RAGBRAI - 2017 Edition

I came out of my self-imposed retirement from the Register's Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa (RAGBRAI) again this year.  (Last time!?)  In the first two days, it went through both my hometown and my spouse's hometown in NW Iowa, so I had to ride those.  Here are this year's observations:

* While the overnight towns seem to have plenty of portable toilets for the 20,000 or so visiting cyclists, the pass-through (no pun intended) towns didn't have one-tenth the amount they really needed.  I mean, when you have 20,000 extra people in your little town, even if it's only for an hour or two, you should have more than 20 (one-tenth of one percent) portable toilets.  What the hell RAGBRAI, didn't you warn them this year?  Maybe it's a sign of me getting older, but I've never had to rely on cornfields so much before.

* I found a non-profit stand selling pineapple pie!  But they were sold out -- at 8:30 in the morning!  Overall, however, I felt there was more pie available this year than on any RAGBRAI in recent memory.  Full disclosure: I had three slices of apple.

* For the third time in my RAGBRAI journeys, I rode the century (100 mile) loop that was optional this year on day two.  Each time was an accomplishment, but each time came with the same downside: You don't have as much fun on the ride.  Not only do you have an extra 30 miles or so to power through, but there aren't any good vendor or farmyard stops available during that time.  You don't stop as often, and when you do, you don't stop for as long.

* Best stop this year was a dill pickle stand that also happened to have people protesting against NW Iowa congressman and WOITH, Steve King.  I ended up wearing a sticker the rest of the day that said, "Dear America, Sorry About Steve King. Sincerely, Iowa."  Got great comments on it throughout the day, too.

* Demographically speaking, while RAGBRAI clearly has more men on it than women, I thought there were more women than in the past.  Also, there were many, many more overweight riders than I can remember -- no way some of them were riding the entire week, if the entire day.  At the same time, the median age of all riders continues to climb.

* Still not enough service for cell phones!  Getting a data connection was harder than ever, and impossible where cyclists were aggregated.  This is 2017, people, it shouldn't be this difficult.

* Best jersey I saw this year was on the back of a t-shirt:  Beer....the reason I get up every afternoon!

A Candidate Guide, Circa 2016

With the first-in-the-nation caucuses only days away, Iowa is once again in the national political spotlight.  It’s time for my quadrennial assessment of the remaining candidates (here's the 2012 version), in alphabetical order by party:

DEMOCRATS

Hillary Clinton
The good: She’s easily the most credentialed to be president.  The bad: There’s something unlikable about her quest for political power, even after reinventing herself as a senator and cabinet member.

Martin O’Malley
The former governor of Maryland seems smart and likable enough, but he definitely picked the wrong cycle to run for president.

Bernie Sanders
Every four years, it seems there’s a grandfatherly-looking candidate with an unusual message who sparks an interest with younger voters.  The last time, it was Republican-Libertarian Ron Paul.  This time, it’s Democratic-Socialist Bernie Sanders.

REPUBLICANS

Jeb Bush
All that PAC money, all that name legacy, and he’s seems to be getting no traction.  Maybe we have had enough of the Bush family in the White House.  He just doesn’t stand out in this field.

Chris Christie
Not the best bedside manner, but that’s a net good, it makes him look less Washington-insider.  He won’t do well in Iowa, but he could do well elsewhere.  Also: Must lose more weight, America doesn't elect unhealthy-looking presidents.

Ted Cruz
Take a ring-wing whack-job who’s disliked by his own party, and add support from Iowa’s own resident whack-job congressman, Steve King.  This is how you identify the Republicans’ potential Iowa caucus winner.  (Has it really been 2+ years since I wrote this?)

John Kasich
Probably the Republican candidate most appealing to independents, someone who seems to understand that governing is a compromise.  Unfortunately, that means it will be tough for him to win.

Rand Paul
Younger folks like him, but his mostly libertarian message isn't getting the traction it did when his father, Ron, ran in 2012.  Interestingly, he can partly thank Bernie Sanders for that.

Marco Rubio
Youth, intelligence, ethnicity, and likability are in his favor.  He could win the nomination, but if he goes too far to the right to do it (a la Mitt Romney), he’ll have a hard time being elected president.

Donald Trump
He’s the Frankenstein’s monster created by the Tea-Party Republicans, and now they can’t control him.  I still predict he’ll eventually ruin his reputation(?) along with the Republicans’ chances of winning.

Ben Carson, Carly Fiorina, Jim Gilmore, Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum
Thanks for visiting Iowa!  Now go home, and stop trying to make a career out of running for president.

April Fools

In honor of April Fool's Day (or is it April Fools' Day?), I wanted to set out a list of a few facts that should be April Fool's/Fools' Day jokes, but aren't:

* There are now successful reality TV shows based on hoarding, pawn shops, doomsday prepping, housewives, duck whistles, alligator catching, arm wrestling, dance moms, teen moms, naked survivalists, and other narcissistic freaks.

* Climate change.

* Most Major League Baseball teams start the year with virtually no chance of making the playoffs, and this is supposed to keep sports fans occupied all summer.

* A full jumbo jet was lost in the south China Sea and no one has the faintest clue exactly how or where.

* Fox News.

* This winter wasn't the coldest and windiest on record.

* Steve King is a U.S. Congressman.

* [This one gets added effective on April 2, 2014:  The U.S. Supreme Court again rules that there is a First Amendment protection given to those who want to make unlimited financial donations to political campaigns, and that said protection won't corrupt politics.]

A Self-Professed Idiot

My Favorite Martian, WOITH Rep. Steve King of Iowa, is at it again.  Our resident racist / homophobe / bigot had a few (dumb) things to say in support of Arizona's proposed anti-gay, er, I mean religious freedom legislation (which I just wrote about the other day).

I'm happy to say The Colbert Report punished him.  You must watch this video now.

Cruzin'

It's been a while since I've inducted anyone into the Whacked Out In The Head (WOITH) club.

First a quick review of current members:

Politicians:
Steve King
Bob Vander Plaats
Glen Massie
Kim Pearson
Kent Sorenson
Michele Bachmann
Brad Zaun

Non-politicians:
Charlie Sheen

Anyone with a reality show on MTV
Jerry Sandusky

The entire Kardashian family

The guy down my street who put a $60,000 house on a $30,000 lot (Honorary Member)

I am now compelled to add another politician, someone who's been begging for membership since he joined the U.S. Senate less than a year ago.

In just that short of a time, he's single-handedly shut down the government with unsupportable grandstanding political tactics, and tried to make everyone believe he's a hero for doing it.  He's also alienated members of his own political party for not being compromising enough, while simultaneously making the other political party look better for not compromising.

But what really put him over the top was being in Iowa (again) this weekend for a speech, then going pheasant hunting with original WOITH member Steve King.  As we've seen before, whenever two or more WOITH members are together, the country ultimately laughs and does the opposite of what they want.

Welcome, Texan Ted Cruz, who's so far to the right on the political spectrum he's off the map.

Two Guys, A Girl, And A Pita Place

You can't make this stuff up.  You can only satirize it once it really happens.  Thank you to my favorite alien-politicians.

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-september-11-2013/two-guys--a-girl-and-a-pita-place

We Can't All Be Valedictorians

Posting links isn't blogging, but in this case it's just too easy.

Steve King does it again!

Michele Bachmann has always done it!

All That Lying Got You Nowhere

I can't let this week pass without a tribute to U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, an always reliable member of the WOITH club.  This week, she released a web video announcement about how she isn't going to run for re-election.

Mixed feelings about this.  On one hand, it's good to get people with extremist views out of government.  On the other hand, I'm going to miss how much her dumb comments damaged others who shared her views.

This article from PolitiFact pretty well sums up her fundamental intellectual dishonesty.  In the larger sense, it reflects how the so-called Tea Party has devolved from a grassroots taxpayer watchdog group, into an extreme right-wing group with no chance of gaining a serious mainstream following.

But at least for a while, she won't go away yet in Iowa, where her pitiful 2012 presidential campaign and campaign manager have serious legal problems, related to how they handled their funds and their affairs.

Plus, it's only a matter of time before she becomes a Fox News commentator and/or lobbyist.  That's sure to keep us entertained for a while.

In the meantime, to U.S. Rep. Steve King, you're up!

About That Presidential Election.....

Many years ago I attended a meeting where an economist was the keynote speaker. His opening line was, "I'm not a member of a major political party.  I'm a Republican."

Never has that line cut deeper than this week.  After all of the campaigning, the SuperPAC money, the advertisements, the blustery predictions, etc., the Rs have gone in reverse.

Their presidential candidate, Mitt Romney, seemed like he was qualified enough to be president.  Certainly qualified enough to defeat an economically-weakened Barack Obama.  So how did this happen?  Let a lifetime independent voter tell you.

If you listen to the Rs, they've got all sorts of reasons why they lost the presidency plus some senate seats.  The only correct reason is that the Rs don't have a big enough tent.  It's comprised of a declining base - whites, males, married females, social conservatives, and, um, that's about it.

Look at America.  It's becoming less white, less dependent female, less socially conservative.  Rs have to start appealing to those constituencies, or at least stop pissing them off.

But what are the conservative pundits framing as their next strategy?  To go even farther right!  They seem to believe that if they simply do a better job promoting their anti-secular, anti-immigration, anti-environment ideals, that we 'moderates' will be more likely to join them.

So, the Rs analysis of the problem is correct, but their solution is exactly wrong.  They think we independent voters don't understand them?  The problem is we understand them perfectly, and we don't like it.  Newsflash to Rs: We aren't going to like more of what we already don't like.

The crazy thing is, the Rs really weren't/aren't so far away from taking power.  Most independent voters are like America - socially liberal, but still fiscally conservative.  If the Rs would spend more time on the fiscally conservative message, and a lot less on the social issues, they'd be fine.

[This is a good time to note and give kudos to the states of Colorado and Washington for legalizing marijuana.  Talk about your trending social liberalism.  By the way folks, it's no big deal - they already have legalized alcohol, a more abusive and dangerous drug.  More about this in a future blog.]

There is plenty to dislike about the other non-major political party, a/k/a Democrats. As an independent, I think they're wrong on union support, wrong on expanded government, wrong on tax policy.  I matured (such as it is) in the 80s, during the Reagan revolution, and I actually believe in supply-side economics.

To a political independent like me, however, the other stuff matters more now.  It's encouraging to see WOITH politicians like Michele Bachmann, Steve King, and especially Bob Vander Plaats struggle so much (and in the latter case, outright lose) this election cycle.  Their message of hate, masquerading as social conservatism, has become the  millstone around their necks.

If they and the rest of the Rs want to appeal to today's independent voter, they need to go farther left, not farther right.

These People Are Not Well

It's past time to add a few new members to my list of people who are Whacked Out In The Head (WOITH).

I haven't even mentioned this acronym for over six months, the last time when I was handicapping the field of Republican presidential nominees.

Based on her campaign after I wrote that, I'm elevating Michele Bachmann to full WOITH status.  Just like WOITH members Steve King and Bob Vander Plaats, if you pulled back her skin I'm pretty certain there's an alien creature underneath.

I'm at least going to add a politician to the WOITH list while I'm on the topic. Hmmm, so many to choose from...Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell is certainly deserving, but it has to be...my own State Senator, Brad Zaun.  Not only has he never met a social conservative issue he didn't like, but he also took on the duty of campaign manager for Bachmann when fellow WOITH member Kent Sorenson quit.  It couldn't be more perfectly symmetrical than that.

To save time, I'm just going to list my new WOITH members with no explanation.  If you don't know why they belong, I suggest you Google them:

Charlie Sheen (obvious and belated omission until now)

Jerry Sandusky

Anyone with a reality show on MTV

The entire Kardashian family

And as an honorary member, I also want to include the guy down my street who put a $60,000 house on a $30,000 lot.

Truth And Prevention

I haven't mentioned WOITH member and Iowa congressman (and possibly Martian) Steve King in a while, although I could do so virtually any day.

He and his Fox News friends are at it again, this time over the new Obama administration's stance that insurers cover contrceptives as preventative care.  A controversial position, but not exactly for the flat-earth reasoning of King.  Check out the clip from this week's The Colbert Report:

http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/393824/august-03-2011/women-s-health-nazi-plan

I especially enjoyed Colbert's remark that a woman's health is a private matter between..... her priest and her husband!  Satire is funnier when it's not so far from the truth.

While I'm at it, let me take this time to officially elevate his Tea Party mistress, Minnesota congressperson Michele Bachmann, to WOITH status. Her stance to not raise the U.S. debt ceiling is effectively saying it's better to have an international economic crisis than it is for the U.S. to pay the bills it has already incurred.

It's going to be fun having her around Iowa to campaign for president, telling everyone she would do the opposite of what Obama does without ever actually saying what she would do.

Grindin'

I grew up in far northwest Iowa. It was and still is a friendly and safe place to live, work, and raise a family. It also was and still is a very socially and religiously conservative place.

I could give you a number of examples of just how conservative (including how they keep electing Steve King to Congress), but one of my favorites was how one of the local parochial high schools canceled a dance once years ago, because the students were dancing too close to each other at the previous one. I always joked (still do) about how that community later implemented a ban on kissing, because they were afraid someday it might lead to dancing! Yes, it was close to a real-life version of the movie 'Footloose'.

It's 20+ years later, and while NW Iowa is still a very conservative place, it's not as repressed as it once was. With TV and technology, it simply can't stop societal evolution. However, this week I was reminded that no matter what, there will always be someone trying to stop that evolution.

Case in point, this week a parent in my own public school district (Johnston, Iowa, a suburb of big bad Des Moines) complained to high school administrators about the dancing they've seen at school functions. That parent had chaperoned a fall dance at the school, and wrote to school officials claiming that what he saw would best be described as "a sex act, albeit with clothes on."

Specifically, the dancing he's referring to is known as 'grinding'. Basically, it's guys dancing behind girls and rubbing their frontsides against the girls' backsides. The fact that this parent would use the term 'sex act' to describe this makes me think he has either an incredibly boring or incredibly interesting sex life - but I bet it's more like incredibly boring.

The best part about this story is that, just like my kissing/dancing joke, now everybody can poke fun at the parents and school administrators. It doesn't matter if they have a point or not. A Des Moines T-shirt shop has already sold more than 100 "Johnston: Straight Grindin'" tees, and if I was a student there I'd definitely get one, too.

This story certainly made me hark back to my cloistered youth, and laugh at the idea that today some people still think that controlling dancing is critical to controlling other teenage behavior. Aside from 'Footloose' it all makes me think of one other movie. In 'Jurassic Park', the Jeff Goldblum character/scientist is not convinced that the dinosaur population can be controlled via gender genetics, because in the end, "Nature finds a way."

He means that eventually, the dinosaurs will start kissing, and it will lead to dancing, and soon societal evolution will run amok!

A New Member Of The Tyson Zone

Today I'm naming a new political inductee into The Tyson Zone. (As a reminder, The Tyson Zone is named after former boxer Mike Tyson, and is the status an athlete or other celebrity reaches when his or her behavior becomes so outrageous that one would believe any story or anecdote about the person, no matter how shocking or bizarre. http://streffblog.blogspot.com/2010/07/politicians-in-tyson-zone.html)

It's social conservative and perpetual Iowa gubernatorial candidate Bob Vander Plaats. After another failed attempt this year at being nominated as the Republican candidate for governor, he is now leading a well-financed (by others outside Iowa) fight to remove 3 Iowa supreme court justices from the bench. Their sin? Being part of a ruling over a year ago that allowed gay marriage in Iowa.

I've said before I think it's up to the people of Iowa to decide this issue (http://streffblog.blogspot.com/2009/08/for-athiests-there-is-god-of-common.html),
but through legislative means, not this this way. Removing justices for a single and defensible, albeit controversial ruling is plain stupid.

However, simply trying to remove these justices isn't what gets Bob into the Tyson Zone. For that, you have to look at what he said this week in a debate on the issue, when he asserted the ruling opened the door to the possibility of polygamy, parents marrying their children, and other similar decisions.

Not sure if Bob really believes that, or if it's just more scare tactics from a bitter man. Regardless, after saying that, I don't see how there's anything more the guy can say or do that would surprise anyone. In short, social consevatives like Bob will say or do anything to get everybody to live in the same little box that they do, bordered only by their own idea of morality.

The truth is, regardless of how anyone feels about this ruling, Iowa's social climate and culture hasn't changed in the past 1+ year. Every once in a while, gay couples come here to get married, spend some money doing so, and then usually go back to their lives. It hasn't exactly become the Sodom or Gomorrah of the midwest, and on the plus side, at least we don't subsidize its economic impact with our taxes, like we do with ethanol.

Bob Vander Plaats, join your political soul mate Steve King in the Tyson Zone.

Politics And The Tyson Zone

One of my favorite sportswriters/columnists, hands down, is Bill Simmons "The Sports Guy" of ESPN. (P.S. You should follow him on Twitter @sportsguy33.) He writes entertaining, epic length columns full of pop culture references.

Over the years, Simmons has also coined a number of phrases for which he associates and ranks a group of people or things. For example, a recurring Simmons topic is the "13 Levels of Losing" where he defines and ranks the most painful ways for a sports team to lose, like the "Stomach Punch" (a game that ends with an opponent making an improbable and game-winning play).

One of Simmons' other themes is called "The Tyson Zone," and named in honor of boxer Mike Tyson. The Tyson Zone is the status an athlete or other celebrity reaches when his or her behavior becomes so outrageous that one would believe any story or anecdote about the person, no matter how shocking or bizarre.

I've been thinking about how The Tyson Zone applies to so many people now on the political landscape. There might be a waiting list at this point, given all of the strange extremist views coming from Tea Party activists (I'm looking at you, Sarah Palin) and media goofballs (I'm looking at you, everybody on Fox News). And yes, there are plenty of Democrats that belong in it, too.

But there is a special place reserved in The Tyson Zone for Iowa's own Congressman Steve King. Over the years his greatest hits include openly insensitive remarks disparaging minorities, homosexuals, immigrants, Muslims - basically anybody who doesn't look or think like him. Dude has already earned a lifetime membership in The Tyson Zone.

If Steve King is a member of The Tyson Zone, what about all of the people who keep voting to re-relect him? It doesn't say a lot for them. On the other hand, when Mike Tyson went berzerko, it didn't stop poeple from going to his fights, either. Maybe King's constituents have been hypnotized in the same way.

Regardless, I'm convinced if you peeled back Steve King's skin you'd find some primordal creature underneath. He is.....a Martian.....in The Tyson Zone.