Breakfast with Selden Spencer

By The DFIA Training Academy Organizers

Tom Latham wants you to pay thousands to have breakfast with him. Selden Spencer only wants your time.

Our DFA training academy starts at 9:00 a.m. on Saturday, March 24th.  There, you'll learn a lot about how to run a political campaign, how to organize a fund raiser, how to craft an effective media strategy and how to target potential voters.

But what you won't get is breakfast with Dr. Spencer. For that, you'll have to show up on Saturday at 8:30 a.m.--that's where the fund raiser comes in. We're having a bake-sale for Dr. Spencer who needs all the help and he can find in Eastern Iowa.

Dr. Spencer will tell you all about his 2004 race against Latham, his visit to Afghanistan as a volunteer doctor in 2006, and how he ran a very competitive race against a long-time GOP incumbent in only 6 months time. Let's finish the job-- elect Dr. Spencer to Congress in 2008.

We hope to see all of you there...8:30 am on Saturday, March 24th.

   ‘‘Our health care financing system does not work, and it’s understandable that state legislators see a need to step in,’’ said Gordon, a senior research consultant for the Iowa Policy Project and co-author of the report — Prescriptions and Placebos: Fixing Health Care in Iowa — for the non-partisan Iowa Fiscal Partnership. ‘‘They must be careful, however, to take a long-term view and not miss the underlying problem of spiraling health care costs.’’

    Previous efforts have encouraged employer-based coverage through tax credits, small-employer purchasing pools, mandates for large employers and other ideas, said Gordon, a historian who wrote ‘‘Dead on Arrival: The Politics of Health Care in Twentieth-Century America.’’

    On their own, these proposals represent a fragmented approach to the problem that would do little to expand coverage or increase affordability, and could actually make things worse, he said.

    ‘‘I really think that trying to patch up employer-based insurance is like moving furniture into a burning house. It guarantees double-digit inflation and rising uninsurance into the future,’’ Gordon said.

A Reminder That The GOP is Alll About Shrub

By Sam Garchik

This picture is on the front page of the Voter Vault, the GOPs version of the Van. I wonder if all of the Republicans know that the GOP heads are only in it for the Shrub.

I'd love to see what the Voter Vault has, by the way, so if any of you have any logins, please let me know. Unlike the VAN, it's national, which means that state Republicans in Iowa use it. And by the way, it was made overseas. Gosh, they really love America.

That brings me to my next point.

Iowa Progress broke this story about Eric Palmer's opponent, Danny Carrol, who scams old ladies out of their money. This must be what Republicans mean when they talk about helping "President Bush's Agenda for America."

Tom Latham, doing his aprt to help the "Agenda for America," has gone negative on Spencer, probabaly because Spencer received three major endorsements (Mason City Globe-Gazette, Des Moines Register, and Ames Tribune). Meanwhile, Spencer has a good ad running, which can be seen right here.