Tom Vilsack
A Rural Economic Forum in Metropolitan Iowa
The Idiocy Of Rural Talking Points
The other day, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack called up Ezra Klein to protest Klein's opposition to agriculture payments and other rural subsidies. The interview is a remarkably revealing. I knew the case for rural subsidies was weak, but I had no idea it was this weak. He argues for food subsidies because the U.S. READ MORE >>
Requiem for the DLC
The End of the Fox News Era
Washington—The smearing of Shirley Sherrod ought to be a turning point in American politics. This is not, as the now trivialized phrase has it, a "teachable moment." It is a time for action. The mainstream media and the Obama administration alike must stop cowering before a right wing that has persistently forced its own propaganda to be accepted as news by persuading traditional journalists that "fairness" requires treating extremist rants as "one side of the story." READ MORE >>
Regional Innovation Goes Rural
One of the more gratifying aspects of the growing embrace not just by the Obama administration but Congress of regional innovation strategies (including those supporting regional industry clusters) has been the increased recognition among rural thinkers and actors that such strategies are in no way exclusively “urban” or cosmopolitan or high-tech. READ MORE >>
Another Vilsack in Washington?
Via Ben Smith, Radio Iowa reports that Christie Vilsack--wife of the guy currently responsible for grading your READ MORE >>
Vilsack To Agriculture
If It's Vilsack Anecdotes You Want, It's Vilsack Anecdotes I've Got
Rumors that Tom Vilsack might be Obama's Secretary of Agriculture give me just the news peg I've been waiting for to get some mileage out of this Vilsack-ag anecdote (that my editors inexplicably didn't see fit to include in my David Axelrod profile). READ MORE >>
