Joni Ernst will make history two ways tomorrow when she is sworn in as Iowa’s next U.S. Senator. Both are because of her gender. She will be the first female to represent Iowa in the U.S. Congress, and the first female military veteran to become a senator in the history of the upper chamber. Here’s hoping her accomplishments during the next six years transcend gender.
“I am there to work for Iowa and to work for what I believe is the best path for the United States of America,” Ernst said in a Des Moines Register interview. “I would love for people to give me the benefit of the doubt just as I give others the benefit of the doubt.”
Ernst won the 2014 general election and there’s little reason not to give her the benefit of a doubt. If Iowa progressives were to walk away from Ernst and senior colleague Chuck Grassley, the chances of their issues being heard in Washington would be reduced from slim to none.
Let’s say the slate is clean for Ernst. What are are the expectations?
If Ernst mirrors Chuck Grassley’s constituent services operation that would be a plus. Whether one agrees with Grassley or not, his office is consistently efficient at getting back with a response. When I have visited Grassley’s office in Iowa or in Washington, staff would take an appointment and devote reasonable amounts of time to hear me out. Ernst should do no less.
One of my concerns about Ernst during the campaign was that she is a field grade military officer. Her appointment to the Senate Armed Services Committee is equally concerning. Control of the military should be in the hands of civilian political leadership rather than the cadre of military officers. Ernst recently decided to stay in the National Guard so she begins with a liability. The test for Ernst will be whether she can take the necessary steps to reduce the U.S. military budget. In particular, the nuclear complex budget is bloated, with a plan to modernized weapons that have little practical use on the modern battlefield. Will Ernst be a yes-woman for military expenditure or will she demonstrate thoughtful restraint in cutting the defense budget? We’ll be watching.
Incoming Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell has a to-do list that includes forcing approval of the Keystone XL pipeline, repeal of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, and approving new sanctions against Iran instead of allowing the diplomatic process begun by the Obama administration to continue. Ernst is expected to support McConnell’s initiatives as a junior senator.
The senate Republican caucus was well disciplined when they were in the minority. They rarely broke ranks until the voting got close. They blocked many Democratic initiatives, something the Democrats will presumably do during the 114th Congress now that the tables are turned. One expects Ernst to keep her nose to the grindstone and a low profile as she gets started in the senate. That includes sticking with Republicans where it matters.
All told, Ernst has an opportunity to distinguish herself. Whether she is able to rise above politics and do so is an open question that soon will be answered.
LAKE MACBRIDE— During the run-up to the Nov. 18 vote on S-2280, a bill to approve the Keystone XL Pipeline, I messaged Senators Tom Harkin and Chuck Grassley, asking them to vote no. Harkin voted no, Grassley yes.
Senator Grassley sent along an explanation of his vote, which is pasted below. As he indicated, the motion failed to pass the Senate. What this letter doesn’t say is that I asked him to vote no, without any other comment. I have been around politics too long to believe that logic and rational thinking have much to do with why a U.S. Senator votes a certain way.
The framing of Grassley’s response points out the challenges opponents of the pipeline will have once the 114th Congress convenes. His arguments are rational in their way, if misguided.
It is hard to disagree with building a pipeline per se. There are many pipelines in the world, and they are a mode of transportation that serves the oil and natural gas industry, which in turn supports political stability. As Grassley pointed out, building pipelines creates jobs.
This is not a partisan issue. In Hillary Clinton’s secretary of state memoir, she mentions building pipelines several times, always as a solution to energy problems which in turn increases political stability around the globe. It will be hard to win the argument against Keystone XL because of the existential fact of it being a pipeline.
If oil prices continue to decline, the economic conditions which made the Tar Sands viable will erode. The reasons for declining oil prices are complex, but it boils down to a combination of increased U.S. shale oil production, lack of willingness by OPEC to curb production, and our society’s addiction to fossil fuels. It seems unlikely that the oil and gas industry will allow prices to get too low, and we are not in control here, except for our personal energy choices.
Something’s got to give to reduce reliance on fossil fuels. Plugging an electric car into our household grid is not an answer if all we do is switch our energy source from gasoline to coal and nuclear, both of which have their own risks to human health. Grassley doesn’t directly mention decreasing reliance on fossil fuels as an issue in his response.
The argument about what happens to the oil in Texas is unresolved, despite Grassley’s assertion otherwise. The issue with refining, in light of increased U.S. oil production, is one of limited capacity. It has been a while since I was familiar with refining operations, but I suspect refineries are still running every minute they can to keep up with demand.
Could the refineries re-tool to handle Tar Sands oil? Yes, definitely. Is there an economic reason to do so when there is plenty of Middle East oil entering the Gulf of Mexico at a low price? Probably not in the short term, and there appears to be little interest in increasing refining capacity in light of the current regulatory environment. Going forward, one would expect the Tar Sands crude oil to be exported the way U.S. light sweet crude currently is—because the refineries are already doing all they can to keep up with imports.
Grassley’s right to say we should decrease our reliance on imported oil. The simple fact is there is not enough oil being produced in North America to meet U.S. needs, and as I mentioned, there are economic constraints to refining capacity. What is missing is affirmation of the need to decrease use of fossil fuels, and that’s more the problem with the response.
The trouble for opponents of Keystone XL is that Grassley takes apart many of their arguments in a way that will build political support for a likely re-consideration of the project in 2017, if not in 2015. It is important to read his response and learn from it… and hope the climate doesn’t reach the tipping point while we dance around what most needs doing: reducing and eliminating our reliance on fossil and nuclear fuels.
Charles E. Grassley
Washington, D.C.
December 4, 2014
Thank you for taking the time to contact me. As your Senator, it is important for me to hear from you.
I appreciate knowing your concerns regarding the crude oil pipeline from Canada to Nebraska called the Keystone XL pipeline. On November 18, 2014, the Senate held debate and voted on S. 2280, a bill to approve the Keystone XL Pipeline. I was an original cosponsor of this bill and supported its passage. However, the bill failed by a final vote of 59-41, one vote short of the 60 votes necessary for it to pass the Senate.
The pipeline would supply more than 800,000 barrels a day of Canadian crude oil to U.S. refineries and help to counteract both insufficient domestic oil supplies in the United States and reduce dependence on less reliable foreign sources. The Keystone XL pipeline is a $7 billion, 1,700 mile pipeline that would create thousands of private-sector jobs at no cost to American taxpayers.
In 2008, TransCanada applied for a presidential permit from the State Department to construct and operate the pipeline. Due to environmental concerns, the State of Nebraska approved a modified route in January, 2013. Following this modification, the State Department released a draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS) on the new presidential permit application. The State Department noted that oil sands development would go ahead regardless of the production of the pipeline by using different pipelines or rail to get to market. The report essentially found that the pipeline would not accelerate greenhouse gas emissions or significantly harm the environment along its route.
After nearly six years of rigorous regulatory review, the State Department issued its fifth environmental review on January 31, 2014. This fifth review reached the same conclusion as earlier reviews. It found that the pipeline will have no significant impact on the environment and is the safest way to transport the oil. It also found that rejection of the pipeline will not affect Canada’s decision to develop these oil resources. The administration had been in the middle of a 90-day review period for federal agencies assessing the State Department’s environmental study when, on April 18, 2014, the State Department announced an indefinite extension of the agency comment period.
Opponents of the Keystone pipeline argue that the pipeline will not increase oil and gas supplies in the United States, rather, that all of the Canadian crude would be sold to world markets. Even President Obama reiterated this claim when he said the pipeline would allow the Canadians to “pump their oil, send it through our land, down to the Gulf, where it will be sold everywhere else.” However, the Washington Post “Fact Checker” disproved this claim. It noted that the State Department’s final environmental impact statement specifically disputed claims that the oil would pass through the United States and be loaded onto vessels for ultimate sale in foreign markets. It found that the crude oil would almost certainly be refined in the United States, with at least 50 percent of the refined products remaining in the U.S. market. It stated, “market conditions could change, of course, but there is little basis to claim that virtually all of the product, or even a majority, would be exported.”
The energy and economic development benefits of this pipeline are too important to delay any longer. We need an all-of-the-above approach to meet the country’s energy needs and give consumers choice. That means oil, ethanol, electricity from wind, and nuclear power. A pipeline would be safer than transporting oil by rail. Canada will produce this oil with or without U.S. involvement in the shipment. I’d rather work with one of our strongest allies than continue to get oil from the volatile Middle East or Venezuela.
What is needed now in the United States is an increased supply of oil. It is simple economics. If you increase the supply, you decrease the price. We are still relying on a very finite amount of oil. We must increase our own domestic supply of energy while promoting the use of alternative sources of energy at the same time. I will continue to support these goals with your thoughts in mind.
Again, thank you for taking the time to contact me. I appreciate receiving your comments and urge you to keep in touch.
I re-read Jennifer Jacobs’ 50 most wanted Democrats article twice and have to say I disagree with her framing.
In the first place, the Republican caucuses are a place where only registered Republicans who show up get to vote, not “where each Iowan gets one vote,” as Jacobs asserts.
Second, I know very few Iowa Democrats who jumped on board some presidential hopeful’s campaign because they were able to associate with people on this list. For example, when Dave Loebsack co-hosted Evan Bayh at Jim Hayes’ home in Iowa City, a crowd gathered, but to say it helped Bayh during his 2008 presidential bid, other than to help him decide to bow out, would be optimistic and self serving. Who would even say that besides someone like Jacobs?
Third, the selection of political activists for the list also serves Jacobs’ point of view. These are folks with whom she presumably has a relationship, and depends upon to present a “balanced” view of Democratic politics. Her view is anything but balanced, and stroking this group only builds her relationship with them, rather than saying anything about how Democrats select candidates.
Finally, this group more represents the problem with the Iowa Democratic Party than a leverage point for presidential hopefuls to gain support. If this list is our set of leadership, we are doomed to defeat as long as they are around. Jacobs clearly gets that wrong. What’s needed is a new, more diverse and much younger set of faces.
If we recall Dunbar’s number, Jacobs has limits on cognitive recognition, and setting fifty Democrats may be a reasonable limit for that part of the political spectrum, at least in her world.
A couple of points:
Is Roxanne Conlin not able to gather a crowd or raise money for Dems? Everyone who believes that, stand on your head.
Jerry Crawford? Really?
Zach Wahls? Besides a flash of celebrity, what does he add?
This sentence about Sarah Benzing is a killer. “Although the latest campaign she managed, Bruce Braley’s, was branded the worst U.S. Senate campaign in the country, Benzing has a good track record.”
I don’t seek to run people down, and know many people on this list. I’m just sayin’. Jacobs is trying to frame who we are as Democrats. If we sit by and let that happen, we had better get used to Republicans running the state.
BIG GROVE TOWNSHIP— Completing this year’s election ballot took more time than usual, partly because I was torn in a couple of the races when I arrived at the auditor’s office to cast my vote.
I began by flipping it over to write in DeWayne Klouda as township trustee.
Klouda had been discussing his re-election for a couple of board meetings, so I called him after the sample ballot was released without his name. His paperwork had not arrived in the auditor’s office by the filing deadline.
Running a write-in campaign where there is no candidate is straightforward. I wrote and issued a press release saying he was running, and once that was in the paper, and through word of mouth, we got enough people to write him in to be elected. Sigh of relief, because he possesses the institutional knowledge of our board. Our clerk was on the ballot uncontested, so he won re-election as well.
The last item I voted was the state house race between incumbent Republican Bobby Kaufmann and Democrat David Johnson.
Early this cycle, the Cedar County Democrats chair called and asked me to stay out of the race. He wanted the effort to be directed from Cedar County. Since our effort failed in 2012, I had had my chance, and felt obligated to step aside, and did. When there was a competitive Democratic primary, I answered questions for both candidates, and interviewed them for the Solon Economist, but campaigned for neither one over the other. Our 2012 campaign had defeated Johnson in the primary, and if he wanted to run again, I wasn’t going to stand in the way this time.
After the election, Iowa City blogger John Deeth commented about the race on his Facebook page, and I responded:
The most positive aspect of this state-house election was that it defined the Democratic base as 32 percent (for the entire district), which, not surprisingly, equals the active Democratic registrations at 31.9 percent. I know there were defections back and forth among party-registered voters, but the base turnout number will help future candidates know that their campaign should focus almost exclusively on building a coalition to get to 50 percent plus one using no preference voters, new voters and Republicans. IMHO, this is the new normal.
What I’m saying is that every candidate has a plan to win, and in that plan, the Democratic base is a solid number. We now know what that is in HD73. Winning elections is about bringing voters into a coalition, and the Democratic base is not enough to win. In my precinct, there were 136 straight ticket D voters among 957 votes cast. Take them and the 174 straight ticket Rs out and you have 647 or 68 percent of the electorate to work with.
Kaufmann won our precinct 611-323 (65.4%-34.6%). For perspective, in 2012, a presidential election year and the first election for the newly minted House District 73, Democrat Dick Schwab won the precinct 559-525 (51.6%-48.4%). What happened? It’s not about party registrations.
After winning in 2012, Kaufmann built a reputation as an energetic and responsive state representative who worked with constituents regardless of party. During the campaign, he door knocked our house at least three times and was constantly in the local newspaper doing something to serve constituent interests. Some argue that yard signs don’t win elections, but the fact that Kaufmann’s name was plastered everywhere built name recognition, and like any advertising, it takes a number of impressions to make a sale. He had that.
It turned out that Kaufmann’s more controversial votes in the legislature did not matter as much to most constituents, as his high level of energy and willingness to talk about any issue and produce results.
For Johnson’s part, I wasn’t privy to what his campaign was doing, but I received a couple of mailers asking for donations, along with one from an outside group criticizing Kaufmann. My only human contact with Johnson, after I wrote the articles for the primary, was at public events, mostly outside the district. He wasn’t an active presence in the precinct. I did not see him one time in our precinct, although to be fair the precinct is geographically large, and I might have missed him.
In October I receive a call from the Cedar County Democrats chair who asked about Johnson’s prospects. I responded he would carry the base, which is what he did. The trouble was he didn’t build on the base.
By winning back-to-back elections, Kaufmann made it more difficult for Democrats to beat him during the three elections remaining before the 2020 U.S. Census and re-districting.
SCHILLER PARK, Ill.— The preliminary election returns for Big Grove Precinct arrived at 10:47 p.m. yesterday from the county auditor’s office. It will be a couple of days before the township trustee write-in votes will be tallied. Once those results are in, I’ll include a more complete analysis of the results and their meaning. For now, suffice it to say that the precinct voters behaved predictably.
Ours is a precinct made up of voters minted in reaction to the firestorm that has been our national media discourse since 2000. They vote on the perceived merits and qualifications of candidates rather than by party alliance. This is highlighted by the straight-party ticket voters: 136 Democratic, 174 Republican and 6 New Independent Party IA (whoever they are) out of 957 voters.
This cycle, they elected Joni Ernst to the U.S. Senate to replace retiring Senator Tom Harkin, 54 to 43 percent (This and all percentages in this post are in Big Grove Precinct only). Finally, Iowa is to send a woman to Washington.
Incumbent Democrat Dave Loebsack was returned to the U.S. Congress 51 to 49 percent. One hopes Dr. Mariannette Miller-Meeks has now gotten the message after her third attempt—we don’t want her.
We followed the rest of the state on statewide office elections, although more analysis about those races will be forthcoming once I have studied the differences. Terry Branstad gets a chance to serve as governor for the longest time of any American governor, including the ones who bridge the Revolutionary War with their service.
Our state senator, Bob Dvorsky, was uncontested, and is well liked, and he easily won reelection with 97 percent of the vote.
Incumbent state representative Bobby Kaufmann beat challenger David Johnson 65 to 35 percent. More analysis of this race will be forthcoming, but Kaufmann ran the superior ground game, by dominating media and sign advertising, and with his physical presence in the precinct.
Incumbent supervisor John Etheredge was the top vote-getter among the three board of supervisor candidates with 58 percent of the vote. Mike Carberry was next with 46 percent, and incumbent Janelle Rettig trailed with 39 percent. Based on county-wide voting, Rettig and Carberry will be sworn in as supervisors. This race is of particular interest to a discussion of the post 2000 voters, so watch for more on this.
Other uncontested county-wide races had Janet Lyness, Kim Painter and Tom Kriz garnering 99 percent of the vote. We retained judges, voted for people who were on the ballot for minor elected roles, although less than enthusiastically.
As the dateline indicates, I am away from home. More when I return later today.
Half of our household budget is paid from wages earned by working in the warehouse. It’s a constant worry and last night highlighted a couple of things.
Up all night coughing due to a cold, or something, I called off today. My worries were about 1). being sick, 2). leaving my superior in the lurch by my absence, and 3). losing the $50 or so, I would have earned today. Each took its mental toll as I rolled and coughed and finally called off around 4 a.m. so the voice mail would be waiting when she arrived to open the office.
It was a reasonable decision, as the condition might worsen had I gone in and worked on my feet, giving people breaks. Coughing and hacking over food samples can never be good, so in the end everyone was served. I suppose the worry serves a purpose too.
After my call, the display on my mobile phone showed the outside temperature was 22 degrees—the first hard frost. A friend wrote:
“I was close to tearful about all my reddish orange raspberries that would have been perfect for harvest in just say three more days. Last year they were completely done a few days before any freeze. Sigh. It was a banner year for raspberries and I’ve loved them all! But I guess harvesting berries past Oct. 31 is really asking for climate change!”
So the season spins, its markers passing rapidly, but recognizably as we tread on in life’s journey. At 1:30 p.m., I had stopped coughing enough to feel ready to sit in my writer’s seat and get to work—tissue box at the ready. I turned from worry to no worries.
Some people worry about a Hillary Clinton presidency, but not me. Few people have the breadth of experience she does, and fewer still focus on the advancement of human rights the way she does. This week she was at the Hamburg Inn No. 2 in Iowa City with Rep. Bruce Braley to have a pie shake—and be seen there. Specifically, a chocolate-bourbon-pecan-flavored pie shake, according to media. It was a sign of something.
I finished her recent memoir, “Hard Choices,” in between coughing spells this morning.
“Now, more than ever, the future is very much on my mind,” she wrote in the epilogue. “Over the past year, as I’ve traveled around our country once again, the one question I’m asked more than any other is: Will I run for President in 2016? The answer is I haven’t decided yet.”
Far be it from me to opine on the matter of whether she should run for office again. But if she does, positives outweigh negatives, by a distance. In sooth, she has no competition among the parade of potential 2016 aspirants testing the political waters in Iowa this election cycle. That is, if experience matters.
If experience doesn’t matter, as a nation we have lost our way.
In my self-imposed quarantine, I’m hoping a couple of things. 1). that I recover my heath well enough to work at the warehouse tomorrow, as we need the income, 2). that Iowans reject Joni Ernst on Tuesday, and send Bruce Braley to the U.S. Senate, and 3). that Hillary Clinton gives fair consideration to throwing her hat in the ring for 2016.
Hopefully that pie-shake reminded her that Iowans are not so bad.
LAKE MACBRIDE— The thought of mowing is pushed back until the deciduous trees shed their leaves. Pools of yellow, red, brown and variegated leaves rest silently around tree trunks all around the neighborhood as geese fly overhead. The next step toward winter and its bitter cold.
Yesterday’s options were many—events with politicians Dave Loebsack, Monica Vernon, Rand Paul and Joni Ernst—but I remained working at home. The morning after, I felt better for the decision.
In the last two weeks of the political campaigns, Ernst submitted a Freedom of Information request to a couple of Democratic county auditors requesting detailed information about election procedures. Who knows what motivated the request, but it’s a close election, and if it goes to the wire, expect legal action—not unlike what happened in Minnesota when Al Franken was first elected.
I met my editor at the Press Citizen for coffee in Iowa City. The freelance work for the newspaper was an unexpected bonus as the year moves toward the holidays and its hope of spring renewal. They are short three of six reporters and need help covering stories. Once they get staffing filled, the number of articles I write will decrease. As farmers say, it is time to make hay while the sun shines and I expect to ask for two to three articles per week.
Apple processing began in earnest with filling the dehydrator with slices. The leaves have begun to turn on the Red Delicious apple tree, so it’s time to pick the high apples. Will get the ladder out later this morning. An apple crisp is in the works, as well as fresh juice.
The end of year crunch is here. Fortunately I have learned to come up for air from time to time in the rush of events. Something needed to sustain a life on the Iowa prairie.
LAKE MACBRIDE— The general election is 18 days away, and how my ballot will shape up is finally clear. This coming week, the two of us will head into Iowa City and vote at the auditor’s office. The down-ticket races and issues have been challenging to make a reasonable decision.
In particular, the township trustee election has no candidate on the ballot. As chair of the board of trustees, I made the following press release regarding the absence of a candidate on the ballot:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 17, 2014
SOLON, Iowa– DeWayne Klouda is running a write-in campaign for Big Grove Township Trustee in the Nov. 4 election. He currently serves as a trustee and was appointed this year upon the retirement of Elmer Vanorny. He has prior service as Township Clerk, beginning in 1998. He is familiar with the roles and responsibilities of the township, which include managing the township budget and the Tri-Township Fire Department, operating Oakdale Cemetery, custodian of the pioneer cemetery at Fackler’s Grove, and resolving lot line disputes.
Klouda’s filing paperwork was delayed by the U.S. Postal Service, so his name is not on the ballot.
We seek to make voters aware of this campaign and hope voters in Big Grove Township will consider writing in DeWayne Klouda for township trustee on their Nov. 4 ballot.
Late breaking situations like this are why I don’t like voting early. This year, I will be in the Chicago area in early November, so won’t be around to vote on election day.
The U.S. Senate election is garnering a lot of media attention, and the Republican advertising campaign has been thorough, well crafted and abundant. Counting how many impressions of Joni Ernst have filtered into my no-television lifestyle would be tough. Suffice it to say her name is everywhere I go. This last week, her sign advertising has begun to crop up, along with new radio ads I hear on my way to work. There are web ads everywhere, and bumper stickers. She will have no problem with name recognition.
Bruce Braley’s name is also most places I go, although there have been less impressions of Braley than his opponent. My sense is that because Ernst and her third party supporters appear to be outspending Braley in an attempt to buy this senate seat, the outreach of her messaging has been effective, the way anything that is well capitalized can be. The benefit for Braley, is many voters that matter most don’t seem to like what they are hearing from Ernst.
When I talk about “voters that matter most,” I refer not to polling subjects, but to people I meet and know who are less partisan in their approach to elections. It seems clear to me that neither candidate has cracked the code to get these votes, other than to work hard at it. It’s hard to tell because people don’t want to talk about the election the way they did during the 2006 and 2008 cycles. As I work my network to turn out votes, people plan to vote for Braley or one of the less well known candidates, but not Ernst. My network has a Democratic bias.
I proofread our local paper and there have been very few letters to the editor supporting one candidate or another. Because I read the stories from text files, I’m not sure who is buying ads in the paper, and can’t provide a meaningful evaluation there.
My state representative is bringing Senator Rand Paul to a fundraising event at his political family’s farm. His challenger is publishing an ad with a photo of himself with Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. There is talk that these two senators are evaluating a 2016 presidential run—key word is evaluating. I suspect they are here more to help Ernst and Braley and other candidates. Neither one of them seems likely to pull in the less partisan voters, although Paul has moderated some of his views in a way that will appeal to some of them.
October will soon turn to November when we’ll know the result. In the meanwhile, there is work to be done in the ground game Democrats are counting upon to win.
WEST BRANCH— After my talk at the Quaker school, I drove west through the darkened town. The streets were familiar as I had walked them each two years ago during a political campaign. I remembered faces and conversations as each one passed. It’s not my town, so I let the memories go into the night. I was ready to be home.
West Branch is the liberal center of Cedar County, with part of the city situated in Johnson County. There are two Quaker meetings, and the birthplace and presidential library of the first Quaker president, Herbert Hoover. The city is about more than Quakerism. There was no time for that as I drove into a western sky glowing from Coralville’s bright lights.
2012 was the worst heat and drought I remember. It was relentless. I wore shorts and blue short sleeve shirts to door knock during the campaign, covering almost every street in every town, and most unincorporated areas in the district. I approached farmsteads scattered midst the drought stricken corn to tell our tale. It was a scorcher and we lost the election.
Some say people receive their information about politics from the television, but I don’t know about that. I get most of mine from people I know or meet, experiences I have, and a few trusted news sites on the Internet. There is a headiness in being involved with politics, mostly from meeting the candidates, some of whom are recognizable in the broader society. The trouble is we can’t live our lives in isolation. Like it or not, we are connected to the body politic, and to accomplish things, one is required to engage.
Yet on some nights all we care about is getting home, and Saturday night, home was enough. That and driving through the darkness to something other than the ersatz illumination of a city on the horizon—toward sleep and tomorrow’s promise.
LAKE MACBRIDE— “Only 15 percent of Americans are paying very close attention to the midterm elections—a number that is both very low and, apparently, significantly lower than the midterms in 2006 and 2010,” according to the Washington Post. Sounds about right. One of eight people are paying attention.
While my friends and family are engaged, the vast majority of people with whom I interact are not. When it comes down to Nov. 4, many seem unlikely to make the trip to the polls and vote, and won’t without prodding in a meaningful way.
In Iowa, the race most are watching, including folks inside the Washington beltway, is the Braley-Ernst contest. Along with my activist friends, we are doing everything we can to support Bruce Braley’s candidacy. It may not be enough to win, and the senate majority hangs in the balance of this and a half dozen similar races around the country.
“I think we have a wonderful opportunity this year to do something that I’ve only had a chance to have four of in thirty-four years have happen to me, and that’s to have a Republican colleague,” said Senator Chuck Grassley last June. “Bottom line, our chances are a lot better now than a year ago. It looks like now we’ve got a chance of winning six out of ten, some people would say six out of fourteen seats that are in play. I don’t know, but the chances are good.”
According to Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight.com, Republicans have a 56.4 percent chance of winning the senate majority, so Grassley had a point, there is a reasonably good chance. In the Iowa race, the 538 forecast is a 65 percent chance of a Republican victory, with a two point lead. While Ernst is leading, Braley’s chances are also good, as the 90 percent probability range includes the potential for a Braley win. With low interest, the election will hinge upon voter turnout.
Predicting voter turnout is challenging at best. Already a record number of early ballots have been cast, with most being Democratic. There is no recent comparable election, at least in the survey done by Pew Research Center, which shows interest in the 2014 midterms well behind both 2006 and 2010. “Perhaps Americans have gotten used to the idea of partisan control of at least one chamber of Congress being on a knife’s edge,” wrote Seth Motel in an article for Pew titled, “For Many Americans, a ‘meh’ Midterm.”
What does the lack of interest in the 2014 midterms mean here?
Where they exist, it favors incumbents. People who have represented me in the U.S. House of Representatives and state legislature seem likely to be the same next year. My state senator is running unopposed, but for the other challengers, gaining traction against an incumbent, where there is low voter interest, has proven difficult. People outside political activists and operatives truly are not interested in the midterms.
Because the retirement of Senator Tom Harkin created an open seat, what happens in the U.S. Senate election doesn’t have a recent precedent in Iowa. We live in a state ranked fourth in the nation in health, safety, housing, access to broadband, civic engagement, education, jobs, environment, and income according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). This is good news for incumbents, however, how it will play in the senate race is an open question.
Joni Ernst will get an updraft from the governor’s race, where Branstad leads Hatch in recent polls by some 22 points. Democrats counter that they have a superior ground game and the ability to make up substantial ground before the polls close because of it. But Jack Hatch is no Tom Vilsack, and the times have changed since Vilsack won his come from behind election for governor in 1998 by overcoming a similar polling deficit. Ernst’s two point lead over Braley indicates she does not appeal to no-preference voters the way the incumbent governor does, and people I meet are willing to split the ticket. In addition to lack of interest, the outcome of no-preference voters will be more important than partisan registrations to either party’s victory.
For now, it’s a horse race, more than in previous years. One that will go to the finish line. It may not be a photo-finish as the polling within the margin of error suggests, but all there is left to do is work to increase interest and make sure that more than one in eight voters go to the polls.
Joni Ernst will make history two ways tomorrow when she is sworn in as Iowa’s next U.S. Senator. Both are because of her gender. She will be the first female to represent Iowa in the U.S. Congress, and the first female military veteran to become a senator in the history of the upper chamber. Here’s hoping her accomplishments during the next six years transcend gender.
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