If John Kerry and his advisors have made a list of Tom Vilsack's assets and liabilities, one item in the plus column would be Vilsack's relationship with organized labor. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union -- known as AFSCME -- endorsed Vilsack when he first ran … [Read more...]
Vilsack accomplishments, legacy
Governor Tom Vilsack will leave his mark on Iowa because of two major programs. The first, called Vision Iowa, hands out state grants for construction of major community attractions like the Iowa Events Center in Des Moines and the Mississippi River Museum complex in Dubuque. By design, local … [Read more...]
Vilsack: "I like governing."
One day back in August of 2002, Radio Iowa's O.Kay Henderson walked eight miles with Vilsack during his annual week-long walking and jogging tour from one small Iowa town to another. Eight miles took just a little over two and a half hours once you figure in the water breaks and the handshaking at … [Read more...]
Vilsack, the speechmaker
If democratic presidential candidate John Kerry chooses Tom Vilsack as a runningate, Vilsack will be thrust into the national spotlight -- and behind a microphone. Vilsack often uses his speeches to draw a rhetorical line in the sand. "Many believe that elections are about winning and indeed that … [Read more...]
Vilsack’s brushes with disaster
Once he became governor, it sometimes seemed as if Tom Vilsack might not survive the experience. Early in his first term, Vilsack traveled to the far east on a trade mission, and wound up in the midst of an earthquake in Taiwan. "I had rosary beads next to my bed. I grabbed them and I just said a … [Read more...]
Vilsack: weathering the storms
In January of 1999, Tom Vilsack was sworn in as Iowa's 40th governor. Republicans Bob Ray and Terry Branstad had been governor for 30 years, and Vilsack offended statehouse democrats and the state workers union that had backed him when he chose to keep many of the administrators who'd been working … [Read more...]
Vilsack: the 1998 campaign for governor
1998 was a big year in Iowa politics. Republican Governor Terry Branstad was not seeking re-election after 16 years in the job. Two democrats launched campaigns for governor -- Tom Vilsack and Mark McCormick, a Des Moines attorney who had been a justice on Iowa's Supreme Court. During that … [Read more...]
Vilsack: the state Senate years
Tom Vilsack was elected to the state Senate in 1992 and tackled complicated issues, like tinkering with the formula used to calculate how much businesses pay into the state's unemployment compensation fund. Vilsack tried to find some middle ground in the brewing controversy over large-scale … [Read more...]
Tom Vilsack, the accidental politician?
If you look at Tom Vilsack's resume, it looks like a flow chart that a college professor would use to illustrate how to move up the political ranks. Vilsack was elected his town's mayor three times, then he won a seat in the state legislature which he held for five years. Vilsack followed that … [Read more...]