Which is Worse, Campaign 2012 or Hurricane Sandy?

The storms slamming the east coast are tragic, costly affairs that have and will continue to cause misery and suffering. With God’s grace, the communities in the wake of this storm will emerge safely from the wind, rain, floods and snow and lives will return to normal quickly. I do not want to minimize the human misery Sandy is bringing. My thoughts and prayers are with those living through it and those who have lost it all. However, Hurricane Sandy should serve as a powerful reminder. Life is fragile and, all too often, we spend too much of our mortal breathing moments focusing on the unimportant.

My Buddhist friends tell me a storm like Sandy is further evidence everything is connected – the good, the bad, today, yesterday, tomorrow, you, me, people we will never meet, animals, insects, earth, air, sea; you get the point. Standing witness to earth’s natural power does help one understand this. The Sandys force us to stop in our tracks and reflect. That is good. It is kind of a shame it takes devastation or calamity to force us to do something so simplistic and basic to life.

Campaign 2012 will be over next week. This race has been nasty and, in many ways, counterproductive to our national progress. We voters have allowed billion dollar campaign machines to divide by distracting us from that what binds the American people in the first place, a belief every person deserves freedom. We have focused on the negative, the accusations, and disagreements.

Here’s hoping when the political storm clears and media chatter returns to non-election year banter, Americans will think more about what unites, than what divides. We must replace choosing sides with working together to build something better.

Elections – this one in particular – resemble hurricanes. They destroy and devastate until they run out of energy. But, much of what causes a hurricane is beyond our control. We can construct stronger buildings and fortify our coastlines, but beyond that, the best we can do is hunker down and wait a hurricane out.

Elections are an invention of man fueled by money. We have the ability to interrupt the campaign path of destruction by demanding candidates rise above the squabble. Candidates respond to voter reaction. It is time we voters tell candidates we expect ideas and integrity, not blame and marketing gimmicks. Most of all, we must cutoff the fuel source feeding this destruction by limiting campaign funding.

The American spirit will be evident as people from across the country selflessly step forward to help those trying to regain their footing after being knocked down by the storms. It will take an even larger and longer cooperative effort to bridge the partisan divide formed during campaign 2012. I would like to think Americans are up to the task.

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Graham Gillette can be reached at grahamgillette@gmail.com 
This entry was first published as a Des Moines Register online essay.

A Mild Chris Christie Kicks-off GOP Convention

I can’t help myself. Chris Christie has a paradoxical affable bravado that makes me like him. He strikes me is a guy who believes what he says and who seems to enjoy a messy skirmish. The Romney campaign brought out the tough talking New Jersey Governor on night one of the convention to stir up the base. Christie delivered on that, but he did little else.

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie 
Republican National Convention
Tampa, Fla., Tuesday, Aug. 28, 2012. 
(AP Photo/J. Scott Applwhite) / AP

A national party convention is mostly made up of the true believers. They sit on the edges of their seats antsy and ready to jump to their feet, cheer, wave signs and look with tear soaked eyes into the cameras. A speaker needn’t have Christie charisma to get a standing ovation from this crowd. An audible “we are the USA” from the meekest of speakers can get a convention crowd chanting USA for five minutes.

That’s why I thought it odd Christie had to prod convention goers at the end of his speech with “It’s now time to stand up. Let’s stand up. Everybody, stand up!” These are not words you generally hear from a convention speaker.

Maybe my expectations were too high for Governor Christie’s speech. I was looking for red meat inspiration. What he delivered was something along the lines of we are better than they are. OK, but you need to give the throng a little more excitement and those at home something to remember.

George W. Bush must have cringed when talking about the nation’s economic woes Chris Christie not so blithely said, “It doesn’t matter how we got here. There is enough blame to go around.” Fair enough and Christie made a the point by following up with, “What matters now is what we do.”

Yeah, but “how is what is being offered different than Bush” went unanswered by Christie.

In fairness to Christie, it is tough being the first pitcher to the mound for convention baseball. The nominee’s agenda is not yours. You are not there to talk specifics. You are supposed to set the stage. Christie did not falter, but I doubt he did much to boost the Romney candidacy.

Maybe it won’t matter Christie was tamer than expected. Vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan takes the stage next. Convention goers should wear comfortable shoes tonight. There will be a lot of standing and cheering even if Ryan decides to read the phonebook. He won’t. The question is will he connect with the crowd outside of the Tampa Bay Forum.

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Graham Gillette can be reached at grahamgillette@gmail.com 
This entry was first published as a Des Moines Register online essay.

Paul Ryan’s Appearance More Circus than Fair

I read the account of Congressman Paul Ryan’s visit to the Iowa State Fair on Monday with a certain amount of dismay. The newly minted vice presidential candidate had come to stand on the Des Moines Register’s soapbox and introduce himself to Iowans. OK, maybe there are better audiences for discussing policy than a sweaty throng of corndog munching fairgoers, but I would like to believe Iowans, if not all Americans, are capable of conducting civilized debate. It is becoming harder to do so.

Paul Ryan went to the Fair and all Iowa got was mustard on its t-shirt.

The sorry display by the group of protesters who came to berate Mitt Romney’s running mate and the backlash by an angry few in the pro-Romney crowd who tried to stop them was disappointing on many fronts.

The shouting and attempts to disrupt the event by demonstrators – one woman climbed onto the stage – did nothing to facilitate the exchange of ideas or help a cause, if they even have one. The pushing, shoving and insults hurled in return only added to the pathetic spectacle. There is a time for civil disobedience and there are times when a little yelling is needed. This was not one of those times.

Campaign 2012 has been as light on ideas as it has been heavy on finger pointing and name-calling. Our nation faces daunting challenges. We aren’t going to solve them through bullying, but by finding common ground.

Like it or not, Paul Ryan has shown he is willing to talk about tough issues such as our country’s debilitating budget woes. It is easy to see why some may not agree with all Mr. Ryan has proposed, but it is refreshing he is willing to take a stand. Perhaps his running mate will soon find the courage to follow this lead.

Mark Twain once wrote “It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them.”

I find myself wishing many like those folks at the Fair would exercise such prudence. They are not helping move anything forward.

Twain was joking, of course. We are not served if those who disagree with Ryan do not challenge his proposals, just as we lose if we allow the shouters to stifle the exchange of ideas. We need to hear both sides.

The journey to common ground begins with understanding and mutual respect. The fairgoers should have held the shouting, enjoyed a corndog and then proceeded with logical debate. Instead they created a silly sideshow.

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Graham Gillette can be reached at grahamgillette@gmail.com 
This entry was first published as a Des Moines Register online essay.

HBO Drama The Newsroom Broadcasts Important Message

I confess I am enthralled with HBO’s The Newsroom. Aaron Sorkin, creator of The West Wing and screenwriter of The Social Network and Moneyball, has cooked up a delicious new drama. The Newsroom is a kind of behind-the-scenes look at the people who make a nightly cable-news program. It is a thinking show that I hope will cause viewers to question the sorry state of modern politics and the gloomier state of news reporting.

Jeff Daniels as Will McAvoy in HBO's The Newsroom

Let’s get the obvious complaint out of the way. The Newsroom’s network anchor (played by Jeff Daniels), his new executive producer (Emily Mortimer), the twenty-something’s of the newsroom staff (John Gallagher, Jr., Alison Pill, Thomas Sadoski, Olivia Munn, Dev Patel) and the boss (Sam Waterston) seem to lean to the political left. Incidentally, Jane Fonda is fantastic as the network chief. Yes, Daniels’s character claims to be a Republican who wants his party back from the Tea Party. But, the majority of political shots have been thrown by southpaws so far. Get over it. Nearly every newsroom I have ever visited has tilted left.

If you fixate on the direction from which the storyline emanates, you will entirely miss the point of the show.

A friend who scoffed at what he described as the morally superior, one-dimensional and altogether too well read Newsroom staff is failing to see why the show works. The show is not about the staff. It is about us, the American viewer.

This week, Sorkin’s recipe called for the juxtaposition of the people my friend described as morally superior leftists to an arguably equally morally superior Tea Party couple the Newsroom staff invited to be hammered on air by Daniels’ character. The result was a tasty bit of thought candy. The Newsroom tries to show how we Americans all-too-often fail to see through the theater of the made-for-commercial-television debate.

The show works because Daniels’ anchor preaches from on high about presenting the facts and then batters the show’s guests with his not-subtle-at-all opinions.

This show works not because people on one side of the political spectrum are painted as villains – this week it was the ultra-politically active and wealthy Koch brothers – and the other side morally superior heroes, but because the Newsroom shows in dramatic fashion how America’s politics and its news organizations are broken.

Sorkin’s concoction works because it makes people think. It isn’t written to allow the viewer to get inside the heads of the Newsroom characters and thereby see the world through Sorkin’s rose colored glasses; the characters are created to get inside the viewers’ heads causing us to consider whether we wear the blinders worn by too many Americans to keep from seeing the messy, incestuous state of modern politics and news.

American politics may not be irrevocably broken, but something is seriously amiss. The debate over which policies are best able to move the United States forward take a back seat to a devilish game played by a rich and powerful few singly interested in feathering their own nests. Making matters worse, the news industry has been corrupted by the same moneyed interests controlling the political parties.

The Newsroom is entertaining, but it is more than that. For those viewers able to put down their Republican vs. Democrat score sheets, the Newsroom should make them question the state of our nation. Allowing the degeneration of modern media to continue while simultaneously turning a blind eye to the consolidation of political power by a frighteningly small group of self-serving wealthy individuals is a formula for disaster.

Sorkin’s Newsroom makes for good viewing and even better food for thought.

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Graham Gillette can be reached at grahamgillette@gmail.com 
This entry was first published as a Des Moines Register online essay.

More Harper Lee and Grandma Allen, Less Newt Gingrich

I am sure there is a rule among those who provide news commentary against including an apology as part of the introduction of a topic. I am going to ignore it, because today’s rant is the result of my spending more time looking backward in recent weeks than looking forward, another thing so-called pundits are not supposed to do. So, I am sorry if my thoughts here seem off-track or even more disjointed than usual.

This all started when my daughter set her sights on playing the role of Scout in the Des Moines Playhouse production of “To Kill a Mockingbird.” She read Harper Lee’s great novel. I then re-read it for the first time since ninth grade. There were numerous family discussions over dinner about what each of our kids liked and did not about the story. Add to this the scrapbook of late 1800’s and early 1900’s family items my mom entrusted to me over the weekend and it is easy to see why I have been thinking about what has and hasn’t changed in America.

Gregory Peck, as Atticus Finch in "To Kill a Mockingbird"  

The role of fictional lawyer and father Atticus Finch in Mockingbird has been described by many an actor as one of the few great roles. I suspect those of us who remain entranced by the novel after all of these years feel a connection to Atticus for many of the same reasons Gregory Peck and George Clooney do. We relate to Atticus not because he is an image of perfection, but because he is anything but. Atticus, with all of his flaws – his reluctant advocacy for Tom Robinson, his questionable bending of the law to protect Boo Radley, his less-than-ideal relationship with his children, Jem and Scout – is somebody we admire because he shows us it is possible for a person to become who he wants to be despite his shortcomings.

I was thinking about Atticus Finch’s fictional 1930’s Maycomb County, Alabama when I stumbled across an actual 1898 Cincinnati Commercial Tribune article in the family scrapbook. The paper reported on the 97th birthday celebration Mrs. Maria Soundes Allen hosted for herself at her home in Elyria, Ohio “at which she received the congratulations of 50 friends without either fatigue or embarrassment.”

According to the story, “Grandma Allen,” as she was known, sent five sons to fight in the Civil War and “then dried her tears to bend her energies to scraping lint, making bandages, bedding, jellies, and wine; in brief, everything in her power for the comfort of the boys who stood by the flag and upheld the union.” I tried to imagine her party as she “entertained her guests, not with frivolous chat, but with a vigorous discussion on the Philippine controversy, the beef scandal and other events of popular interest.” She must have been something.

This is why Atticus and Grandma Allen were on my mind earlier this week when I heard Newt Gingrich make this disconcerting statement, “Our religions, I think we need to have a government that respects our religions. I’m tired of being lectured about respecting every other religion on the planet. I want them to respect our religions.”

In Mockingbird, Scout asks Atticus why he is defending Tom Robinson even though everybody in town says he shouldn’t. Atticus tells her “before I can live with other folks I’ve got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn’t live by majority rule is a person’s conscience.”

My conscience tells me a statement like Mr. Gingrich’s should not go unchallenged.

Harper Lee created Atticus to help us understand there is no “us and them.” “Our” religion is no more worthy of respect than anyone else’s, just as “our” race is no more deserving than another.

Grandma Allen was concerned about making the world a better place until her final day. I have little doubt Grandma Allen had her shortcomings like this Atticus fan does, but I would like to believe Grandma Allen would be disappointed a leading contender for the presidency thinks erecting a wall of division is a winning strategy in 2012.

Harper Lee wrote, “Bad language is a stage all children go through, and it dies with time when they learn they’re not attracting attention with it.” And, divisive political speech is the worst kind of language. Yet, we have yet to outgrow it in America. Voters should stop rewarding candidates who use it. No candidate for public office, let alone for president, should be allowed to drive a wedge between us even with a throwaway line to coddle a few votes in a single speech.

Maria Allen and Harper Lee continue to teach us we are not great because we are a people who are similar. Our strength, our beauty and our greatness come from our diversity.

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Shameless plug: To Kill A Mockingbird continues at the Des Moines Playhouse through February 12 with a fantastic actress I know who shares the role of Scout every other performance. For a story about the 50th anniversary of the film version click here.



Graham Gillette can be reached at grahamgillette@gmail.com


This entry was first published as a Des Moines Register blog entry.

Iowa Caucus Tie Trips Romney

Last night’s Iowa Caucuses may have produced the worst possible outcome for Mitt Romney. He would have been better off with an 8 point trouncing by Ron Paul than a virtual tie with Rick Santorum.

Mitt Romney’s long, bumbling walk to the nomination awkwardly continued last night. It seems no matter what Romney does, only 25% of Republicans support him. He got an astonishingly similar number of Iowa Caucus votes last night as he did four years ago. It has to be incredibly frustrating to raise millions and millions of dollars, and pour your heart out on the campaign trail only to discover you gained no ground whatsoever. Yet, on trudges the former Massachusetts governor.

Ron Paul represents a growing and vocal segment of the GOP and the electorate. Pundits, party hacks and political consultants have foolishly underestimated Paul’s ability to organize and the appeal of his message. However, Paul is limited in his ability to attract voters. Paul’s own campaign admits they avoid reaching out to voters over 60 because they find little support in that demographic. Put aside the irony that the only septuagenarian in the race does not appeal to his peers, a group that votes in high numbers – Paul is highly unlikely to build a winning national campaign because his libertarian message appeals to a limited audience. Combine this with his age and you begin to wonder why Paul does not have a visible bruise from hitting his head on his political ceiling.

I could argue (and have) Rick Santorum has limited electoral appeal. He is a conservative’s conservative. However, Santorum’s impressive victory in Iowa last night will have Republicans across the country giving the Santorum campaign bus tires a thoughtful kick over the next few days – a bus fueled by what will be an impressive influx of newly donated cash. Santorum is the latest candidate to fill the anti-Romney role, but unlike third place finisher Paul; Santorum is attractive to the Republican Party’s natural base.

Rick Santorum can energize a core group of voters. He won his first congressional race running on an economic message and can connect with voters in a personal way the sometimes-robotic Romney cannot.

Santorum may not be able to stop Romney’s slog to the Republican Convention in Tampa, but Santorum’s new looming presence on the trail is the last thing Romney anticipated would come out of Iowa. The Santorum detour poses a significant risk to Romney’s nomination. Romney’s inability to enthuse his party means he is vulnerable to somebody like Santorum.

Should Santorum use his moment in the Iowa victory spotlight to formulate an image of an electable candidate who can connect with voters in a way no Republican has in this race so far, Santorum can damage and possibly derail Romney’s campaign.

Romney’s long tiring plod to victory is far from over.

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Graham Gillette can be reached at grahamgillette@gmail.com


This entry was first published as a Des Moines Register blog entry.

The Iowa Caucuses are Over

Today the quadrennial Iowa Caucuses will climax with 100,000 or so Republicans going to schools, churches, recreation centers and a few homes to stand up for a candidate. The caucus model is truly fascinating and, when it works, it can serve an important role in democracy. It is refreshing to hear average people take the floor and advocate for the person they feel is best prepared to lead. For a brief moment, gone are the TV ads, push phone calls and sound bites delivered by well rehearsed talking heads. What are left are neighbors discussing important matters of state in a civil and meaningful way.
Secret ballots are vital to the process, but at this early stage, the process is made better by the people willing to discuss politics and what it means to them in an open format. In an age when so many hide behind the anonymity of an Internet comment, something strikingly positive happens when people stand-up to be counted at something like an Iowa Caucus. I am proud to be an Iowan and proud of my state for continuing this proud tradition.

What did the 2012 Iowa Caucuses accomplish?
By and large, Iowans acquitted themselves well this go around. They took the process seriously and gave the candidates a fair hearing. The candidates and their campaigns are the ones who fell short in this first presidential campaign test of 2012.


The Iowa Caucuses provide an important balance to the TV-centric/large event/media driven campaigns that follow in more populous states. Most of the time, candidates must spend a large portion of their time here meeting with smaller groups where they have to interact and answer the questions of actual voters. Scripted speeches and choreographed photo ops still happen, but the candidates’ true personalities see the light of day during the Iowa process in a way that is impossible once the national campaign machinery gets up-to-speed.


As important, in order to compete in the Iowa Caucuses, a campaign must focus on building an organization. TV ads and direct mail won’t alone motivate voters to go to a caucus. A campaign with experience building an organization focused on communicating directly to and with voters is going to be ready to turn-out the vote in the contests that follow. Iowa forces candidates to create and manage a campaign team. When one is put together well in Iowa, it will make the campaign stronger as it goes forward.
The 2012 race did not see any candidate take a decisive lead coming into caucus day, primarily because most of the candidates failed to follow the successful caucus campaign models of the past.

Mitt Romney greets supporters on the morning of the 2012 Iowa Caucuses.

Mitt Romney largely took a pass in Iowa. He visited the state infrequently. He did not even open a headquarters here until a few weeks ago. His poll numbers have remained unchanged throughout the contest. That being said, those leading his efforts in Iowa are among the best and Romney’s gamble is going to pay off because, for the most part, the rest of the field ran lousy efforts in the Hawkeye state. The 25% of Republican voters who have stood by Romney to this point will show up tonight and the undecided caucuses goers will break for Mitt as he is seen as the safe bet and eventual nominee. He will skate by, because the rest of the field had campaigns that were more flawed.


But, let me start with Rick Santorum. He did it right. He put in the time to visit every county at least once, held some 360 town hall style meetings and built an organization of hard working believers. His efforts have him surging at the best possible moment. Unfortunately for Santorum, he is so far to the right he is limited in how many people he can attract. Few in the middle will ever stand in his corner, so he cannot sustain the momentum. He has gone as far as he can, but I must give credit where it is due. He ran an all-out effort.


The same can be said about Ron Paul. The guy is consistent and, in his quirky way, he connects with many voters. He has fervent supporters who will show up tonight and he, too, has built an organization that works. Paul, however, has a ceiling of support that will prevent him from going much farther than he has already gone.


Newt Gingrich fizzled twice. He squandered his early opportunity and his last minute surge because he never made the effort to build a campaign organization. Gingrich is adept at thinking quickly when he has a microphone in his hand. But, to win in Iowa and go on to national success, one needs to do more than come up with clever comments to please those in the room at the moment. Iowa will weed Gingrich from the field. While he likes to blame the negative ads his competitors threw his way, Gingrich has himself to blame. Upon rising to the top, Gingrich discovered he lacked the structure required to support a front runner. Gingrich lost Iowa all by himself.


Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann did the same. They showed up at debates and played the part of a candidate, but they did not do the hard work required of a winner.


The Iowa Caucuses make presidential candidates do something most other contests do not. Iowa makes candidates stare into the eyes of voters, shake their hands and interact with them. Iowa also gives voters a stake in the process culminating in their having to stand up in front of their neighbors and voice support for their candidate.


If anything went wrong in Iowa this year, it was that too many candidates - Romney, Gingrich, Perry and Bachmann – tried to take a short cut.


The day may come when Iowa’s first in the nation status is lost. If so, the presidential election process will become something less.

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Graham Gillette can be reached at grahamgillette@gmail.com

This entry was first published as a Des Moines Register blog entry.

Desperate Times Call for Desperate Measures for Rick Perry

With less than four weeks to go before the Iowa Caucuses, Governor Rick Perry’s fumbling presidential campaign appears desperate.  The Perry folks unveiled an ad today I assume is targeted at the most fervent base of the Republican Party, Christian conservatives.  It is likely most of them will find Perry’s ad offensive, or at least I hope they do.

Apparently, Mr. Perry thinks tossing up divisiveness and hate might just be the fabled “Hail Mary pass” he needs to get back in the game.  Hopefully, voters will reject such pandering to the closed minded, yet politically active.

embedded by Embedded Video

Here is the complete text from the ad, “I’m not ashamed to admit that I’m a Christian, but you don’t need to be in the pew every Sunday to know there’s something wrong in this country when gays can serve openly in the military but our kids can’t openly celebrate Christmas or pray in school. As President, I’ll end Obama’s war on religion. And I’ll fight against liberal attacks on our religious heritage.  Faith made America strong. It can make her strong again.”

Mr. Perry’s accusation that President Obama has instigated a war on religion is nearly as detestable and destructive as his linking the sexual orientation of servicemen and women to his ridiculously fabricated prohibition of Christmas.

Something is wrong, Mr. Perry, when a candidate seeking the presidency has such a feeble understanding of the fundamental building blocks of American democracy he thinks incendiary language such as this has a place in political discourse.

Equality and religious freedom are cornerstones of our nation requiring mutual respect among countrymen.  Mr. Perry has shown he lacks that respect and he should be ashamed.

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Graham Gillette can be reached at grahamgillette@gmail.com

This entry was first published as a Des Moines Register blog entry.

Tim "I'm the Most Honest Guy I Know" Pawlenty Makes it Official by Preaching to Choir

Tim Pawlenty announced his campaign for President in Des Moines todayon the rooftop terrace of the State Historical Building.   The sun, wind, airplanes and traffic on the streets below cooperated, for the most part, as the domes of the Iowa Capitol gleamed in the background.   It was a good day for preaching to the choir.

Pawlenty drew a respectable crowd.  I’ll call it 150 to 175 spectators and a generous cadre of media.  His campaign gets points for staging and for making sure there were enough staff and volunteers on hand to capture the contact information of as many people in the crowd as possible.  The Iowa Caucuses are nothing if not an organization game.  It looks like the Pawlenty folks are well aware of this.

After clearly and for the record announcing his candidacy for President of the United States, the former Minnesota Governor launched into a speech written to reinforce he was not Barack Obama. ( I can’t believe many people get them confused, but they must.)

There was much talk of Obama’s failures and an equal number of references to Pawlenty’s own self identified honesty.   Apparently, Pawlenty is rather impressed with his special ability to tell the truth and he is convinced no one else in the race shares this trait.  Maybe I am alone, but whenever a person repeats how honest he is, I get a little suspicious.  But, Pawlenty was here to rally the troops and I suppose honesty polls well.

Healthcare: Pawlenty said his healthcare plan in Minnesota would be used as a model for what he would do as president and “my plan is the opposite of ‘Obamacare.’”  This, of course, begs a question. Since a main Pawlenty objection to the Obama plan is that Americans are “mandated” to buy health coverage, would the Pawlenty plan mandate Americans not be insured?  But, I digress.

Immigration: Pawlenty did not equivocate, “I am for legal immigration.” He talked about how the U.S. is based on the rule of law and that we must uphold immigration laws.  Whew.  That clears that up.

Ethanol: Pawlenty did show some courage by standing in Iowa and saying ethanol subsidies should be phased out.  He did this mostly to prove he was a man willing to say the unpopular (see speaking the truth above), but I will give him credit for saying what he meant in this case.

Education: When asked by Des Moines Roosevelt High School graduating senior Alex Patch about education, Pawlenty spent an odd few minutes summarizing the documentary film “Waiting for Superman” before concluding he was against the “government monopoly of public education” and for choice.  Parents should be “resourced” and given the choice to send their kids to the government monopoly schools (if they are silly enough to choose that), charter schools (if they want another public option), another monopoly school through open enrollment, private schools or home schools.

Pawlenty was most passionate about his education answer during the question and answer period, which made me think he might be running for the wrong position (note: I say “passion” with the caveat I may have been mistaken since passion is often hard to discern in Pawlenty without the aid of highly tuned computers).  Pawlenty had spent a major portion of his overall time today talking about how the federal government needs to scale back and stay out of Americans’ lives.  For instance, the federal government should stop administering Medicare and send the money to the states in a block grant.  This attitude seems to conflict with Pawlenty’s answer to Patch that the federal government should set policy to break up public education and teachers unions. One would think Pawlenty would want to leave such things to the people and their local and state governments.

All and all, Tim Pawlenty did not stumble, meaning his campaign can count today as a win.  Today’s sparkling May skies will eventually turn to January snow showers.  It gets harder from this point on, because the game turns on finding new supporters to add to the choir.  Pawlenty has a lot of work to do before then to inspire Iowans to trudge to their Caucus and stand up for him.  And, since he assured us many times he can be trusted to tell the truth, we know Pawlenty is in this to win.

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(In the ‘you have to appreciate the irony of the timing’ category is this story; Former Pawlenty staffer pleads guilty to public intoxication.  I am not suggesting this young man’s problems are humorous, or that Mr. Pawlenty should be held accountable for his staffer’s drunkenness.  I just found it ironic.)

Graham Gillette can be reached at grahamgillette@gmail.com

This entry was first published as a Des Moines Register blog entry.