Politics in Iowa

Well, once again it is a presidential election year....... dammit! That means that politics is on the menu in Iowa. It isn't enough that we have the first caucus but now we have to suffer through the indignity of a straw poll and the corn kernel vote at the Iowa State Fair. Inevitably, some idiot will shoot their mouth off and that particular idiot will end up on film and be shown on MSNBC or Fox News. It leaves me depressed and ashamed. Almost everyone I know here in Iowa would be considered more of a moderate, perhaps with conservative leanings but usually just more trusting that the government knows what they are doing. Those people really don't have a party anymore as there are no longer any moderates in the Republican party and they just don't quite feel like they can go so far as to vote democratic. Unfortunately, party loyalty usually runs deeper then family loyalty, so what's a person to do?

I'm trying to figure out just when the straw poll emerged. It is actually more of a fund raiser and it equates more to fraternity popularity contests.... and yet they had to pick Iowa to come and crap on. WHY couldn't the straw poll be in New Hampshire!? It's an embarassment!

The corn kernel vote which is sponsored by a very conservative news channel always has a very conservative outcome.... what a surprise! Again, just something stupid to make us all look like rubes.

Then there are the myriad of polls, most of which are conducted by phone. To be exact they are conducted by land lines. Most of the people I know that are younger then fifty do not have land lines anymore, they just have the cell phone, so I really question the relativity of polls anymore.

Then there are the issues that probably make me the angriest ... abortion, gun control and global warming. First, abortion and gun control really aren't issues. The republicans have been in power for most of the last forty years and if they had really wanted to change those issues up, they would have done so. They are topics that get brought out to rile people up when they are behind in the polls. They are triggers, not issues.

And global warming? Only an idiot will argue whether or not it exists... yet the battle rages on! Considering we are just thirty years away from the tipping point, we had better damned well be working on that point.

Okay... that's done. Thanks for letting me get that off my chest cause it is a long ol' stretch when politics come to Iowa.

Louie