Posted on 02/19/2017 7:15:48 PM PST by Olog-hai
After decades as the crossroads of prairie populists and checkbook conservatives, Iowa has suddenly become solidly Republican like many of its Midwestern neighbors. It was one of four states — along with Kentucky, Missouri and New Hampshire — that flipped to complete GOP control in the November election, but Iowa’s rush of new legislation has been the most intense.
In an all-night session last week, Iowa lawmakers approved a bill similar to one enacted in Wisconsin six years ago that strips most public sector unions of long-held collective bargaining rights, including health insurance. […]
Among other items, Republicans also are pressing to eliminate state money for all Planned Parenthood services, outlaw the use of fetal tissue for medical research, subject doctors who perform abortions to lawsuits by women at any time in the future, scrap minimum wage increases in Iowa’s largest counties and block municipalities from enacting sexual orientation discrimination protections.
There’s also talk of a tax cut, despite a $110 million shortfall in the current budget year. …
(Excerpt) Read more at hosted.ap.org ...
My family is from Iowa. with the exception of a cousin or two, most are wild-eyed Lefties (including one cousin who’s a Lefty College Professor).
Sounds like some SWAMP DRAINING finally taking place in Iowa - Great to see!!
Trump won the state by nearly 10 points...a total BLOWOUT there, in a state that usually leans Democrat.
So, add Iowa to our (expanding) collection!
I should think that Minnesota (a state that allows Al Franken in the Senate) is so far gone in its homegrown socialism that no return is possible.
All bets are off given such things as voter ID/vote fraud, insecure voting machines etc. I’m not all that sure that Trump did not win NH.
It’s part of the Trump Effect and his LONG coattails!!!
The employment situation has changed a lot since I left Iowa almost forty years ago. A lot of the large, unionized industrial factories have shut down and been replaced by smaller specialty manufacturers. A huge number of family farms, run by Henry Wallace type progressive populists, have been consolidated into larger or corporate farms which are large suppliers of essentially industrial feedstocks of corn and soybeans. The eastern liberal Catholic river cities have declined in economic importance and political power. The main centers of liberal populism are the many college and university towns and government towns, and even those are starting to feel the pinch of restricted government spending.
All that signals a move to the right in the state as a whole, although Iowans could easily move back to the left if Trump doesn’t improve the job situation there.
MN also allows Keith Ellison in the Congress.
Because some folks are stupid.
I think one factor is the decreased influence of the Des Moines Register. Some 20-30 years ago it blanketed the state and was subtly (and sometimes not so subtly) influentially liberal.
Now except in the city and surrounding suburbs, you don’t see the Register nearly as prevalent for sale or distributed. Regional papers are more influential, well to those who still subscribe.
In the run up to the 2016, the pollsters had Mr. Trump up by 7 in Iowa. It was never in any doubt. This didn’t make any sense to me. Or, was it the other polls that were screwy? My gut instinct was that he would win handily, subject to the level of voting fraud. As it turned out, he took Iowa handily. My thought at the time was he could win this thing. One tell for me, Mr. Bill came here to campaign for her, in a reliably democratic union town. The newspaper said “several hundred” people showed, but the photographs were mostly tightly focused shots, the kind that make the crowd look big. A different angle showed otherwise. There was hardly anyone there! Hard to tell but 100 would be generous. Mr. Trump was packing stadiums with lines streaming down the block in January, and here a former President couldn’t draw flies. It was surreal.
The Eastern part of Iowa trends more democratic, while Western Iowa more republican. As a rule, the local news organizations only talk about the eastern half or northeastern part. Western Iowa does not exist, basically. It’s kind of strange in that way.
I'm actually less sure that we keep Michigan. That kind of felt like a one-time thing, but we'll see.
Well, I don’t mean to brag, but I did move to Iowa last summer. ;-)
Anyone to the ‘right’ of Lenin is “sharply right” to the AP.
Except for a few moonbat cities, MI is as conservative as Utah.
How did Iowa’s half of the quad cities vote?
Scott County went Clinton 56-42.
Other Quad Cities area Iowa counties voted Trump. That made it an unusual election.
I don’t know for sure, but it’s probably a safe bet they went for Hildebeast in large numbers.
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