Iowa

Thomas Dorr may have a lot of enemies in his home state of Iowa, but he has a loyal fan in the nation's capital: George W. Bush.

The president has once again submitted Dorr's name for the post of undersecretary of rural development in the Department of Agriculture, even though Senate Democrats blocked Dorr from the same post during Bush's first term.

The nomination promises to reignite a dispute between Iowa's two senators over Dorr's qualifications and may trigger another testy confirmation process.

Dorr, 58, a farmer from Marcus, Iowa, is a controversial choice to oversee rural development, in part because he has touted the virtues of large-scale agriculture and suggested that several Iowa counties had prospered because most of the residents are white.