Campaign ’96 / MEDIA : Cutbacks Change Voice of Iowa’s Major Newspaper : The Des Moines Register has been forced to retrench from its statewide presence. Some see political, social side effects.

When Chuck Offenburger grew up in the small southwest Iowa town of Shenandoah, the mighty Des Moines Register was more than a daily thump on the front porch. It was like a beacon luring the young writer toward Iowa’s big-time, prestige journalism.

So when he joined the Register in 1972 and became a columnist five years later, Offenburger had “stars in my eyes” about the Register’s state and national reputation. Now, although he still remains loyal to his newspaper, the popular columnist sees the Register’s light dimming in the distant outposts of his state. Instead of a powerful voice for all of Iowa, the Des Moines paper has become more of a paper for Des Moines.

Faced with financial pressures confronting many newspapers, the Register has been scaling back its predawn deliveries of the paper to distant farming communities, trimming away costly subscribers who lived out west near Sioux City or down near Burlington or up north around Mason City. A young Chuck Offenburger way out in Shenandoah might still get the paper, but it is by mail. It comes late in the day, and even though it still has a lot of the big-league Register writers and columnists, the paper is thinner, a shadow of its former hulk.

“Out there, they feel betrayed,” said Offenburger, who has made this issue something of a personal campaign. “They’re angrier than hell about it, and I am too. I think it’s a terrible blow to the state. This is one of the most important social institutions in this state; it is part of the glue that holds us together.”

If the Register were located anywhere else, its problems would be of minimal interest to those outside of Iowa. But over the years, as Iowa’s presidential caucuses have taken on a crucial role in shaping the nation’s politics, the Register has taken on an influence far out of proportion to its size. Its columnists and political writers, particularly chief political reporter David Yepsen, have been eagerly courted by candidates and consultants, and its coverage has dominated the state’s politics.

Now, with the caucuses set for Monday, voters in the snowy outreaches of the state must glean most of their political news elsewhere--from other papers, television, talk radio or, in some cases, even the Internet. The change, along with other factors such as Steve Forbes’ massive budget, have contributed to a shift in the process that has been widely discussed here in recent weeks--a move away from the sort of retail politics that has long been associated with Iowa and toward the sort of television- and advertising-oriented politics familiar in larger states.

“One of the good things about Iowa is that real candidates have had to interact with real people and answer real questions and on occasion be disagreed with and told they’re wrong,” said Hugh Winebrenner, professor of public administration at Drake University here. “If the candidates don’t talk to real folks in Iowa, when will they?”

Many believe that the Register’s political muscle helped coax Republicans in 1988 to choose Sen. Bob Dole over then-Vice President George Bush, for example.

The paper has endorsed Dole again this year in an editorial entitled, “Who better than Dole?” The endorsement last Sunday also noted that the caucuses this year fall on the birth date of Abraham Lincoln. “Lincoln was from humble beginnings, and he was a practical politician who made deals and shied away from extremes. You could get the feeling he’d be comfortable with Bob Dole.”

But whether the endorsement will mean as much as it did in 1988 is now a question.

“The Register has always had a rap as Iowa’s liberal rag--the paper that Iowans love to hate,” Winebrenner said. “Now I think they’re trying to show that they are more impartial. . . . They are really taking seriously the idea of citizen input and are trying very hard to connect more with the community.”

The size and cohesiveness of that community, however, concerns many Register veterans, including columnist James Flansburg.

“I think it’s really a sad thing, and I think I can already see some sectional divisions building,” he said. “It’s kind of like upstate New York versus the city or downstate Illinois versus Chicago. That’s new for Iowa.”

Register President and Publisher Charles C. Edwards Jr. said that despite cutbacks in circulation, the paper has a commitment to “make a high-quality news product available to anyone in the state who wants it,” although that product might come by home delivery or mail or “emerging technologies.”

“The out-state readers are still a very important part of our business,” said Edwards, who believes a new distribution system now starting outside Des Moines will make it easier and more profitable to reach rural readers.

But for many Iowans who have depended on the Register as part of their statewide community, the retrenchment has left them feeling cut off--especially from state news.

“We have a lot of loyal readers out there, and they understand on some level,” Yepsen said. “But part of what happens is that they feel it’s just one more way they are being isolated. If you live in rural Iowa, and this goes back generations, you often feel that somehow you are missing out--recreational, schools, other facilities--this just adds to that feeling.”