“Why so quiet?” you ask, interpreting silence for distress, disturbance or, worse possibly, boredom. What should be said? “I know a woman who takes her shirt off for a living”. “I know a man who can K.O. another man in only one punch and now lives in the Kansas State Pen”. “I know a man [...]

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I want to play in your hair like the ocean loud and lovely. Join the undercurrent, swoon over the strings in your voice. Your lips are John Wayne. Come to think of it, so are your fingers– full of truth.

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I find myself nightly atop a handsome bay mare. Her lines are intimate and I can’t help but care, though we disagree. I loved you more, Jesse, before we really got to know each other. Let’s just run away into the morning fog and stop talking. I’ll bandage your bullet holes and by tomorrow we [...]

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When Barack Obama first announced his candidacy for president in February 2007, his potential for superstardom – evidenced by his keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention and subsequent election to the United States Senate – may have been swiftly realized, but he still faced an uphill primary battle against New York Senator Hillary [...]

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The following was published as a sidebar to “The Democratic Wave in Iowa” in our October issue. In his youth, Hubler said, he turned down what might have been an opportunity to become a rock star. When he moved to California with his parents in 1961, he met the Love brothers of Beach Boys fame [...]

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Part I of “Midway” was published in last month’s issue of the Ames Progressive. Read it online here. Kate came home at five. I was dozing at the table, torn between passing out or nursing my anger and what was left of the bourbon a little while longer. I watched Kate step out of her [...]

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Ralph Nader, the consumer advocate and political activist, is running for president as an independent with running mate Matt Gonzalez. He has secured a place on the November ballot in Iowa with the Peace and Freedom Party. Nader delivered a campaign speech at Iowa State University on October 10, 2008. After his speech, Nader sat [...]

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My friends, the American people have spoken and I concede that Barack Obama is the next president of the United States. I’ve been looking forward to this: now that the race is finally over, I would like to take a moment for some straight talk. My friends, in the 2000 presidential campaign I was devastated [...]

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The George W. Bush that we know today is an irrelevant figurehead, a leader leading no one, a placeholder with a highly anticipated expiration date. He has less-than-zero influence in the international community, he is thoroughly disapproved of in his own country, and his own political party pays little attention to his pronouncements and makes [...]

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On October 29, 2002, President Bush signed into law the Help America Vote Act, a large legislative response to the pandemonium that led to his narrow victory of the White House.  The act was authored by Senator Christopher Dodd of Connecticut with information from a congressional report co-chaired by former presidents Jimmy Carter and Gerald [...]

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