August 2025 - Average Flatlander

Who is Rob Sand? Democrats Win, Republicans Sweat. Who’s the next Governor?

It is an interesting time to be alive in Iowa, a place known for its slow pace of life and laid back culture. It’s hard to understate what a hidden gem of the upper Midwest the once beautiful prairie state is, sandwiched between the mighty Mississippi and that lesser known Missouri River, Iowa has plenty of its own drama and troubles.

In the high intensity political country we live in, Iowa has not escaped that bitter culture war that seems to be engulfing us with violent outbursts. As a reader and admirer of history, American history in particular, and as someone who is very familiar with the mostly violent past of this great country; it comes no surprise to me that the even here at the heart of the bread belt hatred and rivalry has overtaken common human decency at last.

John Deere suffers. The land heals.

This is, of course, overstating the facts, but indeed it is, at least for the hopeful few, a possible harbinger of a small respite that is in order for the once sea of prairie that is not corn that covers the landscape of Iowa. Indeed, the news has been bleak for John Deere (especially their employees) over the last few years, with things continuing to heat up.

TDLR:

As Deere suffers and the agriculture economy as a whole, across Iowa, contracts, it is possible the land may get a small, brief, respite from the continual environmental flogging it recieves. How so? The weak farm economy might spur an increase in CRP, row crop acres dropping generally, less chemicals and fertilizers being dumped (opps, I mean sprayed).

Iowa’s Water Crisis. It’s only just begun.

“While the political parties rage and tear each other to pieces, and the multi-billion-dollar agriculture corporations turn a handsome profit, Iowa citizens pay a terrible price with every drop of water consumed.”

Sometimes I feel as if I’m living in a strange cross between some Orwellian future, and 1984. The rains in Iowa have been pounding steadily for months and the rivers have been running milky brown and over the banks the entire summer. In 2024, Iowa received a total of 36.95 inches of precipitation on average. 2025 has kept the pace going. “July 2025 ties 1897 as the 46th warmest and ranks as the 2nd wettest July in 153 years of statewide records.” – Iowa Ag.

This has come at a price, seemingly out of nowhere for most Iowans.