Judge Hanson made a legal argument in his decision, which I summarized here.  Here are the logical steps he made:
The burden of the plaintiffs is to prove that the gender restrictions on marriage in Iowa law do not bear “a rational relationship to the achievement of any legitimate governmental interest.”
Of the five interests proposed by [...]

I blogged for a while tonight about this story over at Iowa Independent: Iowa’s ban on same-sex marriage was overturned Thursday in a Polk County courtroom. It was a surprise to many, but it was greeted with excitement among fans of civil rights all the same. Even the Republicans, who were criticizing the [...]

New poll numbers from the American Research Group reveal significant improvement in former Gov. Mike Huckabee’s standing in Iowa, bouncing to 14% support after the Iowa Republican Straw Poll earlier this month.  ARG’s polling indicated that Huckabee had the support of only 1% of Iowa Republican caucus-goers last month.
While the ARG’s likely caucus-goer screen is [...]

John Deeth snapped this photo of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s new Iowa City campaign office:

Giuliani is the first Republican to open an office in Iowa City, county seat of “The People’s Republic of Johnson County.” Iowa City is known for its large progressive community, but Deeth correctly notes why opening an [...]

New reasons emerged this week to doubt the tier system most commentators use to describe the 2008 presidential horse race.
Conventional wisdom — here in Iowa and across the country — dictates that the three candidates to watch on the Democratic side are Sen. Hillary Clinton, Sen. Barack Obama, and former Sen. John Edwards.
Sen. Chris Dodd, [...]

“Mainstream Iowan,” a blog that is decidedly not mainstream, writes this morning that illegal immigration is “a public health issue for all Americans.”
Under a photo of a young hispanic male wearing a scary SARS mask, the blogger recounts this story:
When doctors told Francisco Santos he had tuberculosis Friday, health officials said the Gwinnett County 17-year-old [...]

noneed4thneed of Century of the Common Iowan launched a new online poll last week to measure his readers’ support of Democratic presidential candidates.  He held them in the past, and the results were always unscientific but interesting to see.  Now that campaigns are taking Iowa blogs a bit more seriously, however, Iowa bloggers can’t assume [...]

Plenty of volunteers have crappy experiences in campaign offices, because that’s just how it goes.  Once you agree to volunteer, campaigns don’t put as much effort into making friends with you because they assume you have already drunk the Kool-Aid.  Unfortunately, when there are few clear distinctions between candidates and a long, contentious primary, staff [...]

After the Straw Poll, Huckabee and Brownback have both significantly downsized their Iowa campaigns despite their top three finishes.
For Huckabee, who got the second-place spot in Ames, the downsizing is temporary:
Rather than kicking his Iowa campaign up a notch, second-place Ames Straw Poll finisher Gov. Mike Huckabee of Arkansas downsized his Iowa operation to just [...]

Greg Sargent at TPM Election Central noticed this nugget in the latest Strategic Vision poll of likely caucus goers:
 4. Do you favor a withdrawal of all United States military from Iraq within the next six months? (Republicans Only)
Yes [...]