion. But I also don’t believe all Muslims are warmongers. I just think if you look at this history and tradition of Islam, to come to the conclusion that it’s a peaceful religion is laughable on its face. “

Deace was particularly upset with two audio clips he played for his listeners. The first was former President George W. Bush saying Christians and Muslims will both go to heaven, “we just have a different routes of getting there.” Deace said this was absolutely untrue, and that Bush was either lying or uninformed of how incompatible the two religions are.

He then played an interview with Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey who said he’s worried that rumors and speculation surrounding Hasan’s motives could result in a backlash against Muslim soldiers.

“His concern is that we won’t be fair to people who have declared their loyalty to a theology that we are currently at war against. I don’t understand this,” Deace said, later adding: “My concern is that we know who the enemy is and we kill them before they kill us. That would be my concern. Not diversity.”

The problem is that “diversity training and gobbledygook and psychobabble and gay rights and tolerance” have taught society that people who disagree with them are hateful.

“We assume that if I think you marrying another guy is not a good idea for you and that other guy and the children you might adopt, that must mean I hate you,” Deace said. “If I think that the police, instead of interrogating child sex offenders ought to shoot them, that means I hate the sex offenders. If I think it’s not a good idea to have someone who screams out ‘Allah akbar’ to serve in the military, I must hate him. There’s no delineation between the inherent value of human beings created in the image of God and whatever phony, evil things they either believe in or engage in.”

Terry Branstad

And for a candidate whose last political campaign took place long before the Internet age and the prevalence of the blogosphere, the reaction on the Web is proving to be a valuable lesson in 21st century politics.

The pair of meetings, which included several pastors, social conservative activists and leaders Christian organizations, initially received poor reviews from at least two of those in attendance who called the former four-term governor “a Republican version of [Democrat incumbent Chet] Culver.”

On Monday, controversial Christian radio host Steve Deace offered more details about the meetings. His sources said Branstad came across as “arrogant” and as “no threat to the [liberal] status quo at all.”

One of the most amazing exchanges came during a discussion about Branstad introducing the destructive gambling industry to our state.  During one of the meetings, Branstad tried to defend his actions by saying he had vetoed it twice previously, but he was getting booed at Hawkeye football games and 70 percent of the voters wanted it so there was nothing else he could do.

That realpolitik answer didn’t sell this audience.

“Someone then asked him what else he was willing to give in on if the public wants it,” one little birdie told me.

It didn’t take long for Iowa Democrats to get in the mix.

Conservative blogger Shane Vander Hart posted audio from the meeting he attended and Iowa Democratic Party Chairman Michael Kiernan honed in on one exchange in particular. When asked by former Des Moines School Board member Jonathan Narcisse about whether he had a specific plan prepared on how to fix or repair state government, Branstad replied “OK, well I don’t.”

Branstad pointed the Committee on Government Spending Reforms, which he established in 1991 in response to a projected $300 million budget deficit in fiscal year 1993. The commission identified nearly $400 million in spending cuts, although both Branstad and legislators disagreed with and ultimately ignored many of the group’s recommendations.

“Now we have to go further,” he said.

Branstad proposed creating another commission made up of Republicans and Democrats, as well as representatives from the private and public sector, to look at reforming state and local government.

Kiernan said that rather than confronting Iowa’s problems, Branstad “created commissions to avoid making tough decisions.”

“Branstad’s entry into the race may excite his wealthy far-right cronies who stand to profit from a Branstad administration, but it’s not good news for anyone who cares about the state’s financial well-being,” Kiernan said.

The debate is nothing new. Longtime Republicans strategists like Doug Gross and Rick Schwarm have been warning their party for years that the rising dominance of social conservatives in Iowa could result in presidential candidates abandoning the state for fear that they have no chance.

The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder rekindled the discussion in a recent column, concluding “unless you’re beloved by conservative Christians, don’t bother campaigning in Iowa.” The logic goes that because the caucus system is dominated by each party’s base, social conservatives voting on primarily social issues are going to rule the day, and candidates who don’t fit that profile would be wise to avoid Iowa altogether.

This drew the ire of conservative blogger and former Republican Party of Iowa Political Director Craig Robinson, who said looking at previous caucuses shows the argument that  “social conservatives dominate Iowa” just doesn’t carry water.

After reading countless articles on the Iowa caucuses, you might think that the past winners were Pat Robertson who finished 2nd, 12 points back in 1988, Pat Buchanan who finished 2nd, 3 points back in 1996, or Alan Keyes who finished 3rd, 27 points back in 2000. It’s a disservice that the traditional media continues to paint the caucuses as some sort of Christian revival contest. Christian conservative candidates have done well in the caucuses, but many times their voting-block has been split between multiple candidates, which has prevented them from winning.

Robinson goes on to say that it is insulting to think that Iowans “blindly vote for candidates based on social issues,” as they take their role in presidential politics seriously.

Controversial Christian radio host Steve Deace said the debate sets the table for the media and Democrats to dismiss a social conservative who wins the caucuses as simply “those crazy Christians closing ranks.”

On the other hand, I’m not sure why I should be offended as a Christian that I’m being criticized for actually being consistent between my voting patterns and my principles?  Why do I care if the media doesn’t like the fact we vote our conscience?  Why do I care if the [Republican In Name Only] elites don’t like that?  I’m not accountable to either one ultimately for my vote, but to God.  Should I vote for candidates in opposition to my moral conscience just so I can be considered “enlightened” by the very same people that hate me no matter what anyway?

It isn’t “insulting” to say Christians vote primarily on social issues as Robinson contends, Deace said, adding: “Is there a better basis from which to choose a candidate to support?”

We are the customer here, not the Republican Party.  Therefore, the onus is on them to provide we the customer what we want.  Instead of having debates about why the customer won’t buy a product he doesn’t want, why not have a debate about why the business fails to provide the product the customer wants?  Republicans are starting to sound an awful lot like Democrats — whining and moaning when they don’t get the outcome they want and demanding the rules be changed so they can get what they want.

Controversial Christian radio personality Steve Deace slammed Grassley in a blog post Monday morning, calling his speech “a long, rambling, incoherent embarrassment of something which may have resembled a speech that not only killed the event but continued on well into the body’s decomposition process.”

Deace pointed to the elements of the speech and of Grassley’s record in the Senate that most upset him, including his vote last year for a bank bailout and his support for Earthpartk, an indoor rain forest at one time expected to be built in Iowa.

He then criticized several amendments offered by Grassley to health care reform legislation, in particular, an amendment that would clarify  “reporting requirements for tax-exempt organizations.” Deace fears that the language of the amendment opens the door to discrimination against churches that refuse to hire homosexuals or to consider women applicants for pastoral positions.

Perhaps in the future some Democrat will come along and decide these ministries need to be investigated because they think homosexuality is a sin, so government needs to intervene and look at their finances, too?

Grassley is helping to grease the skids for that to happen in the future because when you’ve been in Washington too long you see everything as a problem for Washington to handle.  Yet another reason why the slogan of our nation’s capital ought to be “the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.”

Potomac Fever is a deadlier disease than H1N1 and HIV put together.

Grassley has a long record of  going after nonprofit organizations, specifically Christian ministries, that he believes are engaging in financial misconduct. In 2007, Grassley announced the Senate Finance Committee would investigate six prominent televangelist ministries who were believed to be improperly using their tax-exempt status as churches to shield lavish lifestyles.

Deace’s afternoon radio program has been the platform for sevearl calls for a social conservative to primary to Grassley in 2010.

GOP gubernatorial candidate Rod Roberts (left) speaks with former Gov. Terry Branstad at a fundraiser in September.

Will four-term Republican Gov. Terry Branstad come out of political retirement and run for the 2010 GOP gubernatorial nomination? It’s a question making the rounds in Republican circles, and it is apparently starting to have an impact on the fundraising efforts of other candidates up and down the ballot.

Controversial Christian radio host Steve Deace said Wednesday on his blog that multiple sources have confirmed to him that Branstad will indeed come out of retirement and run for a fifth term as governor.

Deace said he expects an announcement shortly after the State Fair concludes on Saturday.

Branstad will have to sell his conservative credentials to a statewide grassroots skeptical of anything attached to Polk County and Doug Gross.  A grassroots that barely remembers his years in office, but do remember his ties to the gambling entities that have dominated our state since he first brought them here, the judges he appointed to the State Supreme Court that recently decreed sodomy marriages (including the one who wrote the actual opinion), and the fact he made one of Planned Parenthood’s chief cheerleaders his Lieutenant Governor—and Joy Corning has been in a bur in the saddle to pro-lifers in Iowa ever since.

Conservative leaders from around the state tell Deace that Branstad entering the GOP primary will result in a “bloodbath,” as so-called Polk County moderates do battle with social conservative activists.

Veteran Iowa journalist Chuck Offenburger, formerly with The Des Moines Register and now managing his own Web site, called on Branstad, whom he describes as someone he has always liked and respected, to stay put as president of Des Moines University and abandoned any potential return to statewide politics.

… Branstad was a perfect match for Iowa at the time he was building his political and governmental career. He was the right person at the right time for Iowa, someone who had wide support across the state and could lead on major initiatives, some of them very controversial – like legalizing gambling and completely overhauling the structure of state government. I’m reasonably confident he is not the right person now. If elected, he’d be dealing with new generations of legislators, state employees and opinion leaders. And you know what? Not all of those people are going to be charmed by the idea of an old political hero trying to re-start his government career. Many will see him as an impediment to their own futures.

I agree with that last thought, by the way. Just the fact that he now says he is considering running for governor is very damaging to our Republican Party. It just stifles the ambitions of a lot of the young up and comers we need so badly in the GOP.

Offenburger called on Republican Party of Iowa Chairman Matt Strawn to reach out to the “legendary Branstad” and ask him not to run.

Even anonymous gossip columnist Civic Skinny weighed in on a potential Branstad run, saying he is getting mixed signals from those close to the former governor about his intentions.

So will he run? A woman who is in the inner councils of Iowa Republican politics bet a friend last week — two meals to one — that Branstad would run. A woman in the inner councils of Democratic politics told the same friend he shouldn’t have taken the bet.

You figure it out.

For his part, Branstad has repeatedly said he has not made a decision about gubernatorial bid and will not until this fall.  But at least one GOP strategist tells the Gazette’s James Lynch that Branstad’s indecision is “freezing donations to gubernatorial candidates as well as down-ballot candidates,” something that could have a negative impact on the party’s eventual nominee.

U.S. Sen. Charles Grassley (Lauren Victoria Burke/WDCPIX.COM)

Speaking with controversial radio host Steve Deace about a recent letter criticizing Grassley penned by GOP state Rep. Kent Sorenson of Indianola, Salier said it is not surprising political observers believed it was the first shot of a coming primary challenge.

“If this were 8 to 10 years ago, then yes, I would have been surprised by that reaction because Grassley was the dominant force in Iowa politics, in both parties,” he said. “Grassley was the dominant force and had an enormous amount of loyalty. That has so eroded out from underneath him. There is so much talk of primarying Chuck Grassley now that I think he had to respond very quickly to somebody like Kent Sorenson to try to head that off if that was indeed what Sorenson was thinking.”

After the letter was made public, Grassley apparently had dinner with Sorenson to discuss his concerns, which included past statements on same-sex marriage and his vote for the $700 million bank bailout.

Earlier in the day, Sorenson told Deace he has no interest in running for the U.S. Senate. However, he said he has been contacted by two different county central committees urging him to challenge Grassley in a primary.

If Grassley doesn’t take Sorenson’s complaints to heart, a primary challenger will emerge and Salier will work hard to make sure Iowa’s senior senator does not return to Washington, D.C.

“If he doesn’t right his ship on this, he very well may face a primary,” he said. “And if it’s someone who thinks like me on these issues or someone who thinks like Kent Sorenson does, I’ll take everything I’ve got to try to propel them forward.”

Grassley’s seniority in the Senate should not be a reason to support his candidacy, Salier said, since something like his position of power on the Senate Finance Committee means “absolutely bupkis if what you do with that power is work with [Montana Democratic Sen.] Max Baucus to try to advance socialized medicine.”

Deace said several times that if Salier were to enter the race, he would defeat Grassley.

“People are that frustrated,” Deace said.

This isn’t the first time Salier has discussed Grassley’s political vulnerablity. He blasted Grassley’s response to the April Supreme Court ruling overturning Iowa’s ban on same-sex marriage, saying he “isn’t even close to the same conservative” he was when he was first elected.

Salier is the founding member of the conservative group Everyday America. In 2002 he became a hero of sorts to Iowa’s social conservative movement when he ran a surprisingly close U.S. Senate primary race against Congressman Greg Ganske.

Deace discussed the issue with Drew Zahn, editor of the conspiracy theory Web site World Net Daily, who said that while his cohorts have been “ridiculed and mocked” for continuing to follow the story, it simply won’t go away.

“We’re catching heat from almost every direction,” Zahn said.

Zahn and Deace started off blasting the “mainstream media” for not fully investigating an issue that deals with whether “we’re going to follow the Constitution at its most basic level.”

The pair then attempted to debunk any evidence produced that may contradict their theory — including a certificate of live birth and newspapers accounts at the time — ultimately concluding all materials could be easily obtained fraudulently or easily fabricated.

And even if that evidence was proven real, Zahn said the questions would remain.

“Even if we know he was born in Hawaii or not, we still have questions of whether he is a natural-born citizen,” he said. “On his own Web site, he admitted he was born of a father of Kenyan nationality… a dual citizen. Is that or is that not a natural born citizen? We don’t know.”

“Birthers,” as the believers of this particular conspiracy theory are known, believe that either Obama’s mother gave birth to the future president in Kenya in 1961 or that because Obama’s father was Kenyan and Obama has dual citizenship he ineligible to sit in the White House.

Of course, the birthers theories have been thoroughly discredited, and the U.S. Supreme Court last year dismissed a legal challenge to Obama’s citizenship. Despite this, the issue has gained several high-profile supporters, including CNN’s Lou Dobbs and conservative talker Rush Limbaugh.

This is not the first time Iowa’s largest radio station has dedicated large segments to birthers. Afternoon host Jan Mickelson has repeatedly discussed the conspiracy theory, interviewing numerous proponents who have brought lawsuits in regards to the issue.

Deace discussed the issue once before in January, when he interviewed the birther movement’s most high profile advocate, Orly Taitz, a woman news site Politico describes as “the Russian-born attorney/dentist who has become a kind of ringleader for the movement.” Among other things, Taitz has become famous of late for encouraging soldiers to disobey orders from a president who is “ineligible to serve as commander-in-chief of U.S Armed Forces.”

Fong told Cedar Rapids ABC affiliate KCRG that while Iowans deserve the right to vote on a constitutional amendment that defines marriage as one man and one woman, he does not condemn those who disagree with him.

“I’m not embarrassed about where I stand on that issue,” Fong said. “But at the same time I don’t look across at anybody that has a different view. I don’t condemn them for what they hold so deeply.  And I invite everyone to the table.”

Brian Dumas, a political consultant with the firm Victory Enterprises and an adviser to Fong’s campaign, anticipated the answer would upset Deace and e-mailed him a transcript of the interview with the hopes of heading off any angry reaction.

Deace was not impressed, and responded quickly on his blog.

First of all, the idea “that I don’t condemn people that have a different view” is a ridiculous statement for a person that serves as essentially an elder at a Christian church to make.  The Bible constantly condemns people who advance evil, and isn’t shy about doing it.  It also condemns those who claim they know right from wrong but won’t take a stand, you know, kind of like Fong does in the [KCRG] transcript.

God says homosexuality is evil, Deace wrote, so Fong should have no problem condemning evil.

Why would Christians respect the views of those who want to advance evil?  Would Fong say the same thing about Islamic radicalism?  He’d have to, unless he doesn’t really believe homosexuality is evil and that’s why he’s saying such soft-headed psychobabble — trying to pull the wool over your eyes.

Deace then attacks Fong for not agreeing with another GOP gubernatorial hopeful, Bob Vander Plaats, that the governor can issue an executive order stopping same-sex marriage. Fong told KCRG that he “wouldn’t waste time signing an order that my legal staff said was unenforceable anyway.”

Constitutional scholars, as well as Vander Plaats’ other rivals for the Republican nomination in 2010, agree with Fong that the governor does not have the authority under Iowa’s Constitution to issue such an order.