Republicans on September 22 chose Linn County GOP Co-Chair Cindy Golding as their candidate for the Iowa Senate District 18 special election, which could alter control of the Iowa Senate.

Golding, of rural Cedar Rapids, won with 51.6 percent of the weighted vote cast by the 50 delegates who gathered in the Longbranch Hotel & Convention Center in Cedar Rapids.

She defeated former U.S. Attorney Matt Dummermuth of Robins, who placed second with 28.1 percent of the vote, and Marion businesswoman Mary Rathje, who received 20.2 percent of the vote. Governor Terry Branstad encouraged Rathje to run, gubernatorial spokesperson Tim Albrecht confirmed September 23.

The battle for control of the Iowa Senate got underway Monday, with Republican Mary Rathje announcing her candidacy for a vacant Senate seat and a gay-rights group emphasizing the importance of the November 8 special election.

"This is it. We are facing a special election, and marriage equality hangs in the balance," wrote Troy Price, executive director of One Iowa - the state's largest gay-rights advocacy group - in an e-mail to supporters. "If we lose the seat, we face a very real chance that a marriage ban will pass a vote in the Senate. In Iowa, marriage has never been threatened like this before."

Swati Dandekar (D-Marion) resigned Friday from the Iowa Senate to take a $137,000-a-year job with the three-member Iowa Utilities Board, which regulates Iowa's utilities. The move threatens Democrats' majority in the Iowa Senate, now reduced to 25-24.

The turn of events is key, because Democrats' slim majority in the Iowa Senate prevented passage this year of Republican priorities ranging from a public vote on same-sex marriage to sweeping property-tax reform to a bill that Democrats criticized as bringing an end to collective bargaining.

People who were not trained to be teachers but have at least five years of work experience could get approval to teach high school in shortage areas such as math and science under a proposed new state rule.

"This is a last-minute, emergency-type situation. This is not what we would consider normal procedure," George Maurer, executive director of the Iowa Board of Educational Examiners (which handles teacher licensure), told a panel of lawmakers.

But the idea was blasted Tuesday by the state teachers' union, which said the move would substantially lower standards for teachers who must understand how youth learn, how to manage a classroom, and how to put together a lesson.

"It is a significant departure from the expectations that we have had for licensed teachers that we have put in front of our public-school children here in the state of Iowa," said Christy Hickman, staff counsel of the Iowa State Education Association (ISEA), which represents more than 34,000 educators. "This is going to be the first time that we are allowing non-educators to teach very high-level courses to our kids. ... They shouldn't have to be guinea pigs for three years."

The rule proposed by the Iowa Board of Educational Examiners received an initial review Tuesday by the legislature's Administrative Rules Review Committee. Under the rule, school districts that have unsuccessfully tried to hire a fully licensed teacher instead can hire someone with experience working in math, chemistry, physics, biology, foreign language, or music.

I began to reminisce during Governor Pat Quinn's Chicago press conference last week. Quinn had called the media together to announce he was closing seven state facilities and laying off almost 2,000 state employees because the General Assembly had passed an inadequate budget.

"Wait," I thought. "Haven't I already seen this movie?"