Are you ready for the “Occupy Iowa Caucus” headed by a would-be Iowa governor?
On Tuesday, December 27, at 7 P.M. the attention-seeking Occupiers are rolling into Iowa, throwing their own caucus just two days after Christmas.
Allegedly ill-served by the political process, Ed Fallon, former failed Democratic candidate for governor, is helping to organize the first caucus in the nation to defeat the attention given to that other first in the nation caucus. (That, by the way, is what the Occupy Movement is all about. Getting attention!)
Ed Fallon is a long-term Democratic party hack. He served 14 years in the assembly where he had such legislative gems as this: a proposed law banning candy cigarettes because he says youths couldn’t be trusted to know the difference between a real cigarette and a sweet.
Now that he’s out of office, he’s into the county jail. He’s disturbing the peace, getting arrested, and going behind bars. Fallon was one of three dozen protestors who refused to vacate statehouse grounds at 11 p.m. on October 9.
He wrote to supporters, though he hoped not to get arrested again, he didn’t mind if it was. “I am planning to be truthful to my inner voice, and if that calls me to engage in an action that happens to violate the law, then I suppose I could be arrested again,” Fallen told The Des Moines Register. “FYI, jail is not a fun place, even for just a few hours.”
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, this is a statement from one of the former lawmakers in Iowa. This is what democracy looks like, with a mug shot.
No matter. Fallon doubled down and sent out the call to shut down the causes–and got no takers. “Our unique opportunity is being at the pressure point of the most powerful political leaders in the country, even in the world,” Fallon told the A.P. and other activists. But nobody wanted to show up in Iowa.
“People are tired of being ignored by the political establishment in both parties, tired of having the common good placed last when it comes to government’s priorities,” Fallon says. But wasn’t Fallon just such a politician? He did, in fact, run for office and serve in the state legislature.
In 2000, he threw his support to Ralph Nader. “This year the choice is between George W. Bush and a Democrat who is to the right of Bill Clinton,” he told The New York Times in October 2000. “I don’t begrudge my friends and constituents who plan to vote for Al Gore. I understand their fear of George W. Bush. But voting against somebody isn’t enough anymore. If I had three hands maybe I could hold my nose, my gut and my mouth and vote for Al Gore. But in good conscience, I can’t, I won’t, and you shouldn’t either.”
But when Fallon ran for Governor in Iowa, he threw Ralph Nader under the bus, the one true progressive who he had once supported in 2000. He tossed so-called abortion rights under there, too, because knowing that the murder of the unborn is unpopular in Iowa, Fallon confessed he wasn’t going to speak up about “politically polarizing issues.”
Isn’t he just as guilty of putting politics ahead of principle? Or are we just not supposed to notice when he goes behind bars and pays a $250 fine?