Tuesday, March 27, 2012

A Ticket in a Primary?

Estherville Daily News item:
Dennis Guth of Klemme, who is running for the Iowa Senate District 4 Seat and Ted Gassman of Scarville, who is running for the Iowa House District 7 seat will be holding get acquainted meetings with citizens on Thursday, March 29.

Both candidates will be at McDonald's in Estherville at 9 a.m. and at the Senior Citizens Center on the east side of Main Street in Armstrong at 7 p.m.
What's interesting here is that both of these guys are in contested Republican primaries.

Guth was the first Republican to announce, but he's been joined in the race by former senator Jim "Back In" Black, who served one year -- not one term, one YEAR -- in 1997 before resigning. Guth has a Tea Party rhetorical style, while Black appears to be Terry Branstad's recruit in this no-incumbent seat. The winner will run against Democrat Bob Jennings.

Gassman -- who spells his first nickname Tedd on the ballot -- faces Mark Frakes of Forest City for the right to take on freshman Democrat John Wittneben. The rhetorical lines aren't as clear here, but my bet is the alliance with Guth means Gassman is the hard right guy.

Keep an eye on the other half of the district, House 8. Incumbent Henry Rayhons is getting challenged from the right by minister Bob Dishman, and if he allies with Guth we have full-blown factional fighting in a five county area...

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