Winners

Rarely do you see Wal-Mart listed as a “winner” in these pages. But, at least on the surface, it’s tough to disregard the mega-chain’s new $4 prescription drug program. Wal-Mart launched the program — which makes 314 commonly prescribed generic drugs available for $4 per one-month supply — in Florida last month. Since then, Wal-Mart execs have added 27 states, including Iowa, to the plan. Medications for ailments like diabetes, asthma, anxiety, high-cholesterol, depression and heart conditions? Four bucks a month. Seniors, low-income folks and un- or under-insured patients, accustomed to sacrificing rent or food money to pay for needed medications, will surely benefit from these lower prices. But the news isn’t great for everyone. Wal-Mart’s incessant price-slashing will no doubt spell doom for some independent and family-owned pharmacies, just as the corporate giant has devastated nearly every other business sector it has entered. Critics — of whom there are plenty — are already calling it another subplot in Wal-Mart’s plan to dominate competition, and screw over consumers in the long run.

Some people are hopeless idealists. Take, for instance, State Rep. Ed Fallon. For the third time now, Fallon is officially requesting public information about the Iowa Values Fund from the Iowa Department of Economic Development, which has handed out the controversial corporate largesse. Technically speaking, that information is supposed to be public information, since Iowa does have an open records law. Fallon is asking for information about which companies have received funding, what those companies are supposed to do for the money, and details about the jobs that were allegedly created with the free government money. Fallon has had trouble getting the information from both Mike Blouin and Mary Lawyer, who held down the fort while Blouin was off campaigning (but was invited to leave after Blouin lost the primary and wanted a day job). Let’s hope that the next Terrace Hill tenant realizes how offensive the whole Values Fund scheme has been to ordinary Iowans and puts a new person in charge of this state’s corporate welfare agency.

Losers

Does anyone else find it somewhat telling that Jim Nussle decided to hang with the Rotary Club rather that stumping with George W. Bush when the president flew into Des Moines last Thursday? Nussle claims he wanted to honor the appointment he made with the Rotary Club, even though Democratic Rep. Leonard Boswell offered to switch places with Nussle. It doesn’t take someone who can pronounce “nuclear” correctly to figure out that Nussle is scrambling to distance himself from Bush — apparently it takes only a “big lug.” Chet Culver publicly accused his opponent of trying to put miles between himself and Dubya. Of course, Nussle vehemently denies it, but come on. Since when does a Republican candidate and White House darling, mired in a close gubernatorial race, ignore the President of the United States when he makes a special visit to the Heartland? Probably since said President’s approval ratings hit rock bottom.

It’s beyond disingenuous for the city of West Des Moines to pretend that it has no choice but to offer carte blanche TIF funding for any developer who meets certain basic criteria: investing $25 million in construction in that fair city, and offering jobs to 200 people. City officials like to pretend they have no choice in the matter — that they have to put out, just like all the other girls — because other cities are competing for that same corporate growth. But the reality is that West Des Moines is leading the way with corporate freebies, like long-term passes on property taxes, forcing neighboring cities to follow suit if they don’t want to be left in West Des Moines’ shadow. Who loses in deals like this? The taxpayers, as well as the neighboring cities — particularly the city of Des Moines, which has to meet its responsibilities as the aging capital city even as West Des Moines sucks the tax base westward. CV

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