The Worst Of All Possible Worlds For Joni Ernst

2 politicians Ernst should never be near when a camera is around: white nationalists Trump and Steve King

Maybe she was making a play for a bipartisan conservative ticket with Biden-- or maybe she's crazy. But Iowa freshman Senator Joni Ernst (R) looks like she made a classic rookie error this week when she intimated that Social Security benefits had to be cut. First a little background on Iowa, a classic swing state. Despite why the imbecile pundits are all agreed on now-- that Iowa is so red Democrats should not even bother campaigning there, exactly what the abysmal hillary Clinton campaign chose to not do-- Iowa is about the swing very blue (or, at least, very anti-red). Ernst has one chance at reelection: split party voting. Being seen as advocating cutting Social Security is not a way to encourage that. A little recent Iowa electoral history:

2000

• Al Gore- 683,517 (48.54%
• George W. Bush- 634,373 (48.22%)

2004

• George W Bush- 751,957 (49.90%)
• John Kerry- 741,898 (49.23%)

2008

• Barack Obama- 828,940 (53.93%)
• John McCain- 682,379 (44.39%)

2012

• Barack Obama- 822,544 (51.99%)
• Mitt Romney- 730,617 (46.18%)

2016

• Señor Trumpanzee- 800,983 (51.15%)
• Hillary Clinton- 653,669 (41.74%)

All the pundits declared Iowa is so red that it's no longer a swing state, although I don't recall them saying that it was so blue as to be incontestable for Republicans in 2008 when Obama won more overall votes and a bigger percentage of votes than Trump did. Why are they so stupid? And, what's worse, they're still saying that-- to the extent that Biden isn't planning on campaigning or winning there in the general and the only campaign that is prioritizing Iowa after the primaries is Bernie's. What does Bernie know that the others don't? How about that 2018 happened and Iowans gave Trump a huge thumbs down?

There are 4 congressional seats in Iowa and going into the election, the Republicans controlled 3 and the Democrats controlled 1. The Democrats held onto their one seat in 2018, picked up two Republican seats and nearly picked up the 4th one as well! Impressive, but look at the numbers.

In the last midterm election (2014), the Republicans took 595,865 votes statewide (53.19%) and the Democrats took 509,189 (45.45%). In 2018? Turnout grew substantially and Democrats took 664,676 votes (50.48%) while the Republicans won 612,338 votes (46.51%). That doesn't look off the table. It looks like Iowa, Classic Swing State.

Pundits all say Joni Ernst is favored to beat whichever Democrat wins their party's nomination, even though there are two grassroots progressives and a Schumer-picked conservative running. I guess the pundits don't think it matters. Maybe they'll change their minds when Ernst's stupid Social Security comments get out. She said: "So it’s, you know, a broader discussion for another day. But I do think, as various parties and members of Congress, we need to sit down behind closed doors so we’re not being scrutinized by this group or the other, and just have an open and honest conversation about what are some of the ideas that we have for maintaining Social Security in the future."

In Republican-speak that means doing a Grand Bargain that includes cutting benefits for future retirees and raising the retirement age-- something near and dear to the hearts not just of Republicans but also to Joe Biden but out of the question for Bernie and Elizabeth Warren. Ed Kilgore wrote about it for New York Magazine, asserting certainty that "Ernst will claim she didn’t mean what she said, or that the solutions she had in mind might involve giving Social Security beneficiaries more money or Starbucks gift cards. But anyone even vaguely familiar with Republican thinking on 'entitlement reform' knows the drill: The GOP is terrified of intense public hostility to conservative schemes to 'save' Social Security by reducing benefits (usually by privatizing them and then cutting them over time), and needs Democratic 'cover' to get ’er done. But Democrats, you see, are as afraid of doing this as Republicans, which is why it needs to happen in private where those pesky seniors can’t see what’s going on." She's suggested privatizing Social Security before-- and next year would be a very bad year for Iowa voters to be reminded of that, especially if Bernie or Elizabeth are on the top of the ticket vs Trump.

Trump... the guy who has destroyed Iowa's multi-billion dollar soy bean industry and has sent the farm belt into recession. In fact, on Thursday Brendan Cole reported for Newsweek that Iowa corn farmers have had it with Trump not just because of the trade war but for betraying them to oil companies over ethanol.

Corn farmers are now reeling from the move by the Trump administration to drop the requirement for 31 oil refineries to blend ethanol into their fuel.

Using ethanol in fuel was part of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Exemptions would normally be granted to smaller refineries experiencing financial hardship. However, it emerged that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had given waivers to oil giants like ExxonMobil and Chevron.

Around 40 percent of the U.S. corn crop is turned into ethanol. Corn farmers, already struggling with five years of low commodity prices and mediocre harvests due to bad weather, say the EPA waivers are another setback.

Two months ago Trump came to Iowa, the country's biggest ethanol producer, to talk up his administration's approval of E15-- gasoline blended with 15 percent ethanol-- which he said would drive up demand for corn in the Midwest.

But opinion against Trump is turning, with the waivers more than canceling out any gains made from the policy.

Nick Bowdish, CEO of Elite Octane in Atlantic, Iowa, backed Trump in 2016 because he was encouraged by the rhetoric about taking on China.

He said: "Since he got himself involved in agricultural policy issues, it has been a complete disappointment to any of us out here in the heartland.

"Where the president went wrong and made a serious misstep was when he made the decision to start destroying the market for agricultural products at home with these refinery waivers," he told Newsweek.

"He added that much more burden to the back of the American farmer at a time when they were already impacted by the trade war with China-- and that's not acceptable.

Trump won 93 out of Iowa's 99 counties in the 2016 presidential race-- the most for a GOP nominee since 1980. The state is also where the 2020 presidential race kicks off, with its caucuses on February 3.

Bowdish said: "So many people out in the Midwest have tended to vote for a conservative Republican candidate and right now, I can't tell you that support is locked up in there for the president."

"There are a lot of independent voters and a lot of moderate Republicans that are weighing their options and listening to what is the rural vision for the other candidates on the ticket," he added.

He said the most efficient ethanol plants in the U.S. are only just breaking even-- the average producer is losing 15 cents a gallon and the most inefficient producers are being forced out of business.

Trump's touting of E15 was greeted with optimism. However, even though it would increase demand for corn by 100 million bushels, this amount pales into insignificance compared with the impact of the refinery waivers, which represent over a billion bushels of corn.

"It is 10 steps backward for one step forward," Bowdish said.

Since Trump took office, the EPA has approved 85 waivers for 4 billion gallons of renewable fuel, ending demand for 1.4 billion bushels of corn.

This evening I spoke with Michael Franken, a progressive taking on Ernst and asked him about Ernst's apparent plans to wreck Social Security. "I think Iowans deserve better than smoky backroom deals and a privatization scheme cooked up by DC politicians like Joni Ernst and Mitch McConnell," he told me. "They gave us a top 1% tax cut in that same smoky room."