Gibbons moves, Stillians bashes Kauffman, Phil Hill dies
A guy who has too much time on his hands writes: “So I’m reading Business Insurance and read an article where Congressman King skipped his son’s wedding so he could be in DC to vote against the health-care bill.
“Now, there’s a guy with REAL family values.”
Skinny ‘s own subscription to Business Insurance has lapsed. ...
Former Iowa State wrestling coach Jim Gibbons told The Des Moines Register’s Kathie Obradovich that a friend, Ohio Congressman Jim Jordan, called him in the middle of the summer and asked if he had ever thought about running for Congress. “Every day,” Gibbons said. One problem: “Every day” that Gibbons was thinking about it, he was living in the fourth Congressional district, which has long been represented by fellow Republican Tom Latham. And the guy Gibbons wanted to run against was Democrat Leonard Boswell, in the Third District. So, before announcing against Boswell, Gibbons packed up and left his Boone County home and now lives in an apartment on Douglas Avenue in Des Moines. He registered to vote in Polk County earlier this month. (His record as a voter in Boone County is spotty. He voted in two school elections in the past five years, in the general elections of 2004, 2006 and 2008, but apparently not in any primaries or local elections.) Did someone mention the word “carpet-bagger?”
Before Gibbons can take on Boswell, he’ll have to beat state senator Brad Zaun, who also is eying Boswell, and former airline pilot Dave Funk of Runnells. Funk has never been elected to office, but he was co-chair of Iowa Sportsmen for McCain-Palin. If Gibbons or Zaun or Funk should beat Boswell, the winner’s tenure in Congress could be short-lived. Iowa is losing a congressional seat after the next session, and there’s a pretty good chance Des Moines will be thrown in with Ames and Indianola in the Fourth District, where Latham would be running as a strong incumbent. He moved to Ames from northwest Iowa a few years ago, but the move was within the district.
Is Jonathan Narcisse gearing up to run for something, too? …
The more Terry Branstad talks, the more Republican moderates and independents despair. Backers have tried to position him as the moderate in a primary that includes Bob Vander Plaats and others from the far right, but Branstad is matching them issue by issue, particularly bashing gay marriage at every opportunity. Moderate Republicans — they could caucus in a Mini Cooper — “played whatever moderate card they could come up with, and that lasted all of a nano-second,” says a savvy Iowan who spends a good part of his day on political stuff. “I think it’s possible some new candidate could emerge — not from the Republican side....but from a conservative Democrat.” This person, who has long studied Iowa politics dispassionately, also thinks “this is probably the best situation for a third party in a long time.” …
Advice to hostesses: Don’t sit Culver chief-of-staff John Frew next to University of Iowa president Sally Mason at your next dinner party. And don’t put e-mailer Nan Stillians next to Register reporter Clark Kauffman, whom she recently referred to in an e-mail as a “deceitful reporter indulging his strange fixation on nursing homes and public-health units.” But where do you sit Stillians? Not next to council member Christine Hensley, who e-mailed Stillians on another matter: “When you send these e-mails, I would appreciate it if you would have your facts straight.” …
People who care — and, judging from voter turnout, not many do — think Leisha Barcus will beat Skip Moore in Tuesday’s run-off for the Des Moines city council seat being vacated by Michael Kiernan. They say the effort by to unseat long-timer Tom Vlassis will be close. Young voters who might be inclined to support a fellow youth — law student Halley Greiss — don’t vote. In the Nov. 3 city election, there were only 296 voters between the ages of 18 and 24, according to Polk County Auditor and Commissioner of Elections Jamie Fitzgerald. In all, 12,539 people voted — 6,216 men and 6,323 women. The largest turnout was among voters 50 to 59, where the total was 2,973. There was at least one 102-year-old voter among the 131 voters between the ages of 90 and 102, Fitzgerald reports. …
Roxanne Conlin showed up at the Planned Parenthood “Drag Queen Bingo” fundraiser at the Garden in the East Village the other night and was introduced to the crowd as a “special guest.” A person who was there — Skinny couldn’t find an appropriate outfit so stayed home — says she didn’t stick around long. “She waited long enough for her name to be dropped and then skedaddled,” this person says. But he — or was it she? — wonders: “What is the political thought process here? I know she has to cater to the base on the left, but here she is, announcing last week that she is seeking to take a U.S. Senate seat away from one of the most durably popular political figures in Iowa history, and one of her first acts to kick off her campaign is Drag Queen Bingo? How does that play in Dubuque, Dumont, Duncombe, or Dunlap?”...
Skinny mourns the passing last week of Phil Hill, who served in the Iowa House from 1971 to 1975 and in the Iowa Senate from 1975 to 1979. He “was one of the best legislators of my time,” says former legislator and lieutenant governor Art Neu. Indeed, The Des Moines Register in 1978 dubbed him the state’s most effective legislator. Phil Hill was a moderate Republican from the west side of Des Moines in an era when the moderates controlled the party — Bob Ray and Mary Louise Smith were out front, David Belin and Marvin Pomerantz were in the back room, and Gerald Ford and Nelson Rockefeller were on center stage — and he wore his heart on his sleeve. He was a fierce advocate for children and women — with three smart daughters, he had little choice — and he had a lawyer’s mind for process and procedure. He also was droll and witty. Hill, who battled heart problems for the past 40 years (but who ran the Pittsburgh marathon on his 57th birthday, six years after having quintuple bypass surgery), moved back to his native West Virginia in 1982, for health reasons, and practiced law there until he died. He was 78. CV
