A Year in Iowa

Armstrong's army vs. cancer: It's war

mike.hlas — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 13:12:00 GMT

Aug. 27, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- An amazing thing happened in downtown Cedar Rapids Monday and will do so again this morning. The word ‘‘amazing’’ was used by Lance Armstrong.

If Armstrong considers something amazing when he has been the very definition of the word, we probably shouldn’t disagree.

The Lance Armstrong Foundation’s Presidential Cancer Forum was held with four Democratic presidential candidates Monday in the U.S. Cellular Center. The second round today will feature two Republican candidates. In individual sessions before an arena floor-full of intent listeners, Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, Dennis Kucinich and Bill Richardson answered cancer-related questions of Armstrong and MSNBC’s Chris Matthews. Today, Sam Brownback and Mike Huckabee will attend. All major-party presidential candidates were invited.

Those who skipped the event missed a great chance to speak in depth on a serious issue instead of being limited to 90-second snippets in a debate format that lends itself to heat more than light. It was yet another example of Armstrong’s willpower getting something done. The more time that passes, the more the 35-year-old is making his seven straight Tour de France championships look like an ordinary accomplishment compared to what he’s now doing.

Armstrong has raised more than $65 million in the fight against cancer through the sale of yellow ‘‘Livestrong’’ wristbands alone. That’s just a sliver of what he’s done since he was diagnosed with testicular cancer in 1996, launched his foundation in 1997, and won Tours every year from 1999 to 2005.

The mission statement of the Lance Armstrong Foundation is to inspire and empower people affected by cancer. Which is or has been almost all of us, really. So Armstrong organized this forum in Cedar Rapids, smack-dab in presidential caucus territory. He phoned most of the candidates himself. Six have come.

‘‘I personally thought it was amazing,’’ Armstrong said after Monday’s event. ‘‘I think you had a lot of very important people, a lot of significant candidates there. They discussed the issue that we wanted them to discuss. ‘‘We obviously think something that kills 600,000 Americans a year deserves having all of the front-runners here.’’

Five years ago, Sports Illustrated called Armstrong a ‘‘hope machine.’’ He was once given a 40-percent chance to live. Ever since his recovery, he has said he has the obligation of the cured. Apparently, part of that obligation in Armstrong’s mind is to get presidential candidates on the record about what they’re going to do to lead a war. A war on cancer, that is.

Richard Nixon signed the National Cancer Act in 1971, declaring a war on the disease. But it hasn’t been fought with full force in Washington, has it?

‘‘Why wouldn’t you talk about the number one killer in the country?’’ Armstrong asks on his www.livestrong.org Web site. ‘‘The immediate goal is, really from today until election time for me personally, is to make sure that whatever candidate or candidates we have now and ultimately the two that want to be president, discuss the number one killer in this country just like they would discuss war or terror or taxes. ‘‘So that’s my objective now. I think I have an army of people behind that want to see that happen as well.’’

A word Armstrong often used Monday in questions to candidates was ‘‘priorities.’’ ‘‘This just comes down to an issue of priorities,’’ he said after the forum. It does seem like it should be just that simple. This year, 1.4 million Americans will be diagnosed with cancer. As Armstrong said, 600,000 Americans will die from it this year.

Six hundred thousand.

Maybe it takes someone who bicycled up the French Alps faster than anyone else and has never slowed down, an unstoppable hope machine. Armstrong has his army, and has declared his war. A just war.

Clintons, Then Fireworks

mike.hlas — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 20:40:00 GMT

July 4, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- Hillary and Bill Clinton were exiting the Waypoint Madge Phillips Center for homeless women and their families in downtown Cedar Rapids, and bar owner Gary Cooper was trying to make a new customer.

"Bill, come over and have a free beer!" said Cooper, who was holding court and a brew of his own outside his Coopacabana, across the street from Waypoint.

The former president, casually attired in a black polo shirt, blue jeans and cowboy boots, smiled and waved. But he never moved toward the bar. Instead, he got into a vehicle with his wife the presidential candidate, and left almost two hours before downtown's annual Fourth of July fireworks extravaganza that always attracts several thousand people.

From a porch on an old house on Sixth Street SE, about 15 African-Americans quietly observed the Clintons and their support staff as they slowly made their way from Waypoint to their cars. That may have been more blacks than were in the crowd of several hundred at Clinton's campaign stop a block away at Green Square Park. But no one among the young and old people on that porch had anything negative to say about Sen. Clinton or her husband.

"Everybody on this porch, I imagine, is a Democrat,'' said 62-year-old retiree Charles Cook of Cedar Rapids. "I vote. I sure do.

"I like Hillary, yes. Because her husband did a good job. He sure did. I believe she'd be a great president. Women run the country, anyway. She's a smart lady. She's a very smart lady. That's what we need. We need someone to work for working people.

"That other guy is talking a good game, but he'll never make it. What's his name?''

Obama, someone else on the porch told him.

"I feel like Hillary has a chance to win it. I don't believe (Obama) has a chance.''

When asked his feelings about President Bush, Cook look like he bit into something sour.

"Ohhhh, he caused a whole lot of trouble for this country. I've got nephews and nieces in Iraq right now. Yes sir, I sure do. And I don't know for what, really. No, no Bush."

Cook left Tennessee in 1966 to take a job in Iowa., and stayed.

"Now you see all the jobs leaving here to go South,'' he sighed. "It used to be that all kinds of jobs were in Cedar Rapids. No more.''

Cook had no interest in walking the four or five blocks it would have taken to join the masses at the fireworks display. Much like he didn't want to be in the throng at the Clinton rally, which was just a block or so from that porch.

"You get too close, you can't really see them,'' he said.

He was talking about the fireworks. I think.

Game Night for Five "Teams" in Cedar Rapids

mike.hlas — Sat, 02 Jun 2007 20:11:00 GMT

June 2, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- "Is this the best damn pep rally you've ever been to in your life?"

The answer certainly was arguable, but it was understandable why first-term U.S. Congressman Bruce Braley of Iowa asked the question Saturday night. The Iowa Democratic Party's annual Hall of Fame Celebration in downtown Cedar Rapids was pep rally all the way.

About 800 people stuffed a ballroom in the Crowne Plaza Five Seasons Hotel to cheer for their team, and their specific players, five of whom are running for president. In attendance were Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Chris Dodd, John Edwards and Bill Richardson. Each spoke for 10 minutes or so. Each had their core of supporters in the room waving signs and cheering as they entered and exited the stage to specifically chosen music. None of the five said anything new or groundbreaking. You fans are great, they said. Our team is great. We have to fight, fight, fight for victory.

Or something like that.

I've covered sports for a quarter-century in this area, and just about every time I cover one of these campaign events someone jokingly asks me if this is sports. If it isn't, it's very close. The main difference is that games are played frequently in sports, while elections roll around only very two, four or six years depending on the office. Sports and politics have press conferences upon press conferences, strategy discussions, pep talks. Then, at least like in baseball where there's no salary cap, the team/candidate with the most money has the best chance to contend for the championship.

On one side of downtown's First Avenue East, a crowd of Clinton supporters wore similar T-shirts and chanted their support for the New York senator. Across the street, groups of Edwards and Dodd backers did the same. Barack Obama didn't participate in this event. Had he been here with his many young followers, there would have been enough chirping on First Avenue to drown out all the cicadas in Cedar Rapids, who have recently emerged from their 17-year hiatus.

Edwards added to the festive football-type atmosphere with a 13-member drum corps from Dubuque Senior High School. After playing on the sidewalk for about an hour, they made their way into the hotel to follow the candidate before he headed to the ballroom. That got things kind of loud in the hotel. The drummers' payoff, as far as I could tell, was post-performance pizza.

One difference between sports and politics is that sports teams have different colors. Candidates running for president all feature combinations of red, white and blue. The signs waved vigorously by fans of Clinton and Dodd were blue with white lettering and red stripe running through them. Edwards' signs were white, with blue and red lettering. That, one presumes, is because they're all very patriotic.

No more than a hundred feet apart on the hotel's second floor -- with the walls completely covered by red-white-and-blue signs of all the candidates -- Dodd's people were chanting "D! O! D! D!'' while Clinton's were yelling "I! O! W! A!, Hillary Clinton all the way!''

Sophisticated stuff, it wasn't. Not that anyone seemed to mind. This wasn't a night for policy debate. This was, as Braley put it, a pep rally. There was even popcorn, in small plastic bags that were plentiful in the hotel bar.

The popcorn was provided by the Clinton campaign and came with labels with messages like "Are you ready for change? I'm ready to lead! Hillary.''

"I think this is my eighth trip (to Iowa this year),'' Clinton told the crowd. "I plan to spend so much time here I'll be able to caucus for myself before it's over."

"Man, I love being back in Iowa,'' Edwards proclaimed.

"It's so great to be in a sea of blue in Iowa,'' said Biden.

"I will be in every home (in Iowa)," Richardson said. "Well, let's not overdo it."

No, we wouldn't want anyone overdoing it.

Biden's give (mostly)-and-take

mike.hlas — Mon, 07 May 2007 13:26:00 GMT

May 7, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- Joe Biden came to see us this morning.

By us, I mean the Cedar Rapids Gazette. He spent an hour and 10 minutes giving very long answers to very short questions from the editor, the vice president/general manager, the political writer, and the newsside columnist, who also has a role in the paper's editorial department. Oh, and there was me, the dilettante.

"My only shot is you guys grilling me and making conclusions if I should be hanging around," Biden said, "because it sure won't be the money."

Meaning, the Democrat U.S. Senator from Delware who is running for president isn't playing in the Clinton-Obama league when it comes to fundraising.

So he, like most of the presidential candidates seeking to attract as much possible attention in Iowa, Biden pays visits to local television and newspaper people in Iowa when the opportunities arise. The most obvious benefit: He'll get a story and a photograph in tomorrow's Gazette, and the same on Gazetteonline.com and its Iowacaucus.com site. In turn, the newspaper can say it hosted Biden, asked him direct questions on the public's behalf, looked him in the eye.

Mike Deupree, the aforementioned columnist, challenged Biden on a couple of his remarks, one being a comment he made last week to a citizen at a South Carolina political event. It was later broadcast on C-SPAN.

Asked by a voter what Congress will do if President Bush vetoes the Democrat-backed Iraq funding bill as expected, Biden said he would move immediately to secure money for armored vehicles with raised, V-shaped hulls that deflect the force of homemade bomb blasts.

"The idea that we're not building new Humvees with the V-shaped things is just crap. Kids are dying that don't have to die," Biden said, adding "Second thing is, we're going to shove it down (Bush's) throat."

Biden told us the proper context of the "shove it down his throat" remark wasn't conveyed on the broadcast. The clip can be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QB2tcKt-Pgk

Deupree did what good journalists do. He asked a legitimate question about a serious matter. Though he vigorously defended and explained his remark, Biden didn't seem offended by the question.

A free press met someone running for president who was willing to be questioned by it. Few others among the busy people in the Gazette's downtown offices were even aware Biden was in their building. But in one the newspaper's conference rooms, the democratic process was in session.

Dodd Meets Iowa Diversity: Cinco de Mayo in West Liberty

mike.hlas — Sat, 05 May 2007 14:03:00 GMT

May 5, 2007

WEST LIBERTY, Iowa -- In most Iowa communities, Cinco de Mayo might seem like St. Patrick's Day in El Paso. An excuse to drink, but without much apparent local relevance.

According to 2005 U.S. Census estimates, 2.3 percent of Iowa's population was of Hispanic or Latino descent. Nationally, it was 12.8 percent. Iowa's population of whites who aren't Hispanic is 91. 5 percent. Nationally, it was just 66.9 percent.

Perhaps the biggest complaint from non-Iowans about Iowa's first-in-the-nation status when it comes to holding its January presidential caucuses is the state's lack of demographic diversity.

"Tell them to come to West Liberty,'' Sen. Chris Dodd said here Saturday afternoon as he dropped into town for an hour to visit a Cinco de Mayo celebration in Ron-De-Voo Park.

There, in a small open space between two old brick buildings downtown that house a pharmacy and a movie theater, Dodd met about 100 people in this working-class town of 3,600. Directly across the street from the park, Hawkeye Pizza and Steak is between La Mexicana Restaurant and Buelitos Mexican American Food. Around the corner, American Legion Post 509's next-door neighbor is Acapulco Mexican Bakery.

West Liberty is 40 percent Hispanic. Over half of the students in kindergarten through eighth-grade here are Hispanic. The town's newspaper, the West Liberty Index, prints its stories in English and Spanish. The first Hispanic graduate of West Liberty High School was Manuel Sebot in 1929. For a century, people of Mexican descent have lived in this town, 18 miles from Iowa City and the University of Iowa. Many came to work for the railroad. For the last several decades, many have worked for what is now West Liberty Foods, a turkey-processing plant that employs 900.

Rod Perdue, a self-described "Caucasian with some Heinz 57 mixed in," called the plant "an 800-pound gorilla." Formerly owned by General Foods, it's the town's dominant structure.

Dodd, a Democrat from Connecticut, didn't encounter any sort of similar diversity in his previous campaign stop in Burlington, or in the one that followed in West Branch, the birthplace of former U.S. president Herbert Hoover. That town of 2,300 is 95.7 percent White Non Hispanic. In other words, it's typical Iowa.

Dodd gave a very brief speech to the gathering here. Several audience members were small children far more interested in their blue balloons. Dodd gave some of his remarks, including the closing ones, in Spanish. Those of Mexican descent in the audience acted as if he was fluent in the language. Dodd said he learned Spanish in the language in the late 1960s while he was a Peace Corps volunteer in the Domincan Republic.

He then went from person to person slapping shoulders, shaking hands, posing for photos, kissing the occasional old woman, and using more of his Spanish when meeting the young Hispanic women selling tacos de barbacoa and nachos. Their food stand was next to the one belonging to a group of whites, who sold hot dogs, bratwursts and turkey filets. More than a few stomachs in the park were melting pots.

Dodd, said Carmen Gonzalez, "was nice," though she seemed unsure who he was or why he was visiting her town. Many of her white neighbors in the park probably felt likewise.

Most of this diverse group of people seemed far more interested in hearing a middle-aged Hispanic man strum his guitar than listen to an outsider discuss politics. It was a holiday, of sorts, after all.

Dodd and his staffers then traveled the 12 miles from West Liberty to West Branch, where he held a town hall meeting on renewable energy. Different town, different crowd, different kind of event. On this near-perfect spring Saturday afternoon, eating nachos or hot dogs and listening to music seemed preferable over politicking.

The candidate would probably have agreed.

Giuliani Leaves Two Young Would-Be Supporters Wanting

mike.hlas — Fri, 04 May 2007 13:43:00 GMT

May 4, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- As long as you have a crane and a forklift handy, you might as well use them to hold up an oversized -- and I mean oversized -- paper U.S. flag.

So it was late Friday morning in an equipment and parts shed on the grounds of Rexco Equipment, where a somewhat hastily planned Rudy Giuliani campaign stop was held. Word got out to enough of the Republican faithful in the Cedar Rapids area and beyond, and a crowd of 125 got shelter from a light rain inside the shed.

"You here for the event?" a Giuliani staffer asked a senior female as she entered the shed.

She wasn't there to pick up a rough terrain forklift.

Actually, most of the skid loaders and excavators and backhoes Rexco sells to contractors and housing developers were cleared from the shed in favor of chairs and a few small sets of bleachers for the attendees and a platform for Giuliani. A local business was hired to bring in a sound system. The music, almost all country, was selected by the Giuliani campaign. Just how much country music has the Italian-American from Brooklyn enjoyed over the years?

Amid the GOP loyalists ranging from young adults to retirees, two faces stood out. One had a thick chain draped around his neck. His hair was dyed scarlet. The other wore a corduroy jacket with a patch on its back that was attached by four safetypins and said "Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols." That's the 30-year-old album by the Sex Pistols that was a punk rock celebration of disgust, nihilism and raw guitar. Rolling Stone helped me write the previous sentence.

They were Kennedy High School seniors James Woodell and Derek Hamilton, 18-year-olds. Are they anarchists? Nothing of the sort. Although, Woodell did lead a group of 20 Kennedy students last April in protesting the school's policy of mandatory attendance for its spring sports assembly. Here, however, they were attentive audience members with "RUDY" signs.

"Rudy's kind of a different face,'' Woodell said. "I think he'll be able to bring the two parties together. It's all politics, no policy anymore."

"It's the candidate more than the party,'' said Hamilton. "It's not like I think of myself as a Republican or a Democrat. I want to vote for whoever I think will run the country the best.''

"It's not about partisanship anymore,'' Woodell said. "We have to move past that if we're going to develop as a nation. Partisanship is what's tearing us apart. We've just done terribly of handling these last few years

"We're just hoping for something to change, something better, so we're trying to fight for that. We believe in voting very strongly, we believe in personal citizen action. We're just trying to get informed about the issues. I think that's a big problem. People just don't know enough anymore. We just don't care, especially the youth.''

Hamilton said his other interests included "life itself, really. I just like taking everything in, like music and philosophy. I'm into studying everything about the universe, like biology and anthropologies."

So these were two bright, engaged kids about to become high school graduates in a month. They also were skipping school.

"We probably should be in class,'' Woodell said. "But we figured it was more important to get active-learning here. This is real-world stuff, not book-learning. This is what's going to matter the next four years when we go vote. This is a big deal. Missing one day of school's not going to kill us."

What the two young men learned from the 45 minutes they spent listening to Giuliani was they weren't in sync with the candidate as much as they thought or hoped they would be. Giuliani was very partisan in his remarks, clearly portraying himself as a pro-Iraq War Republican. That played well to the majority of the crowd, but not so much to the two fellows who can attend the Iowa caucuses for the first time next January.

"Personally, I don't agree with a lot of his policies,'' Hamilton said as Giuliani posed for photos after his speech and question-and-answer session.

"I'm a little bit disappointed that he's a big supporter of the war,'' said Woodell. "He keeps talking about how he's going to cut taxes, but we spend more on the military than the rest of the world combined. What else is he going to cut? Is education going to be cut? Are subsidies to farmers going to be cut? I'm just a little bit worried about where he's going to go with this.

"But he's definitely the best on the Republican side. If the Democrats don't get it together they're going to lose to him."

Then the two friends filed out of their active-learning classroom and into that light rain, still holding on to their RUDY signs, perhaps not knowing quite what to do with them.

Obama's audience gets some satisfaction

mike.hlas — Sun, 22 Apr 2007 15:00:00 GMT

April 22, 2007

IOWA CITY, Iowa -- "This is April, but it was very powerful."

So said 60-year-old Gary Sanders of Iowa City about Barack Omama's Earth Day speech on the grounds of the University of Iowa's Pentacrest. And Sanders says he's "neutral, non-committed'' when it comes to the field of presidential candidates. He didn't sound too neutral after the event that he and about 5,000 others attended on an idyllic spring day.

"I was actually surprised at my reaction to him,'' said Sanders, an activist for local labor. "Because up until now, I've thought he was more 'rock star,' to be honest.

"He was fabulous. Very, very energized. A really incredible speaker, incredible heart. He spoke to people, he connected with people. He really did. ... He has that potential -- potential -- to be the first candidate since Bobby Kennedy who can speak to black and white, workers and professionals, people across the spectrum who want to turn the page, who just feel that enough's enough.''

Sanders wasn't the only member of his age group here by any means, but this was a young crowd on a college campus in what probably is the most liberal city in Iowa. Obama's insistence that the U.S. must remove its troops from Iraq, that teachers should be paid and valued more in this country, that the American health care system is broken -- these were things that would play to this particular crowd were they to come from any candidate.

But would any other candidate attract 5,000 people here on a Sunday afternoon in April when Iowans wait several months for a Sunday afternoon in April like this one? It was warm, sunny, breezy, perfect.

This "rock star" thing gets beaten to death, but it seemed more than fitting as virtually everyone on the Pentacrest lawn stood to get a glimpse of Obama and click an image of him on their picture-phones as he worked his way to the stage. U2's soaring "City of Blinding Lights'' blared from amply-sized amplifiers, booming off the Old Capitol and other buildings on the grounds.

Bono and Barack.

The song opens with:

The more you see the less you know
The more you find out as you go
I knew much more then than I do now

Voters would probably hope the second line is to be taken more literally than the first or third when applied to their candidates.

But these songs aren't chosen haphazardly. Amid popular modern-day rock anthems played here before Obama arrived (his campaign is big on U2 songs), the Rolling Stones' Vietnam-era classic "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction'' was included. That seemed a better fit for some in the crowd, like 29-year-old Kristi Lohmeier of Iowa City, who works for the non-profit, non-partisan Iowa Policy Project.

"I watched (Obama) speak yesterday in Des Moines,'' Lohmeier said. "I met him. I looked him in the eyes. I have a brother that's on his third deployment right now with the Army and I just looked him in the eyes and said 'Bring my brother home, please, bring him home." If I were to say that to George Bush, I think he would say nothing. He would be totally blank. I could see in Barack's eyes that he felt my fears about my brother being deployed."

But the passionate were intertwined with the merely curious. Some were there because it was the place in Iowa City to be for an hour, to see a celebrity, and move on. Others staked out their viewing positions long before the event started. But like the crowd of 2,200 that packed Kennedy High School in Cedar Rapids to see Obama over two months ago, virtually all in attendance seemed to listen attentively. Like 19-year-old Erica Clausen of Portland, Ore., a goalkeeper for the university's women's soccer team. She also attended a speech former President Jimmy Carter gave in the University of Iowa's Carver-Hawkeye Arena last Wednesday night.

"I haven't decided who I want,'' Clausen said. "(Obama) went up a few notches in my book. Some people said he wasn't very strong at public speaking, but I definitely thought he was pretty strong at it.

"I feel like everyone's kind of up in the air right now.''

I worked at the University of Iowa's student newspaper in 1980. Carter easily outpolled Ronald Reagan for president in Iowa City and Johnson County voting. On that Election Night, some of my co-workers seemed stunned when they learned the nation hadn't fallen in line.

"You can't lull yourselves and delude yourselves into thinking the crowd here is a microcosm of voters in America,'' Sanders said. "What we saw here today was yonger, more middle class and upper middle class, people not committed to power structures, more highly educated.''

But when Democratic flavor-of-that-moment presidential candidate Howard Dean campaigned in Iowa City's City Park on Labor Day, 2003, the gathering was a few hundred. Sunday, over four months further from January's Iowa caucuses than that day four years ago, a campaign appearance was the focal point of this campus and city for a day.

"The amount of people that are here today, to me, is incredible,'' Lohmeier said. "It's very exciting. I relate this feeling I have now to what people must have felt when JFK was president. It's really somebody that cares. I've never felt that way about George Bush. I really didn't feel that way about (Bill) Clinton, honestly. But I think Barack has an energy around him and he comes from a genuine place. He comes from a grass roots background.

"For a lot of people the last eight years that have been working at a grassroots level trying to make a difference and just get beaten down and beaten down, Barack stands for something that they can actually put themselves behind and win. It's just a great feeling.''

It was, in the words of U2 and many here, a beautiful day. "Flawless,'' said a young Obama campaign volunteer.

It also was Iowa City.

Old Can Be Gold For Candidates

mike.hlas — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 14:17:00 GMT

April 20, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- Bill Richardson made one campaign stop in this city of 123,000 people Friday, to a senior center.

If you aren't from Iowa, you might ask if this was a good use of precious time for a presidential candidate. It's a presidential caucus here next January, not a presidential primary. You don't just drop in and vote, you participate for a few hours. You barter, you lobby, you listen. Then you vote. On a winter night. In Iowa.

But the candidates quickly learn that Iowa skews old, and that going out in potentially frigid weather for a night of political participation doesn't scare off Iowans who care about the process. No matter their age.

Richardson spoke to an audience of about 75 at downtown's Witwer Senior Center. The gathering was about two-thirds seniors. All seemed to pay close attention to the Democratic governor from New Mexico. A few asked pointed questions.

For all of Richardson's lines that got light laughter ("I'm not a rock star ... but close," "I'm going door-to-door. Well, door-to-door is a little difficult. I just drove up from Des Moines. There weren't too many doors when I drove up."), the one that got the biggest laugh was delivered by a male senior when Richardson facetiously claimed "I don't see any old people here."

"You got my vote!" the man in the crowd instantly responded, earning howls from his fellow seniors.

If 59-year-old Richardson could actually connect with Iowa seniors that easily, he'd have some traction in trying to close the distance between himself and Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards, the real "rock star" Democrats in the race. Combined, those three will visit Decorah, Des Moines, Dubuque, Indianola, Iowa City, Marshalltown, Muscatine, Newton and Oelwein by the end of the weekend. Richardson needs to make a lot of friends and create a lot of new supporters just to be part of the discussion.

"Just give me a chance," Richardson asked the gathering here. "You know, we've got ten (nine, actually) months to go and they've already announced the winners. My God -- you have a responsibility as Iowans. So bring your candidates and test them and scrutinize them, look in their eyes. I believe I'm the best qualified. I have the most experience."

Cedar Rapids' Doreen Meier, 73, looked into Richardson's eyes, scrutinized him, and enjoyed what she saw and heard. But it may not be enough.

"I really like Governor Richardson, I've admired him from afar," Meier said. "He's very qualified. I think he cares about what happens to people. We need to dialogue, talking rather than taking up arms. I'm always for that."

But ... "I do have a certain candidate in my heart and in my mind."

She wouldn't name her favorite. With nine months still left of Iowa campaigning, Richardson needs all possible caucus-goers to keep their hearts and minds open at least a crack.

"I've met quite a few of the candidates," Meier said. "It's going to be a horse race. Out of the respect we need to give them, I try to listen and learn.''

Whether she'll attend the caucus simply isn't a question.

"It's an honor for me to go. I'm proud of our state being the first in the nation to go. It behooves all of us here to go."

Meier grew up in London. She and her husband moved to California in 1955 when she was 21. They returned to England for 10 years, then moved to the U.S. for good. She became a U.S. citizen in 1979. She raised seven sons here.

"When my sons travel abroad, I want them to be as well-received as I was in the United States by Americans. I love America, and I take great pride in getting my citizenship here. It's been very good to me. I want that to happen for everybody, to get the respect I was given.

"I'm an activist. I was one of the 'Kerry babes' when he ran for president. We feel we need to stay together, stay focused. We meet regulary every week. I feel we will work again for a campaign because we care, and this is a beautiful state."

This was one of the hearts and minds Richardson wooed Friday. An older one, yes, but one whose voice and vote will count as much as any other next January.

"I will be here ... forever,'' Richardson said, exaggerating for comic effect, though not with total success. "I'm not going to just drop in and do a rally in a gym and then leave."

But once his hour at the senior center was done, he was in a Chevrolet Impala on the road to the University of Northern Iowa for a late-afternoon talk on Darfur and international peace missions. UNI is in Cedar Falls,

Before he took off, he said: "We're going to Cedar, uh, Cedar, uh ..."

"Falls!'' several in the crowd responded.

"We're in Cedar Rapids, right?" Richardson asked, knowing he was. But he was serious when he asked "Where are we going now?" to his staffers before climbing inside the Chevy.

That was Cedar Falls, Governor, about 60 miles north of Cedar Rapids. It has confused many others who aren't from here.

During his address to the Cedar Rapids crowd, he struggled to remember the name of a regional economic agency.

"It's hell to get old," Richardson said about himself. Now that got a laugh.

Tancredo: Immigration Man Among Immigration Men

mike.hlas — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 23:46:00 GMT

March 24, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- Surrounded by hundreds of guns of all sorts and a Taser or two, a presidential candidate and several citizens complained about security.

In fact, the only topic of the candidate or those he chatted with was immigration. You heard nary a word about Iraq at the Cedar Rapids Gun Show at Hawkeye Downs Fairgrounds. It was all immigration, or rather, illegal immigration.

The candidate for immigration reform, Rep. Tom Tancredo of Colorado, worked a receptive room this Saturday afternoon. He was preaching to the choir, a choir of voices who want either immigration laws changed or enforced more strictly to keep illegal aliens from taking U.S. jobs while not paying U.S. taxes.

"I like this place!" Tancredo exclaimed in the middle of an animated give-and-take with people who had an immigration complaint of their own for each the congressman cited to them. "This is a good crowd. You know the issues."

It was one issue, actually. Nothing was said between candidate and potential Iowa caucus-goers on Iraq, Iran, health care, the economy or the environment. Their political world seemed to begin and end at the border separating the United States from Mexico.

"You cannot ignore this," Tancredo said. "If you think you're gonna solve any of this (immigration) stuff by pretending it doesn't exist, you're crazy. Most folks who are either running for office or are my colleagues in Congress do not want to deal with this."

Those engaged in discussion with Tancredo amid all the Glocks and Smith & Wessons did want to deal with it.

"As a citizen, I'm supporting him,'' said Craig Halverson of Griswold, Iowa. "I agree with what he has to say. He's the one Christian conservative that's out there running. He's pro-life and I'm pro-life. He's for the Second Amendment, and I'm for the Second Amendment. And he's for the border being sealed."

Halverson, retired after 22 years in the U.S. Air Force, is the director of the non-profit Iowa Minuteman Civil Defense Corps.

"I'm trying to grow chapters of the Minutemen in every county in the state," he said. "I want all my guys to get with the Legislature and let the Legislature know we want them to do the people's work. English is the official language of this state. We want to keep that. For over 230 years, English has been our language. I'm happy with that and the majority of Americans are happy with that. Why is there a push for us to change the language to Spanish? I am against that."

Halverson stressed that he supported Tancredo only as a citizen, not in his Minutemen capacity. He did, however, wear a T-shirt touting Tancredo. He also wore a black armband.

"I'm not mourning for the brave American soldiers that are dying in Iraq," he said, "who I support all the way. I'm mourning for the 47,000 innocent American citizens that have died by the hands of illegal aliens since 9/11."

Last week, the subject of immigration came up often for Sen. John McCain during his campaign swing through Iowa, catching him by surprise. “Immigration is probably a more powerful issue here than almost any place that I’ve been,” McCain said.

"Wherever he went," Halverson said, "the topic was illegal aliens. They're not illegal immigrants. The proper term is 'aliens.' They are aliens to our country. He was in shock because that's the only topic, basically, that people put to him. And he's from Arizona, where it's out of control. Why is he shocked? It's across the country now."

The Minutemen want to identify illegal aliens, who employs and houses them, and demand that the government and law-enforcement agencies enforce immigration laws. Minutemen, Halverson said, "are retired military, retired police officers. Just good, strong American citizens, patriotic. They're tired of seeing what's going on, and they're tired of the government not enforcing the laws.

"I am, too. I've got nine kids. I've got a lot of grandkids. I'm worried what their future brings. I'm scared to death because of what's going on in this country, and that's what got me involved."

But what about ... Iraq?

"President Bush says we're at war," Halverson said. "Why are we sending our National Guard over to Iraq when we're at war with terrorists? Our border should be secured first. Take care of the home base first, and then you go somewhere else and do your wars or whatever you need to do. You take care of home first, and that means sealing the borders.

"Two-thirds of the American people are with us. They're just not out there. But the number is growing."

Thompson: Town to Town, Week After Week

mike.hlas — Wed, 14 Mar 2007 13:33:00 GMT

March 14, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- They aren't talking about Tommy Thompson on the Sunday morning news shows, or on O'Reilly, Olbermann or Matthews. They aren't writing about him in Newsweek, Time, or In Touch. His comments don't instantly show up on Drudge or the Huffington Post.

When it comes to the Republican candidates for president, it's all Rudy Giuliani, John McCain, Mitt Romney. But as many people in Iowa, and maybe more, are at least as vaguely aware of former Wisconsin governor Thompson as former Massachusetts governor Romney. Tommy's from a border state, after all. And that neighbor has logged a lot more time trying to woo support in next January's Iowa caucuses than Romney. Or Giuliani. Or McCain. Or the three of them combined.

"Wisconsin was a debtor state. It was a state where people went to escape their debts. He turned that around," said Jurine Moore of Mount Vernon, who has seldom failed to attend the Iowa caucuses. She came to see Thompson at Konstantino's restaurant in Cedar Rapids Wednesday. That doesn't necessarily mean Thompson will be Moore's candidate. But it does mean, to her, that he is a serious candidate. The same goes for Loren Flater of Toddville.

"Am I totally committed to Governor Thompson?" Flater posed. "I won't say that. I still haven't heard from Giuliani. But I like Thompson's track record. I like his creative thoughts. I like his ideas and have liked his ideas for years, and that's the reason I've come here today. I think I maybe found my man."

Such comments have to offer a little hope to a candidate the national press probably writes off as hopeless. No such national press followed Thompson from Des Moines to Cedar Rapids to Clinton Wednesday. But Thompson keeps covering ground and shaking hands, wearing out car tires and speaking in front of a lot of places where Iowans go to eat.

This day, it was a new Greek restaurant on the bank of the Cedar River. In the last few weeks,Thompson has made campaign stops at Big Muddy's Restaurant in Burlington, Smoky Row Coffee Shop in Oskaloosa, Okoboji Grill in Newton. He's attended a Belgian waffle breakfast at the American Legion in Indianola. He returns to Iowa Saturday, with a stop at the Pizza Ranch in Manchester.

McCain, Giuliani, Romney - they're everywhere, working their national campaign strategies. Most of Thompson's time is focused on Iowa, not New Hampshire, Nevada or South Carolina. Iowa is his one shot at gaining any sort of traction nationally.

"I've got to win Iowa,'' Thompson said before his 25-minute speech to a group of about 65 Linn County Republicans in the back of Konstantino's. "No bones about it. It's like when Jimmy Carter came up here and put his future in Iowa. I am doing the same thing. I've got to carry Iowa. I believe I can, and I believe I will."

Thompson, 65, isn't glib. He's no surefire sound bite. The next invitation he gets to appear on Letterman or Leno will be his first. He's Elroy, Wis., not Hollywood, Calif. He is, however, relentless.

"Nobody's spending time here like I am,'' he said. "I've been here every single week since the first week of December. I'll be here last night and today and tomorrow. I'll be back Saturday. I want people to get to know me. I want their vote, and I think it's starting to pay off."

In getting elected in 1986 for the first of his four terms as governor, Thompson said "I surprised everybody because I outworked everybody. I outworked everybody in the primary, I outworked the Democratic governor in the general election, and the people responded."

While people lunched on bruschetta and spiced chicken wings and listened, Thompson stood with his back against a window that looks out on the Cedar and gave a 25-minute speech on topics ranging from welfare reform, medical diplomacy, and, of course, Iraq. He then fielded questions. Finally, he stood in a narrow hallway in the restaurant as Republicans paid their respects to him and he to them, one at a time. Even if they hadn't wanted to, they would have had little choice but to converse with the candidate on their way out.

"You're just what I wanted here," one man told Thompson.

"I knew you'd like me if you got the chance to know me,'' was the reply, without an apparent trace of humor.

"I came here just knowing him by his reputation," said Forrest Rosser of Cedar Rapids as he neared Thompson in the reception line. "I was very impressed by his presentation. He could be a good president."

One Iowan at a time, town to town, coffee shop to pizza joint, week after week after week.

That 65-year-old guy buying underwear and toiletries in Coralville's Wal-Mart after 2 a.m. a couple weeks ago? That was the former U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, a man running for president of the United States. He had flight snafus getting from San Diego to Chicago to the Eastern Iowa Airport in Cedar Rapids because of harsh winter weather, but made it in after 1 a.m. His luggage did not. Four hours later, he was awake to start another day of campaigning, which would be curtailed by an ice storm. He said the weekend before that he had been on a plane in Iowa that sat on a runway for six hours before it finally got the go-ahead to take off.

“I would have to be either running for president or crazy,” Thompson told the San Diego Union-Tribune, before adding “or both.”

"People know that I'm sincere. They know that I care about Iowa,'' he said here Wednesday. "I'm telling them I'm not going to be just a fly-by type of person. I'm going to be here."

Dodd: "Do You Know Who I Am?"

mike.hlas — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 19:43:00 GMT

Feb. 20, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- This week, the New York Times had an article about presidential campaigning in this state, with the headline "In Iowa, the Living Room Has Fallen Out of Favor."

It suggested the intimate gatherings that once defined Iowa's political events have yielded to the big rooms, with bigger crowds and bigger press corps.

It's true, as the Times story mentioned, that Hillary Clinton spoke to a few thousand Iowans in Des Moines and Davenport a few weekends ago, and Barack Obama attracted four-digit crowds in Cedar Rapids and Ames. John McCain and John Edwards campaigned in hotel ballrooms, not private living rooms, in Iowa last weekend. But most who will attend Iowa's presidential caucuses next January probably remain picky shoppers, not impulse buyers. They still want to see candidates' body language up close, get gut-feelings about these people who seek their support.

So it was this night in a Cedar Rapids pub and grill called the Irish Democrat. "That's a redundant title to a bar," joked Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd, who is both Irish and a Democrat, and happens to be running for president.

Appropriately wearing a green necktie, Dodd met about 50 people in the bar, most of them Linn County Democrats who stopped in to meet the senator. There was no stump speech, just hand-shaking and back-patting, introducing himself to people one and two at a time. After Obama had filled a high school gym here and McCain packed a ballroom in a downtown hotel within the last two weeks, a presidential campaign stop in Cedar Rapids resembled most of the hundreds that had come to this city over the last few decades. It was small-scale, personal, and not accompanied by a glut of national media.

Which means one thing: Dodd, 62, is a dark horse in the Democratic field, out of the bright light cast by Clinton, Obama and Edwards. He insists he isn't a bit disheartened by it. Maybe that's because he could be more able to easily move about Iowa and meet more of its potential voters than the aforementioned trio.

"I believe in retail politics," Dodd said. "When I first ran for Congress there were 60 towns in the Congressional district. We debated each other 60 times. Sometimes there were more candidates in the room than there was an audience.

"If there were not an Iowa or New Hampshire, I'd be out here having a beer with you at the Irish Democrat, but I wouldn't be a candidate. Because it wouldn't be possible for me to be one. This state allows me to take my 26 years of experience in the United States Senate that involved every major foreign policy debate, authored almost every piece of major legislation involving families and children in the last 25 years, as well as was a major force on the financial services area, to be heard.''

But this wasn't a night for sounding like a policy wonk. Facing a wall that featured photos of John and Robert Kennedy, Hubert Humphrey, Jimmy Carter and Tip O'Neill, Dodd went from table to table in the Irish Democrat to try to warm strangers to an Irish Democrat most of them knew little about.

"I'd be happy to have a thousand people show up,'' Dodd said. "But I know it's an essential liability for (Clinton and Obama) in a way. Because Iowans don't just want to go to a rally. They want to sit down and look you in the eye. It's almost a physical process.

"They do something here that I've always thought is so important, I don't care what office you're running for. It's a question voters ask candidates that is never articulated directly. Too many people in public life think campaigns are about them. Campaigns are rarely about the candidate. They're about the voter. That sounds cute, what do you mean by that? I mean the following:

"You may ask me a question as a voter. The question you're really asking me, particularly the first time we meet, is 'Are you listening to me? Are you paying attention to me? Do you know what I'm going through? Do you have any idea what it's like to lose your job? Senator, do you have any idea what that's like?' That's what you're asking me. If I don't answer that question or series of questions formatively for you, you never get to my eight-point program on energy, or health care.

"Don't misunderstand me. If I don't have answers on the intellectual side, I'm not suggesting you can get away with that. But frankly, this is a far more primal exercise than it is an intellectual one. It becomes intellectual."

This day for Dodd included meeting about 50 people at an Iowa City coffee shop, touring a Johnson County neighborhood center, meeting with an IBEW council in Cedar Rapids, and stopping in a Cedar Rapids pub where many a presidential candidate has wandered through over the years. It was a lot of "Are you listening to me?"

"I've often said if I could have one thing said about me at the end of my public life, it would be the great anecdote about old FDR,'' said Dodd. "His casket is going down Pennsylvania Avenue in April of 1945. A reporter is interviewing the crowd about their recollections of him. Some guy seemed to be grief-stricken more than the rest. The reporter says, 'You must have known Franklin Roosevelt.' He said they never met. "So why do you seem more grief-stricken than the rest?' He said 'I didn't know him, he knew me.' I remember hearing that 30 years ago and thinking what an incredible thing to say about someone.

"To me, that's really what goes on in Iowa and New Hampshire. People ask that question 'Do you know who I am?' "

With 11 months left until Iowa's caucuses, Dodd can answer it many times. He'll probably do it in a living room or two along the way.

This time around, Iowa is McCain's audience

mike.hlas — Sat, 17 Feb 2007 15:56:00 GMT

Feb. 17, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- You can't come off looking like the grim reaper if you want to get elected to anything other than, well, grim reaper.

That isn't the easiest thing to avoid when you're 70 years old, you're about to discuss deadly serious global issues, and you're on a campaign schedule that would beat down people a half-century younger. Like Chicago last night, Des Moines, Cedar Rapids and Davenport, Iowa on this day, South Carolina tomorrow, and onward.

So Arizona U.S. Senator John McCain tries to warm crowds with old chestnuts of jokes before soberly explaining why he believes the U.S. must maintain and increase its military presence in Iraq.

"Two inmates at a state prison are in a chow line,'' McCain told a crowd of about 450 this afternoon in a ballroom at the Crowne Plaza Five Seasons Hotel. "One of them said to the other one 'The food was a lot better in here when you were the governor.' "

"Do you know the difference between a lawyer and a catfish? One is a scum-sucking bottom-dweller and the other is a fish. There goes the lawyer vote.''

"Following Phil Gramm (who introduced McCain here) sometimes, I feel like Zsa Zsa Gabor's fifth husband where on the wedding night he said 'I know what I'm supposed to do, I just don't know how to make it interesting.' That's the kind of line that goes over better at Republican women's club meetings.''

Jokes about Zsa Zsa Gabor's long line of marriages faded from comedians' monologues back when Ronald Reagan was president. McCain referenced Reagan four times here, but in more relevant contexts. But hey, Zsa Zsa is newsworthy again, so maybe McCain's on to something there. Her eighth and current husband, Frederic von Anhalt, filed papers in California this week seeking to establish paternity of the late Anna Nicole Smith's daughter. Which some have found pretty funny in itself.

But McCain is running for president. Like he did seven, eight years ago. Unlike seven, eight years ago, he isn't bypassing campaigning for support in the Iowa caucuses to focus on the New Hampshire primary. He used the phrase "my friends" at least a dozen times in addressing this gathering of people who were almost entirely strangers to him. He's looking for all the new friends he can grab, since his support of the Iraq War and President Bush's intent to send another 21,500 troops there isn't an overwhelmingly popular stance these days.

And, the sprinkling of his old jokes aside, his tone was very serious. So was his audience.

"We lost the Vietnam War and we came home,'' he said. "All we had to do is heal the wounds of that war and of those men and women who had suffered so grievously in that conflict. But (the North Vietnamese) didn't follow us home. If we leave Iraq, I am convinced (Al Qaeda and other Islamic extremists) will want to follow us home. Why am I convinced of this? If you read al-Zawahri, if you read bin Laden, if you read these people, it's not Iraq they're after. It's us they're after. It's us. It's the United States of America.

"This is now, whether it was before, another part of this great struggle betwwen good and evil, and real evil as you know it. People that enjoy cutting off peoples' heads on the Internet. People that enjoy torturing and killing people just because they happen to be Sunni or Shiite or some other religion."

Had Joe Biden not changed his schedule on this Saturday, two men with a total of 54 years of service in the U.S. Senate would have been at presidential campaign appearances just three blocks apart on the same Cedar Rapids street. They would have touted two vastly different philosophies on what the nation should do in Iraq. But Biden interrupted his weekend trip to Iowa to fly back to Washington Friday night for Saturday's Senate vote on a nonbinding resolution rebuking the president's deployment of additional troops into Iraq.

McCain called the nonbinding resolution "a publicity stunt," skipping it to stay in Iowa. So, he probably got more publicity from this trip than he would have otherwise.

Funny how that worked out.

Who says Obama has charisma? Everybody

mike.hlas — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 18:10:00 GMT

Feb. 10, 2007

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa -- One moment in Barack Obama's "conversation" here Saturday afternoon produced a lot of soft, skeptical chuckles.

"There's a big crowd today," Obama said late in his talk to the gathering in the gymnasium at John F. Kennedy High School, where none of the 2,200 seats appeared empty. "But let's face it. The novelty's going to wear off. It'll be 'Oh, it's Obama again. He's coming to town. A ballgame's on, I've got things to do.' But that's OK. What that means is we'll be able to meet in smaller groups and house parties.''

That was when the snickers seeped from the bleachers. A house party for this guy? Somebody better have a whopper of a living room. Based on the size and interest of a crowd here for a presidential candidate 11 months before the Iowa caucuses, it's doubtful any residence in this city of over 100,000 people will suffice as a campaign stop for Obama anytime soon.

"This is the biggest crowd I've spoken to," this district's first-term Democratic U.S. Congressman, David Loebsack, told the crowd before Obama arrived. He wasn't joking.

Obama gave his "I'm in" speech Saturday morning in Springfield, Ill. Here in his first Iowa stop as an official candidate, the Democratic U.S. Senator from Illinois held what was billed as a "conversation." That seems to be a buzz word early in this presidential campaign. Hillary Clinton had a self-described "conversation" with Iowans two weekends ago. Obama had one here Saturday afternoon, and presumably had one in Waterloo Saturday night and would have one in Ames Sunday before flying back home to Chicago. A conversation apparently consists of a candidate giving opening remarks for several minutes, then offering long answers to questions from five or six citizens out of 2,200.

Whatever this was called or whatever it was, a lot of locals were dialed into in it. When a long line of people willingly waits more than five minutes outdoors in single-digit temperatures for doors to open for anything, they're either really curious or really passionate. This audience had plenty of both types. They roared when Obama and his family entered the Kennedy gym, and they roared even louder when he said "This is the first of many visits I'm going to make to Cedar Rapids." They made a collective "Ohhhhh" of disappointment when they were told there was time for just one more question.

But while some are calling Obama a "rock star," this event didn't come with a light show and an ear-puncturing decibel count. If anything, the heat was turned just a bit down. The predominant visual from the event was of faces old and young of different colors sitting intently, focusing on the senator's words. Everyone waited until an Obama sentence was finished before they sounded their approval. There was no foot-stomping or whistling once he began the hour-long talk. These people came to listen.

"You could tell everyone was attentive. You didn't have to strain to hear him,'' said 60-year-old Mike Wright of Cedar Rapids.

Wright said he won't need to wade through the numerous other Democratic candidates for president as they flow through here this year. His guy was in this gym.

"I'm on board," he said. "The others seem to be the same-old, same-old. I don't think he's running for himself. I think he thought about it, and I think he's running for this country."

Others here, many who didn't balk when asked to wear an Obama decal upon entering the school, weren't as committal but were no less impressed with his opinions on the Iraq war, health care, education and national security.

"I came looking today," said Linda Whittle of Cedar Rapids, 62. "I intend to see all the candidates that come to town, all the Democratic candidates as they come to town, at least. I loved his answers. I thought they were thoughtful. I love the fact that he was against the war from the beginning. I was so disheartened when Democrats went along with that war resolution.

"I was really concerned about his 'quote' lack of experience, but his life experiences are immeasurably important. I think that's where Bush has gotten us in trouble, in that he just does not have the intellectual curiosity. I don't know that he had traveled outside the United States or into Europe before he became president.

"We just got back from Europe. As the news and everyone reports, they are not very fond of our president and they were not very subtle about feeling us out to see where we were coming from as we were standing in line for two hours to get into the Vatican."

Frederick Thomas, 36, is an African-American formerly from Chicago but now a 6-year resident of Cedar Rapids. He sat in one corner of the bleachers and observed Obama. I'd been to four different presidential candidates' stops in the previous 13 days. No blacks were in attendance. There were more than enough at Kennedy to make Cedar Rapids look more racially diverse than it really is.

"The president we have now has pretty much failed the country as a whole, I believe,'' Thomas said. "We definitely need some changes. We definitely need someone like Barack Obama because he has charisma."

Charisma. That, not "conversation," was the real buzz word of the day. It just kept popping out of peoples' mouths here.

When asked what he liked about Obama, Wright said "Just his charisma. He seems to have good ideas, he's intelligent."

"He just has that ability to transcend generations, races," Whittle said. "Very articulate. He just has that charisma."

Oh, that "rock star" stuff? That became far more perceptible after Obama's "conversation" as he oh, so slowly worked his way out of the gym while signing autographs and getting his picture taken.

A girl wearing sweatpants that identified her as a member of Kennedy's cross country squad squealed and hopped around after Obama signed her copy of his book "The Audacity of Hope."

"I touched his hand!" another teenaged girl giddily shouted at a friend. "I touched his hand, too!" was the reply. "I'm not gonna wash it!"

Who knew that advocating better pay for schoolteachers and a withdrawl of U.S. troops from Iraq by March, 2008 got kids so excited? One wonders if fellow Democratic candidates Joe Biden or Bill Richardson or Tom Vilsack will induce anything resembling hysteria from teen girls as they travel Iowa this year. On second thought, one doesn't.

"He's something different," said a calmer, but nonetheless enthusiastic Ashley Hartkemeyer, a 23-year-old U.S. history teacher at Jefferson High in Cedar Rapids. "A lot of young people are excited about Obama."

Hartkemeyer said she hasn't decided on a candidate, "but I'm very excited about Senator Obama's announcement this morning. I think he's a nice change, a young face.''

And ... "He's someone with a lot of charisma."

Romney's Red Meat

mike.hlas — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 15:36:00 GMT

Feb. 8, 2007

MONTOUR, Iowa -- He says he's made 16 or 17 trips to Iowa since deciding to consider giving this presidential thing a swirl. Mitt Romney probably needs a lot more to really get known here.

"I never heard of him," LaVerna Watson told me while working in the post office in the town of about 250 people, unaware that a candidate for president had been across the street.

"Are you him?" she sheepishly asked me. When I assured her I wasn't, she appeared a bit relieved and said "Well, good luck to him. There's a lot of 'em."

Presidential candidates are plentiful these days, and they'll be widespread in Iowa through the next 11 months leading up to the state's presidential caucuses. But they rarely stop in this central Iowa town with a restaurant, a meat locker, an auto-repair shop, and little else for business.

"I don't know of a presidential candidate ever coming here before, and I was born and raised just north of Montour," said Joyce Wiese of rural Toledo, less than 10 miles from here, on the other side of the Meskwaki Tribe's casino/hotel complex.

But that changed when former Massachusetts governor Romney rolled into town in the front half of a 2-car caravan. He rode in a maroon Chevrolet Impala on a day that began with temperatures under zero degrees Fahrenheit.

Romney campaigned at a lunch-hour event in Rube's Steakhouse, which long ago put Montour on the map in Iowa. If you're from Iowa, you've probably at least heard of Rube's if not stuffed yourself there. It's a modest, grill-your-own place with large charcoal grills situated in three different areas of the restaurant. But on this day, the Romney campaign hired Rube's staff to prepare fat sirloins and baked potatoes for a gathering of about 130, most of whom were seniors who spoke and applauded like true-red conservative Republicans.

"I like what he stands for. I thought he made real good sense," Wiese said after Romney gave a speech and then took a few questions from the audience."

"I have a son in the military," said Wiese's friend, Donna Gitausis of Tama. "I just don't like people yapping about how we should get out of there (Iraq). We've got to stay and we've got to win.''

"I wish we could get the media to tell the true story," Wiese said. "You talk to guys that have come back, and what they know and what the media tells you are on opposite ends. I just think it's pathetic that (the media) come back and tell the stuff they do and let the people overseas hear that."

Like the other two women, Audrey Lutes of nearby Gilman is a staunch Republican. "I watch two shows every Sunday," she said. "I watch 'Meet the Press' and Fox News. I don't agree with that guy on 'Meet the Press.' I watch it for the news.

"The Democrats, they said they were going to work with President Bush (after last November's election) and they are not. When he was first elected, he tried to work with them, and they wouldn't."

To hear Romney tell it, stopping in Rube's was a sentimental journey on a day in which he also made campaign appearances in the vastly larger cities of Boone, Ames, Marshalltown and Des Moines. A little over a quarter-century ago, he spent some time working in Marshalltown, 15 miles from Montour with a poulation of almost 40,000. Romney was vice president of Boston-based Bain & Company Inc., and one of his clients as a consultant was Marshalltown's Fisher Controls, a manufacturing company owned by Monsanto at the time.

"We used to go to dinner at Rube's," Romney remembered with a smile. "Rube's at the time was just one grill and about maybe 10 tables and a glass refrigerator with good steak. I cooked my own and I cooked it very well done like I like it, with lots of salt."

Romney only ate a little from the salad bar's offerings when he sat at the head of one of the three long tables assembled in Rube's main dining room. But after his speech was over and the crowd had dispersed, he ate by himself in the adjoining dimly lit bar, enjoying a large cut of beef that was in a Styrofoam container. For a few precious moments, it was steak and solace.

Shortly before that, Romney had stood three steps from the salad bar to shake hands with attendees as they filed out of the restaurant and back into the Iowa cold.

"I liked what I heard," an elderly woman told the candidate. "How about running against Ted Kennedy and getting him out of there?"

"I tried that once (in 1994),'' Romney told her, "but he beat me good and solid."

"Really? I can't believe it,'' the woman replied.

Romney is returning to Iowa next Tuesday, the day he makes the formal announcement that he's running for president. Clearly, he has get-to-know-me work remaining here.

Huckabee's race has only begun

mike.hlas — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 17:56:00 GMT

Jan, 31, 2007

TIPTON, Iowa -- He has written a book called “Stop Digging Your Grave With a Knife and Fork.” So did Mike Huckabee see any irony in holding a presidential campaign stop in a downtown restaurant here Wednesday afternoon?

The former Arkansas governor politely laughed at my question, then emphatically replied “No.”

Of course, had the Stoplight Café been a greasy spoon, the question might have been an actual barb. But the food that the Republican’s campaign bought for a gathering of about 30 Tiptonians featured black bean and chicken noodle soup, cornbread, and apple pie. It all looked great.

Huckabee, 51, burdened his 5-foot-11 frame with over 280 pounds while governor. He was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes and told to lose significant weight if he hoped to live more than another 10 years. He heeded the advice, shedding 110 pounds. He didn’t add an ounce at this event, opting not to eat. He typically packs his own meals for the day, and keeps them in a portable cooler. But his 25-year-old daughter, Sarah Huckabee, was persuaded to try a slice of the pie.

“It’s real food,’’ Sarah was assured by Mary Barnum, who owns the Stoplight (she said it’s located next to the only stoplight in Cedar County) with her husband, John Barnum. “It’s not processed.”

That might have been a set-up to ask if the same could be said for this event, whether it was real or just processed. But it seemed as genuine as these things probably get. No television cameras and their operators cluttered the restaurant during this stop between Huckabee’s campaign events in two of Iowa’s three largest metropolitan areas, Cedar Rapids and the Quad Cities. So he had room for more relaxed one-on-one conversations. That was after he gave a stump speech and then took several serious questions from people of this town of about 3,200 people in a Q&A session. He isn’t a household name in this race, but the Iowa caucuses aren’t for another 11 ½ months. Which leads to another comparison to Huckabee’s personal life, this being one that he enjoys making.

Huckabee used to be out of breath and exhausted after climbing the long and steep steps of the Arkansas capitol building from the entrance up to the Governor's office. That was four marathons in the last year-and-a-half ago, the most recent last fall in New York City. Well, if he’s gotten himself into anything in this presidential campaign, it’s a marathon.

“I see a lot of similarities,” Huckabee said. “In fact, I’ve said that training for a marathon has taught me a lot about politics. The most important single thing is you can’t get spooked or worried if you think people are running in front of you and getting ahead early on. In fact, that’s great. You want them to get out there early and in front so you can run in their draft.

“Most of the time I’ve run marathons, the people that burst out of the gate often never get to the finish line. Because they’ve burned up their glycogen levels by Mile 17. So the key thing is to stay focused and disciplined, and you have to take the attitude ‘My pace, my race.’ ”

Then Huckabee, his daughter, and his staff got in automobiles and continued on their 2-day swing through several Iowa cities and towns. It’s only Mile 1 of this marathon.