Gomers -- What's going wrong

DERECHO DEVASTATION: Monday's derecho - a vicious thunderstorm system featuring 100 mph-plus winds - inflicted immense damage along a path from Story to Linn counties up to 20 miles side. Tama and Benton counties, declared disaster areas by the governor, suffered the most. Iowa's worst wind event since 1998 claimed thousands of trees and power lines and hundreds of buildings, and damaged at least 100,000 acres of corn. Vinton, for example, lost as many as three-fourths of its many trees. Some power outages remained at week's end.

lll

STAGNANT STATE: The Iowa Business Council, representing the state's largest employers and the three public universities, released its first Competitive Index last week. It indicates that Iowa has been flat over the past decade in four of five measurements: Economic growth, education and work force readiness, governance and fiscal matters and work force demographics and diversity. The one improved area was health and well-being.

lll

GUARD LOSES ANOTHER: Sgt. 1st Class Terryl Pasker of Cedar Rapids become the fourth Iowa Army National Guard soldier killed in Afghanistan this year. An Afghan security guard shot him July 9.