Chet get elected! Chet popular! Nothing like a little Chet Not Stupid jargon to get the day started.

But according to the most recent Survey USA poll, 49% of those surveyed disapprove of the job Chet Culver is doing as governor, 48% approve. I find this surprising since Culver has really only been in office for a year. It is very clear that the honeymoon was short lived, and numbers like these should have potential Republican gubernatorial candidates climbing all over each other for the opportunity to run against Culver.

Another interesting nugget of info is that 51% of Blacks disapprove of Culver's performance, and 53% of respondents in the 34-54 age group (can you say taxpayers) also disapprove.

When you see numbers like these, it becomes easy to understand why the Iowa Democratic Party and Lt. Governor Patty Judge are up in arms over the Iowa Future Fund ads which blast Culver on his sweetheart deal for Microsoft and his out of control budgets.

Culver’s numbers before the current legislative session were strong at 59% approve, 34% disapprove. Just more proof that Iowa Voters didn’t give the Dems a mandate for their liberal agenda.

United States Senate

Grassley

65% Approve

25% Disapprove

Harkin

58% Approve

37% Disapprove

By Emily Geiger

State Sen. Brad Zaun is bringing attention to the fact that $600,000.00 of Iowans’ tax dollars have been used in the ad campaign from the Department of Public Health to promote the passage of the proposed smoking ban. And on top of that, Zaun says that not all of the “waitresses” and “bartenders” in the ads are actually even waitresses and bartenders.

So you all know by now that a state-wide smoking ban is not going to keep me up at night. In fact, I’d personally like to be able to go out and not come home smelling like I just rolled around in a fireplace. However, I do have a problem with state dollars being used to advocate for certain legislation.

If we can use tax dollars to advocate for the smoking ban based on the potential for lives being saved by this legislation, then I have another idea. How about we have a $600,000.00 ad campaign advocating for 24-hour waiting periods for abortions and true informed consent laws? We might as well throw in true parental consent for minors who want abortions as well. This would likely save lives, too. So where’s our state funding for these ads?

Iowa House Democrats go on record for supporting Gay Marriage

Now, we all know that Speaker of the Iowa House Patrick Murphy is not the brightest bulb in the Statehouse chandelier, but what the heck was he thinking yesterday?

House Minority Leader Chris Rants called for a vote on that would have kept the marriage amendment eligible for debate for the reminder of the session.  House Democrats voted it down on a party line vote yesterday, including three Democrats who were co-sponsors of the bill in 2005. Reps. Dolores Mertz, Kurt Swaim, and Brian Quirk are all three committee chairs and word in the rotunda is that Murphy and McCarthy threatened to take their chairmanships away if they voted with Rants and the Republicans.

If I were in Murphy’s position, and thank God I’m not because I would never be caught in one of his nasty suits, I would have let this pass. It didn’t mean anything and it would have protected his members in conservative legislative districts from going on record on this issues. House Democrats could have continued to use their same talking points by saying that they are not going to touch the issue while it’s in the Iowa Supreme Court. Instead, he gave Rants a huge political victory yesterday, I’m sure Rants already has David Kochel creating the direct mail pieces.

A defeat for Iowa social conservatives, a political victory for Rants and the Republicans.

McCain wraps up nomination, while the Democrats are heading to Convention

Last night John McCain captured the Republican nomination while the race between Senator Clinton and Senator Obama got much cloudier. I was surprised that Clinton was able to win Ohio, Texas, and Rhode Island, and I think she has a very compelling argument to make that she, not Senator Obama can win the states in November that a Democrat must win.

Clinton has won all the states that a Democrat must win to be successful in to win the general election: California, Florida, Ohio, New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Michigan. There is no doubt that the Democratic race is going to the convention where the Super Delegates will decide their party's nominee. I also think this is an advantage for Senator Clinton since she has Bill Clinton at her disposal to work these delegates.   And don’t fool yourself, I’m sure Bill has plenty of favors to call in.

Clinton’s wins last night were huge, and don’t let anyone else tell you differently.

Apparently House Minority Leader Chris Rants is going to force a vote on the proposed marriage Amendment today. Currently the bill is stuck in the House Judiciary Committee. If the bill doesn't pass out of the committee this week, it will not be eligible for debate this year. If Rants can get 51 votes then the bill will remain alive, but there will be no guarantee that the bill will be brought up for debate by the Democrat leaders of the House.

This is a smart move by Rants by doing this he can get a recorded vote on marriage to use in the fall elections. However, I expect Rants’ vote to get the 51 votes needed, I just don’t think the bill will ever see the light of day as the Democrats will continue to hide behind the Iowa Supreme Court (which they also control).

I’m interested to know if the Senate has the same option available to them. I think it’s important to keep the bill alive, but I’m not expecting much after that.

Iowa Future Fund

Apparently Governor Chet Culver and Lt. Attack Dog Patty Judge don’t like the radio and TV ads that are being run by the Iowa Future Fund. The ads point out the tax increases passed by Culver and the Democrats and their special earmarks for companies like Microsoft. Like Patty, I would like to know who the group is because they need to be thanked! Finally somebody understands that you can’t let this stuff slide and pull it out during an election year, you have to strike while the iron is hot.

Mulder Out

Mulder set to retire and word on the street is that Randy Feenstra will run for the seat. There is no doubt that Feenstra would be a definite upgrade over Mulder. What I think is interesting is that while Republicans might not have much of a chance to pick up seats in the Iowa Senate, they are upgrading their talent tremendously. There is actually a core of good conservative candidates to get excited about if/when this new class of Republican Senators take office in Jan 2009.

Hey Don, see what happens when you call someone out? Keep it up buddy!

Teahen for Congress Announces Campaign Team.

Wes Enos from Des Moines is heading east to run the Teahen campaign. Wes is from Polk County and was the Political Director for Mike Huckabee in Iowa. Teahen has also secured the services of Victory Enterprises (Steve Grubbs and Brian Dumas). The most interesting nugget of info is that Bill and Gerri Dix are heading up his fundraising effort. Dix ran for Congress unsuccessfully in 2006. While Dix was a good fundraiser for his own campaign, it will be interesting to see what he can do for someone else.

Teahen is announcing his campaign on Wednesday.

Marriage Amendment

I know Emily has written a lot about this subject, but I would like to commend Chuck Hurley on his efforts to let the people vote ON THE Marriage Amendment. Now I just wish we would have had the same effort a few years ago when the Republican controlled the House and Senate. Then Majority Leader Iverson failed to apply any pressure to his members to support the amendment. I think Hurley’s efforts back in 2004 would have made a huge difference.