Watch what former governor of Iowa Tom Vilsack has to say about food insecurity, Iowa ag issues, water quality and more on Iowa Press or read about it at Capital Dispatch. or check out the transcript of the program.
The term food insecurity is defined as lacking reliable access to a sufficient quantity of affordable, nutritious food.
If a person doesn’t believe an industry can capture the U.S. government, they haven’t been paying attention. The proposed rescission of congressionally approved funding for clean energy projects, combined with the omnibus reconciliation bill endeavor to strip away any government support for wind and solar generated electricity, electric vehicles, and more. The same moneyed players are at work here to retard progress toward a clean energy future: the fossil fuels industry.
Former Vice President Al Gore of the Climate Reality Project shared his thoughts on the regressive Republican policies:
We don’t have any time to waste if we want to solve the climate crisis in time to avert the truly catastrophic impacts that can still be prevented. But dangerous delay – which is the new “climate denial” – is exactly what Congress has done by repealing the clean energy provisions of the IRA: wasting time we don’t have by trying to prop up the fossil fuel industry while the world burns.
Make no mistake, the clean energy transition will continue in the United States despite these efforts – our direction of travel is clear.
But by prioritizing the fossil fuel industry over true climate solutions – even forcing taxpayers to add yet more subsidies for large oil and gas companies – our leaders are shirking their responsibility to the American people and ceding leadership in the global economy to China, Europe, and others who are embracing the many benefits of a clean energy future. (Statement by Former Vice President Al Gore on the Budget Bill, The Climate Reality Project, July, 3, 2025).
Gore is right. An obvious truth is that if the United States steps back from what once was robust governmental support for clean energy, there are two consequences. The domestic transition from fossil fuels to solar and wind powered energy will continue. The course is set, despite hobbles the fossil fuel captured Trump administration tries to attach to it. Second, if the United States doesn’t want to lead, China, Europe and others will, putting our country at a competitive disadvantage.
Last Wednesday, Reuters reported, “Solar power was the European Union’s largest source of electricity for the first time in June, overtaking nuclear and wind while coal’s contribution fell to an all-time low, data from energy think tank Ember showed.” The next challenge for Europe’s power system is expansion of battery storage and grid flexibility to reduce reliance on fossil fuels when the sun doesn’t shine and the wind doesn’t blow, according to the article. The U.S. should be leading this energy transformation instead of ceding it to other countries.
The future is ours if we will grasp it. Despite Republican efforts to stop the clean energy transition, progress will continue, only this time with the United State playing catch up.
I remember watching one of the Soviet Sputnik satellites flying over the back yard of our Iowa home. Besides launching a “space race” between the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, Sputnik heightened tensions between the two countries over potential use of nuclear weapons. Back in the 1960s, we graders practiced school drills for a nuclear attack. This period of competition became known as the Cold War. To this day, the U.S. and Russia own most of the nuclear weapons that exist. The NASA website makes a point:
The Sputnik launch changed everything. As a technical achievement, Sputnik caught the world’s attention and the American public off-guard. Its size was more impressive than (the U.S.) Vanguard’s intended 3.5-pound payload. In addition, the public feared that the Soviets’ ability to launch satellites also translated into the capability to launch ballistic missiles that could carry nuclear weapons from Europe to the U.S. Then the Soviets struck again; on November 3, Sputnik II was launched, carrying a much heavier payload, including a dog named Laika. (NASA website).
Our life of living with nuclear weapons changed dramatically since Sputnik. The public is vulnerable to being caught off guard again because few are paying any attention to nuclear weapons proliferation. Last year, Annie Jacobsen published Nuclear War: A Scenario, which provided an update on where the country stands regarding our nuclear weapons complex. Jacobsen’s work is part of the picture.
Our compliance with the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, which commits all parties to negotiate in good faith on effective measures relating to the cessation of the nuclear arms race, nuclear disarmament, and general and complete disarmament, is at a stand still. The story of how that happened is less interesting than the diversion from this core compliance issue caused by attention to North Korea and Iran’s development of nuclear technologies. It avoids the basic question of when will the U.S. and Russia comply with Article Six of the treaty?
Daryl G. Kimball, Executive Director of the Arms Control Association, addressed the recent bombing of Iran by Israel and the U.S. He argues, “U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to join Israel’s illegal military attacks against Iranian scientists and safeguarded nuclear sites represents an irresponsible departure from his earlier pursuit of diplomacy. It will increase the risk of a nuclear-armed Iran and erode confidence in the nuclear nonproliferation system.”
The nuclear deal that Trump unilaterally abandoned in 2018, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), imposed limits, prohibitions and intrusive inspection requirements on Iran that were to last for 10 or 15 years, with some being permanent, Kimball wrote. He expressed hope that the negotiating framework can still be salvaged, even if it has been severely damaged by this year’s U.S. military operations in Iran.
In the meanwhile, the U.S. government continues to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on our nuclear complex. We don’t hear much about that, except when it’s federal budget time. Ann Suellentrop, vice chair of the PeaceWorks Kansas City board and a member of the Physicians for Social Responsibility Board, noted in the Kansas City Star, “Kansas City’s nuclear bomb parts plant is ramping up significantly.” She provided details:
There is a new federal government plan to increase production of plutonium pits — the trigger that starts the bomb explosion in nuclear weapons — to 80 pits per year in each of the next 50 years. This is in comparison with the current production of fewer than 30 per year. The sites that are supposed to work together on what amounts to a new nuclear arms race include Kansas City’s federal nuclear bomb parts plant, managed by Honeywell Federal Manufacturing & Technologies. That is the Kansas City National Security Campus located in the south part of the city. The recent allocation of taxpayer funds for this National Nuclear Security Administration site reveals a huge jump from the 2025 budget from $1.3 billion to $1.7 billion in 2026. The plant is now doubling in size as it produces electrical and mechanical parts for seven new nuclear weapons programs simultaneously. (Kansas City Star, July 9, 2025).
Despite the efforts of Suellentrop and others, the nuclear weapons spending issue gains little media traction. “We need a mass movement of people to speak up and hold the government accountable,” Suellentrop said. The fact is we need a mass movement to speak up and hold the government accountable in many areas. If such a thing exists, it hasn’t ramped up fast enough.
The irony with the war between Israel and Iran is we appear to be returning to the days of Sputnik. Joe Cirincione recently opined, “we look at the unintended consequences of this 12-day war: the risk of dragging us back to the nuclear anarchy of the 1950’s, when many nations — friends and foes — sought nuclear weapons.” The 1950s may be a fond memory for some of us. We definitely don’t want to go back, especially as it pertains to proliferation of nuclear weapons.
You can sign up for the weekly planning calls with Indivisible co-founders Ezra Levin and Leah Greenberg, held every Thursday at 2 pm central. If you sign up and attend the call you will receive an email afterward with an action plan and homework, links to resources and a transcript of the call. If you can’t make the live call due to work or other reasons you will be emailed a link to the recording. Hope you have time to check out this week’s (July 10) recording of the live Zoom call. Join Indivisible Iowa on Facebook.
Taylor Wettach from Muscatine has announced he is running against Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks in IA-01. Check out his website. taylorwettachforcongress.com
Follow Taylor on Facebook Twitter Blue Sky Instagram
Action alert from our inbox:
CALL FOR VOLUNTEERS
FAYETTE COUNTY DOOR-TO-DOOR
FRIDAY JULY 11, 2025, STARTING AT 10 A.M.
We are searching for volunteers who would be available to go door-to-door in West Union, Iowa, to inform residents of our upcoming Community Event in West Union, Iowa, which will occur on Saturday, July 12, 2025, at 1 p.m. at the West Union Community Library.
Door-to-door volunteers will meet at 10 a.m. outside of the West Union Community Library (210 N. Vine St, West Union, IA) on Friday, July 11, 2025.
Please let us know if you are interested in this wonderful volunteer opportunity at 319-541-4240 or email us: admin@driftlesswaterdefenders.com
About the event:
Driftless Water Defenders
UPCOMING COMMUNITY MEETING JULY 12, 2025 IN FAYETTE COUNTY
FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC
WHO: YOU AND OTHER CLEAN WATER ADVOCATES
WHAT: CHRIS JONES WILL DISCUSS IOWA’S WATER QUALITY, WAYS YOU CAN ADVOCATE FOR CLEANER WATER FOR IOWA AND MUCH MORE
WHERE: WEST UNION COMMUNITY LIBRARY (210 N. VINE ST, WEST UNION, IA)
WHEN: JULY 12, 2025, AT 1 P.M.
WHY: TO ENGAGE WITH DWD
RSVP ON OUR WEBSITE OR FACEBOOK PAGE
CONTACT:
JAMES C. LAREW: 319-541-4240
OR EMAIL: ADMIN@DRIFTLESSWATERDEFENDERS.COM
Driftless Water Defenders, 504 E. Bloomington St, Iowa City, United States
Prairie Dog
From the July 2025 edition of The Prairie Progressive, Iowa’s oldest progressive newsletter. The PP is funded entirely by reader subscription, available in hard copy for $15/yr. Send check to PP, Box 1945, Iowa City 52244. Click here for archived issues
“Restarting a closed reactor in decommissioning status has never been attempted.”
by Wally Taylor
Recent news articles have reported on NextEra’s interest in restarting the Duane Arnold nuclear plant in Palo, Iowa. We need to consider the consequences of such an action. Restarting a closed reactor in decommissioning status has never been attempted. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) admits that there are no regulations authorizing the restart of a closed reactor. In order to restart Duane Arnold, NextEra will have to cobble together a daisy chain of existing regulations that is of doubtful legality, as is being attempted at the Palisades Nuclear Plant in Michigan. Nor is there any assurance that the operation could be done safely.
The Duane Arnold plant has been in the decommissioning process for almost 5 years. It is not just a matter of putting fuel back in the reactor and starting it up. Even the Palisades reactor will require an expensive and tricky process to attempt to restart, and no decommissioning activity had been done there. At a recent earnings call with investors, NextEra CEO John Ketchum, said the company would “consider” restarting Duane Arnold only if it “could be done safely and on budget.” And last June Mr. Ketchum said NextEra might consider restarting Duane Arnold if it could be done “in a way that is essentially risk free with plenty of mitigants around the approach.”
So how does the project become risk-free (I assume he means financially)? It becomes risk-free by obtaining billions of dollars from the government, funded by the taxpayers. That is how the restart of the Palisades plant is being financed. On the earnings call, Mr. Ketchum said that a restarted Duane Arnold plant would be used to provide power to data centers. Do we really want to use billions of dollars of taxpayer money so NextEra can provide power to a private industry? That is just like the federal tax credits funding the carbon dioxide pipelines for the benefit of a private company. If not for the billions in taxpayer dollars, would NextEra even consider restarting Duane Arnold?
Aside from the cost to taxpayers and the risky regulatory process for relicensing the plant, there are serious negative aspects to nuclear power. Contrary to the nuclear industry’s assertions, nuclear power is not clean or renewable. Nuclear reactor fuel is made from uranium, which is mined from the ground, just like oil, gas or coal. No one refers to those energy sources as renewable. The uranium that is mined leaves tailings and uranium processing leaves behind radioactive waste and harmful chemicals. During the operation of the nuclear plant, a radioactive material, tritium, often leaks and pollutes groundwater. But the really dirty aspect of nuclear power is the radioactive waste, primarily spent nuclear fuel.
There are approximately 90,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel in the United States today, and more is being added each day. Restarting Duane Arnold would add even more, and no one knows what to do with it. Efforts to establish a permanent repository have failed. The NRC has licensed two “interim’ storage facilities in New Mexico and Texas. But neither New Mexico nor Texas wants it. That dispute is now before the United States Supreme Court. One federal court said the spent fuel will remain dangerous for “time spans seemingly beyond human comprehension.”
With no foreseeable likelihood of having a permanent repository, these “interim” facilities will become de facto permanent repositories without the protections of a permanent repository.
However, there is an alternative, one that was even acknowledged by Mr. Ketchum in the earnings call. In that call he repeatedly touted NextEra’s significant build-out of renewable energy and battery storage. He said NextEra’s renewables have saved its customers nearly $16 billion since 2001, and renewables will only get cheaper in the future.
As for nuclear power, Mr. Ketchum said there are only a few nuclear plants that might be re-commissioned economically, but even with a 100% success rate, they would meet less than 1% of demand.
The Duane Arnold plant was closed because it was uneconomical in the face of the increase in renewables. Nothing has changed.
—Wally Taylor is the Legal Chair of the Iowa Chapter of Sierra Club.
While America’s vaunted media was chasing the very latest on Sean “Diddy Diddy” Combs, a few, including Heather Cox Richardson, noted that that day was the first anniversary of the day on which the Supreme Court said “Yep, there is one guy above the law. That guy is Donald Trump, because we say so.”
Remember how the SCOTUS held the decision into another month last year because they knew that the repercussions would be so loud. The Roberts Court has twisted itself into a pretzel to please Trump. Then they did it again this year as they handed down a decision that makes Trump farts have the force of law that can’t have a national injunction against them.
The MAGAs in congress quake in their boots and pee themselves at the very thought that Trump may say even a word against them. This is what our founders thought they had insulated themselves against – one man having so much power. That’s why we had separation of powers within the government and even powers of the press and the electorate outside the government.
Yet despite all that countervailing powers within the government wilt in front of Trump and external powers simply acquiesce – once more this week a major press power (CBS under the Paramount umbrella) bent a knee to Trump and offered to settle a ridiculous lawsuit for $16 million.
We are almost to the point where all our eggs of stopping the end of our democracy are in the one basket of the midterm elections coming next November. Will the elections be legitimate? Will they be honest? We really just apparently have to hope so. We also have to put faith in the machines that do the ballot counting.
Heather Cox Richardson recording on Tuesday as the press focused on Diddy Combs and Lisa Murkowski’s gutless vote in the senate: (15 minutes)
This Land is Your Land! – Woody Guthrie! – love the “this machine kills fascists” decal (4 minutes)
I guess I could understand it if the billionaires were desperately in need of tax cuts in order to eat. But I have it on good authority that no billionaire – or even a lowly millionaire – will starve if they do not get their tax cuts. However, some poor and even middle class may starve or die from a treatable illness if the bill does pass.
Nursing homes will close as Medicaid reimbursement dries up. When the homes close residents will be dumped onto the streets where they will live homeless until they are arrested and jailed for violating homeless laws that were legalized by the Roberts Court in 2024.
Then to complete the cycle, the Trumpco Justice department will strip them of their citizenship and then deported to a hellhole country most have never even heard of. Billionaires will be able to enjoy the fun through streaming services on their 200 inch TVs. A true synergy of MAGA policies.
Since the huge cuts in Medicaid are not scheduled to go into effect until after the 2026 election we can fully expect voters to blame the cuts on newly elected Democrats as the FIWH (felon in the White House) vetoes any attempt to fix the problems. It is just a game to MAGAs and we are nothing but pawns.
Most of the questions will be about US history this week. Ready?
A) Cruelty is the reason! What is the ‘catchy’ moniker given to the immigrant detention center built in super fast time in the alligator infested swamps in Florida?
B) Do you believe them? I don’t. The BLS (Bureau of Labor Statistics) reported how many new jobs for June on Thursday?
C) History – Is a person born in Puerto Rico an American citizen?
D) A part of your grocery shopping all your life, what fruit and vegetable canning company filed for bankruptcy this week?
E) In the states surrounding Iowa, how many have capital cities named for presidents?
F) Which senator made a big deal of how bad the Big Bad Bill was and then voted to pass it?
G) Can you remember which presidents were assassinated? There were 4.
H) What major media company caved to the FIWH last week promising to pay the FIWH $16 million so the media company can proceed with a merger without government interference?
I) Democratic Senator Jeff Merkely of Oregon said if the preceding payment takes place, he will investigate that company on what charge?
J) Ethan Allen was the leader of what guerrilla type group during the US Revolutionary War?
K) Still playing games with our legal system, the FIWH moved his lawsuit against what Iowa entities from federal to state courts?
L) What Iowa congress member is part of this lawsuit?
M) What founding father was also a renowned scientist credited with such inventions as bifocals and the armonica?
N) The state of Nebraska is already being greatly hurt by what policy of the FIWH?
O) The Erie Canal was one of the most famous public works in the early US. What two bodies of water did the Erie Canal connect?
P) ‘Oh Lord I have sinned.” What televangelist noted for his sexual exploits years back died this week after a massive heart attack a month or two ago?
Q) What do the stripes on the US flag represent?
R) Which Native American leaders led their warriors against Custer at Little Big Horn?
S) Who was the first black member of the Supreme Court?
T) Who is/was Ruby Bridges?
“The American fascist would prefer not to use violence. His method is to poison the channels of public information.” ― Henry A. Wallace
Tip of the hat to democraticunderground.com
Answers:
A) Alligator Alcatraz
B) 147,000
C) Yes. Puerto Rico is a commonwealth of the US
D) Del Monte
E) Madison, Wisconsin; Jefferson City, Missouri; Lincoln, Nebraska; St. Paul was not a president
F) Lisa Murkowski of Alaska – what an act
G) Lincoln; Garfield; McKinley and Kennedy
H) Paramount Global parent of CBS
I) Giving a bribe to Trump to smooth the way for their sale
J) the Green Mountain Boys
K) The Des Moines Register and Anne Seltzer
L) Marionette Miller-Meeks – apparently she is against freedom of the press also
M) Ben Franklin (that is armonica, not harmonica. Look it up I think you will be surprised
N) The crackdown on immigration. Immigrants leaving is hurting farmers, the meat packers and tax revenues.
O) Lake Erie and the Hudson River
P) Jimmy Swaggert. BTW his first cousin was Jerry lee Lewis
Q) 13 stripes = the 13 original states
R) Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse
S) Thurgood Marshall in 1967
T) Ruby Bridges was a little black girl who integrated New Orleans schools in 1960 with the help of federal marshalls. She is still alive.
Tip of the hat to http://all-hat-no-cattle.blogspot.com
Reprise This Land with Pete Seeger! (5 minutes) With Bruce Springsteen who the FIWH hates!
Blog For Iowa 