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Tuesday, September 30
Incumbent Molly Regan Runs for Scott Co. Soil & Water Commission
by
Linda Thieman
on Tue 30 Sep 2008 05:00 AM CDT
Incumbent Molly Regan Runs for Scott County Soil & Water Conservation Commission
by Linda Thieman
 Scott County's Molly Regan was one of the success stories that came out of the Howard Dean movement in 2004. Inspired by Dean to run for local office, Molly found herself in a tight race for Soil & Water Conservation Commissioner. To our delight, she pulled it off and has been serving ever since. Molly is currently up for re-election. Molly is also serving as co-campaign manager for Steve Smith of De Witt in his run for Iowa House District 83.
Four years ago, Molly wrote this piece for Blog for Iowa about some of the DFQC folks' bus trip down to the Harkin Steak Fry. Here's what she said about the excitement amongst the progressives on the Iowa political scene when Barack Obama leaped into the national consciousness at the Democratic National Convention that year.
 Molly Regan speaks at the Sierra Club/Eagle
ViewChapter at the Bettendorf library.
About half an hour west of Davenport, I put in the tape from the Democratic National Convention I had brought along. The bus we rode had 6 small TVs overhead and a tape deck! So we watched...You guessed it... GOVERNOR HOWARD DEAN. The man received a two-and-a-half minute standing ovation even before he could speak! We also heard Barack Obama. Several people on the bus had not heard his speech. How inspiring that man is. He will probably be president some day.
Molly, you may be right!
Monday, September 29
Quad City Earth Summit, Oct. 11, 2008, Davenport
by
Linda Thieman
on Mon 29 Sep 2008 05:00 AM CDT
Quad City Earth Charter Summit, Oct. 11, 2008, Davenport
 Global Climate Change: Generating Hope and Energy
Join them for a day of exploring facts and possibilities. Walk away with hope for the future and energy to make a difference.
Saturday, October 11th, 2008
8:00 am - 4:00 pm
The River Center
136 East 3rd Street
Davenport, Iowa
cost: $20 - includes the organic lunch, or $10 without lunch.
Guest speakers include our own Molly Regan, Soil & Water Commissioner, Scott County
2008 has been named the United Nations' Year of Planet Earth. A perfect time to emphasize Earth Charter's role in healing the planet.
Register Early
call: 563-323-9466
Sunday, September 28
McCain's Top 10 Temper Tantrums
by
Linda Thieman
on Sun 28 Sep 2008 05:00 AM CDT
McCain's Top 10 Temper Tantrums
 As former GOP Senator Rick Santorum put it, "Everybody has a McCain story."
If you like astonishingly vulgar temper tantrums, you'll love John McCain's Top 10 Blow-ups, posted over at Eyes on Obama. Be forewarned, Number One is a doozy. And this is how he treats his own wife? Ugh.And in other news . . .
From Bloomberg.com
Senator John Kerry: McCain said "he was going to interrupt his campaign to come down and save the negotiations,'' according to the Massachusetts Democrat. "What he did was interrupt the negotiations to come down and save his campaign.''
Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd said in a CNN interview today that McCain's trip was "a political stunt'' that "delayed and slowed down this process.''
Poll: Obama Did Better in First Debate
A new USA TODAY/Gallup Poll shows 46% of people who watched Friday night's presidential debate say Democrat Barack Obama did a better job than Republican John McCain; 34% said McCain did better.
Obama scored even better -- 52%-35% -- when debate-watchers were asked which candidate offered the best proposals for change to solve the country's problems.
For more information on the poll, click here.
Sarah Palin's bad, bad week
Over at Midwest Voices
Sarah Palin is trying to pick herself up after several knockdowns this week. It's been a bad, bad week for the GOP vice-presidential nominee.
On Friday, nationally syndicated conservative columnist Kathleen Parker withdrew her support for Palin. Parker said Palin isn't prepared to be vice president or president, and said Palin should withdraw as John McCain's running mate.
Earlier in the week Palin looked anything but vice presidential in an interview with CBS News anchor Katie Couric. Palin fumbled her answers to questions on the economic bailout and America's relations with Russia.
Disappearing Stories
By the way, have you Googled today? It seems that a number of anti-Palin articles and anti-McCain articles which are still showing up on the Google News index have been taken down. They have moved to Disappearedsville. I noticed one was from FoxNews, although why they ever put an anti-Palin article up in the first place is a question worth asking. Perhaps it was because it was a direct AP feed. The other was an article by film critic Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times about McCain's bad manners. Hmm. Reminds me of how all those votes for Kerry just suddenly disappeared 4 years ago.
Friday, September 26
Part 4: The Shameful History Behind Iowa’s English Only Policy
by
Linda Thieman
on Fri 26 Sep 2008 05:00 AM CDT
Part 4: The Shameful History Behind Iowa’s English Only Policy
by Nancy Thieman, LMSW, Sioux City, Iowa
 An original Blog for Iowa exclusive in four parts
Government-sponsored Coercion Leads to Mob-mentality Violence
The fact that the State of Iowa and the U.S. Marshall officially supported the anti-German sentiment that was rabid in Iowa led citizens to take liberties with people and property that they no doubt would not have during more peaceful times. For instance, it was fairly common for German churches and businesses to be vandalized with yellow paint. In 1917, in Hamburg, Iowa, the Lutheran church had its windows broken and yellow paint thrown all over the church, both inside and out. This was said to be the mark of the “slacker,” or one who did not support the war full out.
Even on Armistice Day, the day the war officially ended at 11:00 am on November 11, 1918, the mob mentality was in full swing. One merchant in Hamburg, Iowa, was informed by a group of men that all businesses were going to close their doors at 11:00 am in honor of the armistice. The merchant said he would shut his doors at noon. The men roughed him up for not cooperating, and he fled out the back of the shop and hid out until after dark. In the meantime, a huge crowd of men gathered and waited for him to return. The street was completely blocked till nightfall until most of the men in the mob finally gave up, too hungry to wait any longer, and went home.
As the War Ends, Anti-German Sentiment Gains Ground
In many instances, it was not until the war had ended that the enforced Liberty Bond sales and the slacker courts reached the full thrust of their power. In fact, many county councils employed returned soldiers to enforce their authority and harass the German-speaking population.
A full six months after the war had ended, in April, 1919, the Iowa legislature passed a law requiring that all instruction in schools in Iowa be in the English language, legitimizing at least a portion of the Babel Proclamation. Foreign languages could only be taught in ninth grade or above, a dictate which seems to have consequences even today as most Iowa public schools do not offer foreign-language classes until ninth grade.
Modern-day Language Policy in Iowa
In 2000, former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack made a big push to bring new immigrant populations to Iowa to bolster the dwindling workforce. Ironically, almost as soon as the newcomers got here, Gov. Vilsack turned around and signed a bill into law making English the official language in Iowa. The 2002 Iowa English Language Reaffirmation Act also encouraged non-native speakers to improve their English skills and, shockingly, to assimilate into “Iowa’s rich culture” (SF 165, Section 1a, 2002). But thankfully, Iowa has come far enough that the legislature felt no pressing need to try to force assimilation by outlawing foreign language use. In fact, the law stipulates that “nothing in this section shall disparage any language other than English or discourage any person from learning or using a language other than English” (SF 165, Section 5c, 2002). That, in and of itself, is a 180 degree turn in Iowa language policy in the last 90 years.
Whether the Babel Proclamation and the 1919 Iowa law requiring all school instruction to be in English ended up having the effect that Iowa’s Gov. Harding had hoped they would have, or whether the German language died out naturally, one would no doubt be correct if one concluded the worst. It seems likely that the death of German was hurried along in Iowa by the official anti-foreign language policies, the English-only school law, and the widespread system of persecution of German speakers. In fact, researcher Nancy Derr goes so far as to say that this persecution and “the pressures it put on Iowa’s society led to the virtual obliteration of the self-confident, aggressive German-American community.”
Allen, L., (1974). Anti-German sentiment in Iowa during World War I. The Annals of Iowa, 42, 418-429.
Davidson, M.E., (1979, July/August). The homefront: Hamburg, Iowa. The Palimpsest, 60(4), 116-120.
Derr, N., (1979, July/August). The Babel Proclamation. The Palimpsest, 60(4), 98-115.
Frese, S., (2005, November). Divided by a common language: The Babel Proclamation and its influence in Iowa. The History Teacher, 39(1), 59-88.
Thursday, September 25
Part 3: The Shameful History Behind Iowa’s English Only Policy
by
Linda Thieman
on Thu 25 Sep 2008 05:00 AM CDT
Part 3: The Shameful History Behind Iowa’s English Only Policy
by Nancy Thieman, LMSW, Sioux City, Iowa
 An original Blog for Iowa exclusive in four parts
Targeting the Average German Speaker
There are many instances of outrageously-large fines being levied and enforced if citizens were overheard speaking German in public. In Scott County, in the day of party lines, four women of German ancestry were fined $225 for speaking German on the telephone. That is the rough equivalent of $3,200 in 2006 dollars.
In the Lowden incident mentioned in part two, four men, all naturalized citizens in their fifties and sixties who had spoken out in favor of the Rev. Reichardt, were arrested and taken forty miles to the Cedar Rapids court. There, they all denounced the reverend, and charges of “treasonable utterances” were dropped. They were released without a fine, but were ordered never to speak German again.
The Ironically-named Liberty Bonds
Next came the enforced coercion of the Liberty Bonds, an ironic name being as German-Americans were forced to buy them to prove their loyalty to the country that was abusing them. According to Allen, each federal reserve district would be assigned a quota for bond sales and then local committees would be responsible for meeting that quota. In Iowa, the local committees would snoop into the business of private citizens, including looking at property records, bank accounts and other assets, and then determine exactly how many Liberty Bonds each person was required to purchase.
At first, no one paid much attention to these “requests” for money. But once the systematic enforcement set in, people were much more willing to part with their hard-earned cash. This enforcement was made up of public lists of those who had and had not paid up, i.e., loyalty lists; the distribution of cards telling how much each person was required to pay; and frequent warnings of negative consequences for not paying. Citizens who did not “give” a sufficient amount were taken before “slacker courts,” yet another method of extra-legal intimidation which was supervised by the county Council of Defense and which seemed to prove very successful. In fact, 400 people were summoned before the slacker court in Council Bluffs in one year. And in Black Hawk County and elsewhere in Iowa, the sheriff would be so good as to accompany you to the court if you decided not to show up on your own.
In one case on record, a farmer from Newton, Iowa, named Peter Frahm, was called before the post-war slacker court at the Courthouse in Jasper County. He had apparently balked at paying the required $1350 that the committee had decided was the amount that would prove his loyalty. The intimidation seemed to work, since his name never showed up in the records again. To guarantee his safety and that of his family, Mr. Frahm had, in the end, forked over the modern-day equivalent of $16,225.
Tomorrow on Blog for Iowa
Government-sponsored Coercion Leads to Mob-mentality Violence, Part 4 of The Shameful History Behind Iowa’s English Only Policy
Allen, L., (1974). Anti-German sentiment in Iowa during World War I. The Annals of Iowa, 42, 418-429.
Derr, N., (1989, Summer). Lowden: A study of intolerance in an Iowa community during the era of the First World War. The Annals of Iowa, 50(1), 5-22.
Dollar Times Inflation Calculator. (2007). Retrieved September 21, 2007, from http://www.dollartimes.com/calculators/inflation.html.
Wednesday, September 24
Part 2: The Shameful History Behind Iowa’s English Only Policy
by
Linda Thieman
on Wed 24 Sep 2008 05:00 AM CDT
Part 2: The Shameful History Behind Iowa’s English Only Policy
by Nancy Thieman, LMSW, Sioux City, Iowa
 An original Blog for Iowa exclusive in four parts
A System of Coercion
The Babel Proclamation was not an Iowa law, per se. Nevertheless, the Babel Proclamation’s English-only policy appeared to carry the weight of law through a system of coercion, which included arrests by county sheriffs, neighbors spying upon neighbors and reporting what they saw, and “extra-legal” court proceedings that instilled themselves with the authority to fine and jail suspects who did not cooperate when money was extorted from them for “Liberty Bonds” or who were reported to be disloyal Americans—the only offense being that they were “caught” speaking German.
As researcher Leola Allen explains, during and even after World War I, “concern for the loyalty and patriotism of all Americans approached paranoia in many sectors of the nation. Iowa was particularly affected because many Iowans were of German birth or ancestry.” In fact, during World War I, each state set up a Council of Defense that organized the enforced patriotism. These councils had what were called “secret service” agents (no relationship to the modern-day Secret Service under the Department of the Treasury) who investigated purported acts of disloyalty, such as speaking the German language, and who used their pressure tactics to enforce the no-foreign-languages proclamation.
Targeting the German-language Ministers
Iowa’s Gov. Harding strongly believed that the German-speaking leaders of German-stock congregations “undermined trust in the nation with their indecent tales, communication in code, [and] their fanatically loyal following.” Therefore, one of the first groups targeted in the coercion campaign was the German-speaking ministers.
In one case, the Reverend Baushoff, pastor of the German-language congregation of the German Evangelical Church in Denver, Iowa, in Bremer County, said that he would take up arms to defend his right to preach in German. When he continued to deliver his sermons in the German language, he was “visited” by the Iowa secret service agents and quickly was “convinced” to sign a paper agreeing to give services only in English.
In Alta, Iowa, the Lutheran pastor, a Reverend Mennoich, who spoke no English at all, refused a “leave of absence” to study English, and was summarily called before a “board of military affairs,” where he promised to be “good.” One wonders how this “good” Reverend supported his family once he was forced from his profession.
In Cedar County, outside of Lowden, Iowa, the German immigrants and their children made up 81% of the population. This area was a hotbed of coercive behavior. For instance, when the German-language pastor of the Zion Evangelical German Reformed Church, the Rev. John Reichardt, voiced objections to public claims of German atrocities, maintaining that German cultural traditions and cultural consciousness deserved respect, a U.S. Marshall was sent to arrest him on charges of sedition under the guise of a law passed by the U.S. Congress in June, 1917. The judge “took pity” on Rev. Reichardt, exacted a promise to use his power for good, and let him go after he paid a $5000 bond to ensure his appearance in court, the rough equivalent of $84,750 today.
Tomorrow on Blog for Iowa
Targeting the Average German Speaker, Part 3 of The Shameful History behind Iowa’s English Only Policy
Allen, L., (1974). Anti-German sentiment in Iowa during World War I. The Annals of Iowa, 42, 418-429.
Derr, N., (1979, July/August). The Babel Proclamation. The Palimpsest, 60(4), 98-115.
Derr, N., (1989, Summer). Lowden: A study of intolerance in an Iowa community during the era of the First World War. The Annals of Iowa, 50(1), 5-22.
Dollar Times Inflation Calculator. (2007). Retrieved September 21, 2007, from http://www.dollartimes.com/calculators/inflation.html.
Sharon Avery, Archivist, State Historical Society of Iowa, personal communication, September 7, 2007
Tuesday, September 23
The Shameful History Behind Iowa’s English Only Policy
by
Linda Thieman
on Tue 23 Sep 2008 04:54 PM CDT
The Shameful History Behind Iowa’s English Only Policy
by Nancy Thieman, LMSW, Sioux City, Iowa
 An original Blog for Iowa exclusive in four parts
When the southern states succeeded from the Union at the start of the Civil War in 1860, there was one little-acknowledged consequence that had far-reaching effects on the growth and expansion of the nation. Because the U.S. Congress no longer had to face the opposition from the south, they were able to pass through a bill called the Homestead Act of 1862.
The Homestead Act allowed for immigrants to come to America to receive the allocation of 40 to 160 acres of undeveloped public land. After five years residence on the land, the “homesteader” would pay a nominal fee and receive ownership of the land. The homesteader was also required to have built a house on the land and developed at least 10 acres for farming or timber. The Homestead Act mainly covered the plains states in the great Midwest. Iowa was included in the area proscribed by Congress.
The Homesteaders
In Germany, at that time, farmland was passed from father to son. A second son would, therefore, be without land or income of his own. The appeal of owning one’s own farmland was great amongst these German farmers who were without land and who were in danger of being conscripted by a militaristic government, and the Homestead Act set off several waves of emigration out of Germany. Many of the homesteaders from Germany took up land in Iowa.
In fact, according to U.S. Census data, just over 7,000 German-born people lived in Iowa in 1850. But by 1890, just forty years later, the German-born population of Iowa had reached its peak at over 127,000. What’s more, this figure does not include the families of these immigrants, i.e., their children and grandchildren who were American-born and yet German-speaking. So the German-speaking population of Iowa, by the turn of the 20th century, was substantial.
The Life of the Community
During the late 1800s and the early 1900s, the heart and soul of every German-immigrant community in Iowa was the German-language church. This produced, for the German-born minister and his flock, a kind of isolation and independence whose power came from their own sense of self-worth and their dedication to the will of the Lord. These congregations/communities were rooted strongly in religious, cultural and linguistic tradition, and had developed such a sense of self over the decades that they were almost impervious to outside pressures from the non-German-speaking community.
The Babel Proclamation
Once the Great War in Europe started in 1914, anti-German sentiment became rampant in Iowa. Hatred against Germans was visible everywhere, as English-speaking ministers preached against them and newspapers vilified them. Soon, in Iowa, public schools were forbidden to offer German language classes, and German language teachers were fired en masse. German books were burned, parochial schools forced to close, and German church services outlawed by town councils. Most German-language newspapers in Iowa had been pressured or forced to shut down their businesses, and the average man or woman on the street would be scolded or physically attacked when heard to be speaking German in public. Iowa’s German immigrant community and their offspring had become scapegoats for the war acts of the Kaiser.
This growing hatred and bigotry was given Iowa’s official stamp of approval a year after the U.S. entered the war. In May of 1918, in what came to be known as the infamous “Babel Proclamation,” then Iowa Gov. William Harding issued an edict proclaiming that “English only” would be allowed in Iowa—the first and only state in the Union to have an official policy aimed at persecuting German speakers. The idea was to “homogenize” or “standardize” the population; to make everybody a “real American,” one who looked, acted and spoke “American.” Throwing off one’s “foreignness,” then, was seen as an act of patriotism.
Tomorrow on Blog for Iowa
A System of Coercion, Part 2 of The Shameful History Behind Iowa’s English Only Policy
Derr, N., (1979, July/August). The Babel Proclamation. The Palimpsest, 60(4), 98-115.
Hansen,
Z. K. and Libecap, G. D., (2004). The allocation of property rights to
land: US land policy and farm failure in the northern great plains.
Explorations in Economic History, 41(2). 103-129.
Who came to Iowa?, (1981, November). The Goldfinch 3(2), 14.
The Savings & Loan Collapse and McCain's Role in it
by
Linda Thieman
on Tue 23 Sep 2008 05:00 AM CDT
The Savings & Loan Collapse and McCain's Role in it
by Devilstower, Daily Kos
 A concise explanation of the Savings & Loan collapse and the role John McCain played in it as a member of the "Keating Five"
"Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is Enemy Action."
-- Auric Goldfinger
James Bond's wealthy nemesis may have had an obsession with gold, but he judged, quite correctly, that if people keep putting your plans awry, that was likely their intent.
In 1982, the same year John McCain entered the Senate, a bill was put forward that would substantially deregulate the Savings and Loan industry. The Garn-St. Germain Depository Institutions Act was an initiative of the Reagan administration, and was largely authored by lobbyists for the S&L industry -- including John McCain's warm-up speaker at the convention, Fred Thompson. The official description of the bill was "An act to revitalize the housing industry by strengthening the financial stability of home mortgage lending institutions and ensuring the availability of home mortgage loans." Considering where things stand in 2008, that may sound dubious. It should.
Seven years later, the S&L industry was collapsing. What was the cause? And what was the role of John McCain in the collapse?
Read the rest of the article here.
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