Category: Living in Society

SOLON, Iowa — What you see is what you get. Politics is more meaningful with experience and a proper lens. Our view of things is imperfect.

A political Saturday began with a meeting of the county party arrangements committee in North Liberty where members went around the table to introduce ourselves and tell how we got active in politics.

My first political campaign was for Lyndon Johnson. After taking the bus downtown and paying my weekly carrier newspaper bill, I stopped by the Democratic party office to help out. I wanted an LBJ for the USA campaign button and asked for one. They had me stuff envelopes for a while then gave me a button. The 1964 election built my expectation as a Democrat that we would win every election by a landslide. Imagine my disappointment when Richard Nixon was elected in 1968. Imagine my outrage as he dissembled about the war in Cambodia. Imagine how I feel now.

A fluffy, wet snow was falling as I left the arrangements meeting. I swept a couple inches off the Subaru with a broom and made my way across the lakes to Solon where Rep. Bobby Kaufmann was holding a town hall meeting at 1 p.m.

The town hall venue was the Palmer House Stable built in 1838. It has a turbulent recent history as it was bought for cheap and remodeled in a way that forced the owner to declare bankruptcy. A local Republican owns it now and holds some events there. He donates use to Kaufmann a couple times a year. Covered in snow, it looked very picturesque as I walked up to the door.

The setup was clean but uncomfortable with cheap plastic folding chairs. Local resident Lynn Gallagher brought posters with information about Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations and lined them up on chairs along the wall in the main room. Someone else brought a couple of trays of mini-cupcakes. When the town hall ran long, half a dozen attendees stood up from the chairs to alleviate back pain they caused. Despite the discomfort, I didn’t see anyone leave until the question and answer period was over.

In all 23 people plus Kaufmann attended the meeting, about double the normal number for a Kaufmann town hall in Solon. Most of the faces were familiar and most attendees had a prior relationship with Kaufmann. Whenever he took a note to get back to someone, he did not ask their name. He called on many of us by name to ask our question. To say attendees were supporters is not true. At the same time everyone had an interest in government, a relationship with the representative, and more interest than usual demonstrated by venturing out on slippery roads to attend. Based on attendance and level of engagement, interest in politics continues to run high in the 2018 midterm election cycle.

I found the town hall to be valuable because Kaufmann gave a glimpse into his work in the House and the environment in the Republican caucus. His view was surprisingly insular and focused on the House, not Republicans in general. For example, according to his response to the Republican who asked the question, he didn’t know that the Senate had advanced the embryonic heartbeat bill until someone from Cedar County pointed it out to him. The takeaway is the heartbeat bill is unlikely to get 50 votes in the House because Republican members believe that when it is struck down by the courts, it will be done in a way that makes it difficult to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. Getting another abortion-related issue to the Supreme Court is the endgame of the flawed bill.

A good mix of Democrats and conservatives attended the meeting, although the group leaned somewhat Democratic. It seemed ironic that a current Iowa City School board member asked about his pet projects rather than school funding, and a former Solon school board member was more interested in the heartbeat bill than school funding. To characterize the meeting, school funding was not raised as an issue with the current legislature.

Kaufmann gave about ten minutes to answering my question about Governor Reynolds’ proposed tax cut, which I felt was generous. The new federal tax bill is forcing the state to do something to avoid a dramatic increase in taxes, according to Kaufmann. Governor Reynolds wants to delay addressing the $500 million in tax credits going out the door each year until next year. Kaufmann and other house members want them addressed this session.

Mental health got the biggest part of the discussion based on time and number of participants. I appreciated the woman who coached Kaufmann on mental health messaging. His statement, he was waiting to see the revenue estimate before action, seemed like a dodge of the need to do something to fix the mental health regions Republicans previously designed. Why wouldn’t the legislature determine what is needed to fix the mental health system and only then determine how to pay for it?

We talked about gun control beginning with a neighbor’s suggestion county sheriffs register assault weapons like the AR-15. This kicked off a long, albeit civil discussion about gun control that bordered on a skirmish. It had me wondering who might be packing. Kaufmann let the discussion get out of control and it degenerated into a pointless endeavor of confirmation bias.

The strong attendance at the town hall was a sign that people are engaged in politics more than in previous years. My conclusion afterward was that even on a snowy day people can come out, be civil, and learn about our government. This group was definitely not a flock of sheeple. People are engaged in politics more now than I can recall since 2012. An electorate for change in November is beginning to come together.

When it comes to the Iowa caucus, there’s little use pondering what might have been.

Despite a winter storm that brought roughly six inches of snowfall, attendance at our precinct caucus was stronger than in previous years when the weather was perfect. In 2014 four of us attended the Big Grove precinct caucus. This year there were eight, including the precinct captains for the 2008 campaigns of Barack Obama, John Edwards and Hillary Clinton. What was different about this off-year caucus is people I had not seen much in public showed up and hung around talking long after the caucus adjourned, mostly because “we have to do something in November.” We shared a sense that we are stronger together.

WYSIWYG. The caucuses are an interface with the electorate as it is being created, long before most voters engage in primary or general election campaigns. What you see is what you get.

Five rural precinct caucuses convened together at 7 p.m. at the new middle school. We heard from surrogates for a few statewide and local candidates and collected money for the state and county party. We broke into precincts to elect delegates and alternate delegates to the county convention, solicit volunteers for the platform committee and committee on committees, and elect two members of the party central committee. We did all that, ratified our slate, and adjourned by 7:30 p.m. While my car warmed up in the parking lot I keyed in our results with my mobile device on an Iowa Democratic Party web site.

When I arrived home, Jacque remarked, “you’re home early.”

“I was in charge,” I replied.

The morning after I hope we can get past zero sum gain politics where when someone wins, someone loses. The conversation our caucus had after adjourning centered on health care and the treatment delivery system — a complex problem, a wicked problem.

Wicked problems are not engineering problems, they can’t be solved. What we can do is work together to find common ground and solutions that work.

I hesitate to assign deep meaning to what happened last night. It was a glimpse at what the future will be, still a rough draft, with much uncertainty. The story of this electorate is being written in real time. It will be written by us all.

Jackie Norris spoke on behalf of her husband, Iowa gubernatorial candidate John Norris, last night at the Johnson County Democrats central committee meeting.

In terms of political star quality, Norris’ light was brighter than anyone else in the room. A long-time and well known political operative, she served as Michelle Obama’s first White House chief of staff.

Her connections with the group were deep, revisiting the 1984 presidential campaign of the Rev. Jesse Jackson and a host of others during her ten minute speech. I re-read our correspondence from 2008 for this post and was reminded how persistent, diligent and professional she was then and still is.  I’ve often thought she should be running for governor instead of her husband.

There were more political speeches than usual at the last central committee meeting before the group is re-elected at Monday’s Iowa caucus.

Secretary of State candidate Deidre DeJear spoke. She seemed credible and was very well-spoken. Already I like her better than perennial candidate Jim Mowrer who announced for Secretary of State first. She seemed so fresh, and alive last night. Just what Democrats need going into the midterms.

All three announced candidates for State Senate District 37 spoke to the group. Their names are Eric Dirth, Zach Wahls and Janice Weiner. As mentioned previously, I’m with Wahls, but Weiner gave the strongest speech in the room.

The question no one is asking about the Iowa Democratic gubernatorial race is will Fred Hubbell continue to donate to Iowa Democratic candidates if he loses the primary? In 2014, he was the largest single donor to Jack Hatch’s gubernatorial campaign at $75,000. During the last 16 years, he gave $550,885 to Democratic candidates, according the the campaign finance website Follow the Money. While I don’t hear people talking about this aspect of the Hubbell campaign, it’s an idea I’m putting out there. I suspect candidates are treading water on this. They want to win the primary but in a midterm cycle, general election campaign money will be more difficult to raise. Donors like Hubbell will be needed more than ever.

I continue to have laryngitis so I quarantined myself in the back of the room. By the end of the meeting, a number of people joined me in back. I guess that means politics is contagious.

2018 will be an amazing year for Democrats, win or lose. Even so, I’ve been slow to engage, that is, until Zach Wahls announced his campaign for State Senate District 37.

First I said no politics until after the June 5 primary. An aging, low-wage worker doesn’t have bandwidth for everything and I know both my limits and what politics can demand.

That didn’t last long. I volunteered to be temporary chair at our Feb. 5 precinct caucus.

However, the 2018 political campaign began for me at 8:54 a.m. Jan. 13 with this.

Zach Wahls had been in Tipton for a morning meet and greet at D’Alicias Cupcakery and Cafe. He held his first campaign event in the City of Solon that afternoon.

Wahls is running in the June 5 Democratic primary against Janice Weiner to replace retiring State Senator Bob Dvorsky in the general election. The filing period doesn’t start until February, so there could be other candidates for this open seat. No Republican has declared in the race.

I was in Tipton to speak at a gathering of Indivisible Iowa and Weiner spoke as well.

Weiner’s credentials are impressive, especially her work for the U.S. State Department and as a Stanford intern working on policy for then San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein.

Her uphill climb to a primary win will be a lack of name recognition, and articulation of her views and credentials. Wahls’ challenges are different and unique.

If people know Zach Wahls, it is likely from the speech he gave in Des Moines in 2011. As of today it has more than 3.2 million views on YouTube and created an internet sensation. He must balance internet celebrity with grassroots campaigning among people who may not have heard of him. He had a great start in Solon.

About 35 people, young and old, gathered at Solon’s old middle school on a winter Saturday to meet and hear Wahls. Political pal and city councilor Lauren Whitehead and I organized the multi-layered event. Attendees who came and went during a two-hour period included a small group of boy scouts, school-age children, long-time political activists, local business people, a labor leader, Democratic central committee members and the president of the Solon School Board, a registered Republican.

Wahls gave a brief speech regarding his personal history and three legislative priorities: healthcare, education and workers’ rights. He took questions as long as people asked them and impressed with his depth of knowledge about policy issues that mattered to attendees. Wahls has experience in public speaking since the viral video but seemed genuine and unrehearsed in answering questions about tax policy, education, Medicaid, mental health, labor, law enforcement, water quality and other topics. He hung around after the formal part of the gathering to speak individually and take photos. He even helped clean up the room.

The real Zach Wahls literally hit the streets on Saturday where I met him. As district voters get to know him there is a lot to like. He gained at least this supporter in the process.