Warren Buffett's biggest newspaper just backed one of the GOP's worst congressmen

Many people don't know it, but Warren Buffett's conglomerate, Berkshire Hathaway, runs the 10th-largest newspaper chain in the country, with 31 dailies and 47 weeklies in 11 states.
     The perception of Buffett, recently photographed at a rally for Hillary Clinton, is of a "liberal" billionaire. The reality is that his most influential paper, the Omaha World-Herald, is often the editorial equivalent of a voter who pulls the straight-ticket master lever to vote for GOP candidates, no matter how incompetent or troglodyte some of them are.
    The Herald's corrosive political influence includes a large section of conservative northwestern Iowa, across the Missouri River from Omaha, Nebraska.
     On Wednesday, the Herald urged its Iowa readers to return Supreme Court Obstructionist Sen. Charles Grassley to office, as well as Rep. David Young and Rep. Steve King, who is almost certainly the loosest cannon in the U.S. House of Representatives whose name isn't Louie Gohmert.
     Before endorsing King, the Herald acknowledged that King continues to draw controversy, which is like acknowledging that Adolf Hitler was rude to Poland.
     This is the best defense of King that the Herald could come up with:

     Responding to criticism that he hasn’t offered a large number of bills, King told The World-Herald, “It is far more important to be engaged in killing bad ideas than to put your name on a good idea.”
     King has done strong work on the farm bills as a member of the House Agriculture Committee. He has supported renewable fuels and worked to obtain federal earmarks to complete Highway 20.
     King noted that future trade agreements will rest on the trade promotion authority Congress has approved. He said the legislation would not have passed if not for amendments he worked to include.

     Compare the Herald's less-than-persuasive praise of the baldly homophobic, racist and chauvinistic King with the Des Moines Register's tell-it-like-it-really-is assessment of King, a lawmaker it has called "an embarrassment to the state of Iowa" and whose opponent, Kim Weaver, the Gannett paper just endorsed:

     Contrast that with her opponent in the 4th district, Rep. Steve King, who’s infamous for talking. He’s known nationally for making outrageous statements — on the floor of Congress, on cable TV, on talk radio, and anywhere else he can get attention.
     But actually doing anything? King has earned a reputation for being one of the least-effective members of Congress. In seven terms in Washington, not one of the bills he’s introduced have ever made it out of committee. Instead, he’s known for his amendments and resolutions that ultimately go nowhere. He takes pride in obstruction.
    We invited King to meet with the editorial board twice this election season, but his campaign declined.
     The Register instead endorses Weaver, who represents a refreshing voice in Iowa politics. She knows the challenges many Iowans face because she’s heard from them directly. 

     Iowans would be better off listening to their own statewide newspaper and ignoring the GOP-inspired machinations of Nebraska's.
     Below are 20 good reasons to defeat Rep. Steve King (which don't include his latest remarks about the superiority of white culture and his idiot comments about Mexican immigrants with "calves the size of cantaloupes.)



20 Reasons to dump Iowa Rep. Steve King

King, a miserably ineffective showboat, sponsored 17 bills in the U.S. House, but, according to Open Congress, not one of them was enacted

In 2013 Steve King has been identified as one of the “ten Republicans who shut down the government” (Gawker), costing the U.S. economy $24 billion.

Has one of the worst congressional ratings, according to Iraq and Afghanistan veterans and avoided the Vietnam draft for three years before he suddenly quit college after being assigned a high draft number which ended the threat of him being forced to shoot at anything that shoots back

The Des Moines Register can't stand him: "King seems to amuse himself by being as partisan and vitriolic as he can be. He has had 10 years in Washington to cultivate his inner-statesman, but he has failed to do so. It’s time for Iowa to make a change." (Written in 2012)

The right-wing editorial page of the Omaha, Nebraska World-Herald endorsed King 

Engaged in deceitful race baiting in the House of Representatives

Voted to expand internet surveillance of users by forcing Internet Service Providers to retain customers' temporarily-assigned IP addresses, as well as other information, for 12 months

Voted for a $250,000 congressional publicity stunt/nonbinding resolution to encourage public display of "In God We Trust" and to affirm that divisive religious bumper-sticker slogan which replaced E Pluribus Unum (Out of many, one), the US' original motto

Voted to defund your local NPR station, presumably in an attempt to get you to listen to Rush Limbaugh more

Voted to strangle Medicare

Voted to force a rushed decision to extend the toxic, leaky Keystone XL pipeline through the Ogallala aquifer

Voted for the "2004 American Jobs Creation Act" — which cut jobs

Accused Iowa marriage equality supporters of following him around and screaming "the worst profanity I've heard anywhere" — but offered not a shred of proof

Somehow concluded that the existence of babies in trashcans meant that the Obama's Affordable Care Act was unconstitutional

Was endorsed by Wall Street financiers who want to eliminate farm subsidies and were fined by the Federal Elections Commission

Played hookey from the House to whine at CPAC about Nancy Pelosi forcing him to use energy-saving lightbulbs in his office while the rest of Iowa's congressional delegation was on the job fighting to protect Iowa National Guard jobs

In a legislative passion ploy, showcased Bishop William Lori, a notorious Catholic bully, as Joan of Arc, tied to the stake by marriage equality advocates

Claimed he bulldozed throngs of intimidating, profane gays to protect Connie Mackie (but unfortunately failed to provide any evidence whatsoever of this)

Was called an embarrassment to Iowa by the state's largest newspaper, in its 2010 endorsement of opponent Matt Campbell. The Des Moines Register added that King was "provocative, not focused on getting results for Iowans... reactive, not visionary" and added that it was time for Iowa voters to replace him

 King wants U.S. Intelligence (which didn't see ISIS coming in the first place) to spy on U.S. mosques, despite the fact that virtually every single American Muslim organization has publicly disavowed both the ideology and the practices of ISIS