Obama Stops in Eastern Iowa to Talk Rural Jobs

By Hannah Hess 
From IowaPolitics.com 

PEOSTA — President Barack Obama took the pulse of the rural economy in a small chunk of the heartland Tuesday, talking with business leaders here, while Iowans gauged his job performance. 

“Obviously we’re going through tough times right now — I don’t have to tell you that,” Obama told the 200-person crowd invited to join a rural economic forum here, on the middle leg of his three-day bus tour of the Midwest. He visited Minnesota on Monday, and will continue to Illinois on Wednesday. 

“A lot of folks are looking for work,” he said. “Even if you have a job, or a small business, or a farm, you may be getting by with fewer customers, maybe doing fewer shifts, or less money in tips, and for a lot of families in rural parts of the country, these challenges aren’t new.” 

The president heard directly from small business owners over breakfast in Guttenberg this morning, then compared ideas with ranchers, farmers, public servants and entrepreneurs during a closed forum at Northeast Iowa Community College here. 

During his journey through rural Iowa, he waved to small children clutching U.S. flags along the sidewalk and grandparents who pulled out lawn chairs to watch the motorcade. 

Republican presidential candidates have crisscrossed Iowa for weeks, pandering their job-creation records and duking it out to become the nominee who will challenge Obama. 

This week, the president unveiled his own solutions to the national 9.1 percent unemployment rate. He came to the state bearing news of a $13.2 million loan program for small business owners in Iowa and a $510 million investment in biofuel technology. 

Iowans cheered the announcements, including U.S. Rep Bruce Braley, D-Waterloo, who said he was pleased with the rural economic initiatives. 

“I look forward to working with the President to make sure these proposals are implemented in a way that creates jobs in Iowa and gets our economy back on track,” Braley said in a statement. 

U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, a former Iowa Democratic governor who joined Obama on the bus tour, characterized the biofuel initiative as a key step to ending dependence on foreign oil and exploring a burgeoning new sector. 

“All of the sudden, there’s a tremendous amount of interest in the (biofuel) industry,” Vilsack told reporters. “We show that it works, we show that it’s effective, we show that it’s made in America, that we don’t have to import oil from foreign countries that don’t like us. We can create job opportunities here.” 

He said the construction, trucking and agricultural industries would benefit, and new permanent jobs would be created in plants dedicated to turning straw, trees, algae and other types of biomass into synthetic fuel. 

Vilsack has traveled with Obama throughout the bus tour, receiving warm welcomes from Iowans along the way. He got handshakes and pats on the shoulders from people in the audience who gathered Tuesday on the campus. 

The crowd also cheered for Obama when he vowed that America would come back from the recession “stronger than before.” 

The line received a massive round of applause from the audience, who seemed confident in his solutions. 

The president got a different reception when his black armored bus pulled up to the 500-acre campus. A small cluster of tea party protesters assembled, waving flags and carrying signs reading "One Term." 

Roger Mall, 59, of Davenport, took a day off from his work as a home investor to join the anti-Obama rally, after hearing about it from local organizers. He said he had a message to send to the president. 

“People are really distressed over the economy, and the policies are just not working. You can’t increase costs on business and investors and hope to engender a vibrant economy. His proposals are all drags on the economy — regulation, taxes,” Mall said. 

Another tea party protester, Don Holmes, 70, of Davenport, said he thought the president was using his tour to play a blame game for the bad economy. 

“You know Harry Truman used to have a sign on his desk that said, ‘The buck stops here.’ This president passes it so many times, that he doesn’t even know what the buck is,” Holmes said. “So if you’re looking to assign responsibility, don’t look to the president because he blames everybody.” 

Introducing the roundtable, Obama said he was seeking solutions and creative ideas from the crowd. Special invitations were issued to the leaders whom the president hoped could engage in a conversation about the economic future of rural communities. 

A group of eight Democratic-leaning women sharing coffee at the Philips 66 gas station across the street from the college before his appearance said they wished they were invited to see the president, but said his presence in the town gave them a chance to think about the performance of the man they elected. 

“He’s doing the best he can, but his hands are tied,” said Mary Jo Schmitt, 70, of Peosta. “They act like a bunch of kids in Washington, like a bunch of little grade-schoolers in there fighting. Get to the business at hand. I mean, it’s ridiculous. I think they need a bunch of women in there to clean it up.” 

The group laughed, then Dorothy Schilling, 70, of Dubuque, offered her own perspective. She said the greatest problem Obama inherited was the war in Afghanistan. 

“There’s a lot of blame going on, but I don’t think it’s all the right way either,” she said. “He got (the war) right in his lap, when he got elected, and so it keeps carrying on, and we’re deeper in debt because of it.” 

Though his visit Tuesday was about building policy solutions, the president’s campaign is attempting to build momentum across the Iowa. 

Describing the state of Obama’s campaign organization to reporters Saturday in Ames, Democratic Party of Iowa Chairwoman Sue Dvorsky said, “The real work — it’s not very glamorous." 

"There’s not much story; it’s not very sexy. It’s been going on for months. It continues to go on every day (and) every weekend,” she said. 

The conventional wisdom, she said, holds that Iowa will be one of the last battleground states in the 2012 presidential election. Dvorsky then vowed her personal commitment to delivering all of Iowa's six electoral votes to Obama. 

During the same meeting, Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz acknowledged that re-election would not be a “cake walk” for Obama. 

“We’re going to run the most robust, aggressive presidential campaign in American history on our side,” said U.S. Rep. Wasserman Schultz, D-FL. “There’s no question that it’s going to be a competitive-spirited campaign.” 

More than 1,500 organizers have been deployed nationwide, she said, selected from a pool of 15,000 applicants. They are trying to generating momentum for Obama's re-election campaign. 

Obama said the gathering here was not political. While sitting down to share ideas, he said he had no sense of whether participants were Democrats or Republican. 

“It’s a recognition that the prime driver of economic growth and jobs is going to be our people, and the private sector and our businesses ... but you know what, government can help. Government can make a difference,” the president said.