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Jan 22, 2025 | 
bleedingheartland.com | Randy Evans |Laura Belin |John Kearney |Gerald Ott
Iowans deserve transparency on government employee departures Tuesday, Jan 21 2025 0 Comments Randy Evans is executive director of the Iowa Freedom of Information Council, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that promotes openness and transparency in Iowa’s state and local governments. He can be reached at [email protected].
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Jan 20, 2025 | 
bleedingheartland.com | Laura Belin |John Kearney |Gerald Ott |Bruce Lear
At least ten Iowans are among some 1,500 people President Donald Trump pardoned on his first day back in the White House. The sweeping proclamation affects everyone convicted of offenses related to the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Most of them will receive a “full, complete and unconditional pardon.” Fourteen named individuals, who were leaders of the extremist groups Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, will have their sentences commuted to time served.
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Jan 19, 2025 | 
bleedingheartland.com | Laura Belin |John Kearney |Gerald Ott |Bruce Lear
What had been obvious for weeks became official on January 14. Hours after Pete Hegseth’s confirmation hearing in the Senate Armed Services Committee, Senator Joni Ernst announced in an interview with WHO Radio’s Simon Conway and later in a news release that she would vote to confirm President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for secretary of defense. It never seemed likely Ernst would stand in Hegseth’s way.
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Jan 17, 2025 | 
bleedingheartland.com | John Kearney |Laura Belin |Gerald Ott |Bruce Lear
John Kearney is a retired philosophy professor who taught at Saint Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He has lived in Waterloo, Iowa for the past six years. On January 9, 2025, Robert Barron, Roman Catholic Bishop and prelate of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester in Minnesota, posted on the social media platform X (formerly Twitter):I was watching highlights from President Carter’s funeral service at the National Cathedral in Washington, DC. I found some of the speeches very moving.
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Jan 17, 2025 | 
bleedingheartland.com | Laura Belin |Gerald Ott |Bruce Lear
One of the biggest spenders on behalf of U.S. House Democrats launched digital advertising this week targeting U.S. Representatives Mariannette Miller-Meeks and Zach Nunn in Iowa’s first and third Congressional districts. The ads, enclosed in full below, claim the GOP incumbents “could cost you more,” because they support President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for health and human services secretary, Robert F.
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Jan 16, 2025 | 
bleedingheartland.com | Gerald Ott |Bruce Lear |Laura Belin
Governor Reynolds, the condition of the state is not strong Thursday, Jan 16 2025 0 Comments Gerald Ott of Ankeny was a high school English teacher and for 30 years a school improvement consultant for the Iowa State Education Association. I watched Governor Kim Reynolds’ Condition of the State message on YouTube on January 15, the day after she spoke to state legislators. I followed along with the text from her official webpage. If she left out a word, I missed the omission.
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Dec 27, 2024 | 
bleedingheartland.com | Gerald Ott
Gerald Ott of Ankeny was a high school English teacher and for 30 years a school improvement consultant for the Iowa State Education Association. “We recognize as a board and as a district that the lives of many of our students and their families will be impacted because of immigration policy,” said Des Moines Public Schools board member Maria Alonzo.
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Dec 14, 2024 | 
bleedingheartland.com | Gerald Ott
Gerald Ott of Ankeny was a high school English teacher and for 30 years a school improvement consultant for the Iowa State Education Association. Belatedly, I listened to the Iowa Down Ballot podcast released on November 28. I say “belatedly” because, since the election, a new “breaking news” story surfaces every day, usually one more shocking than the day before. It has been doubly true in the week since Thanksgiving.
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Nov 15, 2024 | 
bleedingheartland.com | Dani Replogle |Laura Belin |Gerald Ott |Matthew Thornburg
Dani Replogle is a staff attorney with the national advocacy group Food & Water Watch. The Midwest’s iconic prairie potholes and other wetlands across the nation are under attack. A politically motivated lawsuit targeting the popular “Swampbuster” provision of the 1985 Farm Bill aims to erode a policy that has protected wetlands and supported farmers for nearly four decades. The case–CTM Holdings, LLC v.
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Nov 13, 2024 | 
bleedingheartland.com | Lora Conrad |Laura Belin |Gerald Ott |Matthew Thornburg
Lora Conrad lives on a small farm in Van Buren County. Sassafras. One of my favorite smaller trees, Sassafras albidum, is considered native to Iowa. However, it has been found in the wild only in one or two counties along the Mississippi River, one of which is Lee, adjacent to Van Buren where I set out two in my yard. Sassafras is prevalent across the southeast and northeast, including adjacent Missouri and Illinois. It is a member of the Laurel family.
