Iowa Political Flashbacks

Iowa has had only three governors since 1968, so Tom Vilsack's announcement that he wouldn't seek re-election is a critical event in the state's political culture. Republican frontrunner Jim Nussle would be the state's most conservative governor since the early 1960s, meaning that the Dem primary may very well choose the next governor.

Last week, the majority of Democrats in the state legislature endorsed former director of the Iowa Department of Economic Development Mike Blouin, the most conservative of the four Democrats seeking the nomination.

His 2006 gubernatorial bid is Blouin's first run for electoral office since 1978, when he failed to win a third term to the House of Representatives from Iowa's Second District. I cannot think of any former member of Congress in American history who has a longer gap between elections. Blouin was a member of the Watergate class of House Democrats, though he was also pro-life on abortion. He lost to a moderate Republican, Tom Tauke, in a disastrous year for Iowa Democrats (in the year's biggest Senate race upset, Iowa voters ousted incumbent Democratic senator Dick Clark, who was attacked by his opponent, Roger Jepsen, for spending too much time on international issues; Clark maintained that such work would be rewarded politically, since"Iowans are not hicks.")

Blouin's immediate predecessor in the House was John Culver, who vacated the seat to make a successful run for the Senate. The subject of a flattering biography by Elizabeth Drew that remains a perceptive analysis of the inner workings of the 1970s legislature, Culver narrowly lost his re-election bid to Chuck Grassley in the Republican sweep of 1980. Had he prevailed, Culver would almost certainly have been among the key players in late 20th century politics--1986, 1992, and 1998 were strong Democratic years in Iowa, and so in all likelihood, this talented Democrat would have been a 30-year senator.

Ironically, Blouin's biggest obstacle to the Iowa governorship is none other than Culver's son, Chet Culver, currently Iowa's secretary of state. There was some talk that Chet Culver might challenge Grassley in 2004, but he deferred to 2006, only to see Blouin mount a surprisingly strong bid.

As Hillary Clinton apparently gears up to run for president in 2008, events in Iowa remind us that it's not just national politics that seem to be running in cycles these days.