Capitol Ideas: Old foes Branstad, Conlin discover the real digital divide

DES MOINES — Gov. Terry Branstad is a cutting edge, high-tech sort of guy, right?

He's promoting broadband expansion so farmers have the same Internet access from their tractors as Iowa City millennials have from their coffeehouses. And while @ChuckGrassley may have his Twitter and Instagram accounts, Branstad, according to his staff, is the first governor in the nation to use that cool tech toy, Meerkat, that lets him live-stream events, such as his news conferences or tours of Iowa manufacturers, through the administration's Twitter account.

But when it comes to smartphones, the governor is not all thumbs.

An exchange between the governor and Des Moines lawyer Roxanne Barton Conlin, who was deposing him in a lawsuit brought against Branstad by a former state appointee, highlights the limits of his 'tech-knowledgy.'

Conlin, who was Branstad's opponent when he first ran for governor in 1982, is asking the governor about his answer to earlier questions when he said he didn't have a smartphone. It turns out his answers may not have been completely accurate.

CONLIN: 'Governor, you told me that you did not have a smartphone, but apparently you do.'

BRANSTAD: 'I have a BlackBerry …

just an old-fashioned BlackBerry.'

Then, almost apologetically, Branstad offers that, 'My staff people have a lot more sophisticated things than that.'

It reminded me of the time I tried to explain to my then 80-something-year-old mom how cellphones work. I think she believed me when I said the Holy Spirit was involved.

It turns out that Branstad, like Hillary Clinton, has an 'email-gate.'

The governor has said for years that he doesn't use email or text messaging in his job — because he doesn't have a smartphone. Conlin asks how he gets daily briefings — news clips — on his 'old-fashioned BlackBerry' if, as the governor said, he doesn't have an email address.

BRANSTAD: 'Well, I don't know. There's an app for that. If I click on that app, then this comes up.'

CONLIN: 'OK. That's — there's an icon of some kind that you click on that.'

BRANSTAD: 'Well, I think they call it an app. But, yeah.'

In the end, we learn the governor receives email through a staff-maintained account, 'but the governor does not send email whether it is personal, political, state or some other form,' according to spokesman Jimmy Centers.

There are two exceptions, Centers said. One was a reply with nothing in the body of the message. The other was an email sent to a non-existent v@vv.

'Both appear to be mistakes,' Centers said, what he called a 'pocket reply.' Otherwise known as 'butt dialing.'

Perhaps the moral here is that the real digital divide isn't about where you live or how much income you have, but about age.

Hillary Clinton may have said it best. Or, to be accurate, Amy Poehler playing Clinton may gave said it best in a 'Saturday Night Live' skit poking fun at the former secretary of state's struggles with newfangled technology — a cellphone.

'I wasn't born yesterday,' Poehler-as-Clinton said. 'I was born 67 years ago.'

That might explain the technological struggles of Branstad and Conlin, both older than Clinton.