The current primary between Dick Lugar and Richard Mourdock, for some reason, reminds me of the primary between now state Sen. Greg Walker and former state Sen. Bob Garton. Indiana did not trade up in the latter case and I don’t see that they would in the current primary either.
Mourdock is trying to get traction over Lugar based on whether or not he owns a house in Indiana. It’s a bit odd to me that Lugar has been re-elected for decades and now some are shocked that he spends most of his time in D.C.; their support somehow hinged on the particulars of his accommodations when he returned to the state.
In the meantime, what’s Mourdock’s signature accomplishment? Investing in distressed Chrysler assets, being surprised when the fire sale prices he bought them at turned out to be indication that they were troubled assets, then spending $2 million in legal fees trying to kill Chrysler so Indiana could get less money out of the bankruptcy.
I’ll take Sen. Lugar whose real mortal sin, of course, is being friendly to President Obama that one time.
No one is shocked Lugar is spending most of his time in D.C. People are shocked he is claiming residence at a house he sold 35 years ago, and continues to vote from that signing documents under oath that he lives there…not just to vote, but to register with the BMV and to pay taxes. That news has only broke during this year. Not sure the law that give the Senator and his a wife a pass on following the laws we all have to follow. When he abandoned his residence 35 years ago, he should have identified another residence. He failed to do so.
Lugar is one of the last statemen we have in the Senate. The era of Dole, Cranston, Byrd, is passing. Men that understand that the Constitutional Republic cannot function without compromise. He is the only Republican I have ever voted for in a statewide or national race.
I have not followed the race much, but the Republicans that I hang with are not concerned yet, but are concerned that their party is being hijacked by the spawn of talk radio, the Gadsden Flag and conspiracy theorists.
Doug, you also forgot that under Mourdock’s watch, Indiana “lost” $400 million dollars in tax revenue.
So he’s not even a good treasurer and he’s supposed to be a better senator than Dick Lugar, given what Lugar has done in office. Please.
I understand the opinion of those who say that Lugar has had his time and it’s time for someone new. I don’t agree, but you’re welcome to your opinion.
But this nonsense that Lugar isn’t conservative enough? Total garbage. You cannot look at the man’s record – his entire time in office – and come to that conclusion. Those who make the claim have short attention spans or are OK with being liars.
Richard Mourdock is not an improvement over Dick Lugar, and I think even he knows it. He’s hoping the residency issue, along with the conservative lunatic fringe that is chasing people like me from the party, and sweep him into office.
I’ll vote for Dick Lugar in the primary. But if Mourdock manages to win the primary, I will never, EVER, vote for him. Full stop.
Joe: just a few thoughts.
“You cannot look at the man’s record – his entire time in office – and come to that conclusion.” You are entitled to your opinions, but that is the wrong test. Being elected Senator (again) isn’t a lifetime achievement award. You don’t look at the full body of work, you look at his current positions and current actions. I don’t care if Lugar voted conservatively XX 20 years ago, I care about his current positions:
(1) how he is going to lower the budget (his earmarks comments suggests the deficit issue is not important to him).
(2) Lugar’s previous backing of the individual mandate for health care and his current refusal to sign the brief supporting it be found unconstitutional.
(3) His support of Dream, which furthers a higher education bubble, by providing citizenship to illegal aliens that go to college.
(4) Lugar’s attacks at the Tea Party, which constitutes a grass roots effort to fix many problems currently found in the Republican establishment, of which he is a member (while I am not a member of the TP, I do feel some of their claims are valid).
(5) Lugar’s refusal to spend much time in the state of Indiana, and lack of interest in OUR concerns.
Additionally, any comments about Lugar being a “statesman” are laughable to anyone that has seen his campaign material in this election. Lugar may have been a statesman at one point in time, but that time is gone. Exhibits A and B are his attacks against his constituents that identify as the Tea Party and his current campaign tactics, which are full of half-truth attacks and misrepresentations.
What’s the benchmark for conservatism? Is it the ideas which have been accepted as conservative throughout Lugar’s political life or is he expected to follow conservative orthodoxy as it continues to shift. For example, you might recall that not so long ago, the individual mandate was championed (possibly even originated) by the undoubtedly conservative Heritage Foundation. Now, it’s not only not conservative but has made it all the way to “unconstitutional” proving, at least, that even conservatives treat the Constitution as a “living” document. (Incidentally, when he was a candidate, President Obama opposed the individual mandate and identified that opposition as a difference between himself and Hillary Clinton in the primary.)
Excellent Doug. Obama pulled out a 1990s Republican healthcare plan and now the Republicans disown their spawn.
Doug: A few quick responses…
(a) As I said to one of your previous responses to me, I am not sure why date matters. People also thought the sun rotated the earth at one point in time. I don’t care if it was 10 years ago, or 1000. If we think we know better now, let’s adjust accordingly.
(b) As an intelligent lawyer (that phrase is neither an oxy moron nor redundant), you know that conservative/liberal has nothing to do with constitutional/unconstitutional. Conservative ideas can be unconstitutional too (albeit with less frequency).
(c) The #1 mantra of conservatism is ” less government.” Please explain how a government mandate is “less government.” I would argue it isn’t. Of course, I had bigger concerns in 1989-1994, so I do not remember/appreciate the argument for it.
Prior expression of belief matters because it requires some good explanation to avoid the conclusion that the new position something other than a pretense.
In the case of the sun – yeah, we used to believe it revolved around the earth because that’s what it looks like. We changed our mind because we learned the scientific method and better math and the new theory predicts the observed data with much better accuracy.
In the case of the individual mandate, not much seems to have changed except that it was proposed by The Enemy.
You say that smaller government is a core conservative principle. Observation of past conduct does not really bear that out, but I’ll leave that aside for a second (and sidestep the “no true Scotsman” defense.) Personal responsibility is also a value expressed by conservatives.
The insurance mandate helps promote personal responsibility by reducing the free rider problem. A more direct method of reducing that problem is to let the poor and uninsured die in the streets. But, absent the political stomach to do that, you require people to insure themselves and take the burden off the rest of us when they get sick. See, e.g., this report. (pdf) from Heritage Foundation fellow Robert Moffit.
Very well analyzed, Doug. The mandate will be upheld, I believe. I taught a con law class a year ago at a four-year college and read up on commerce clause jurisprudence. I predict 7-2, maybe 6-3. Clarence Thomas, a man unqualified by intellect and temperment to sit on the bench, is a sure bit to rule against the mandate, though.
The scientific method has led me to the conclusion that Richard Lugar is the best candidate for the US Sentate, followed by Joe Connelly. I have two chances to win.
This dialouge has prompted me to donate to the Lugar campaign. Other tha personal friends running for office on the GOP ticket, I have never donated money to a Republican before. My Great Grandmother and a whole bunch of ancestors would kick the tops off of their caskets. Many other ancestors would smile and nod.
C’mon Doug, you don’t really want to argue that the Republican Party of 2008 would have supported the individual mandate if it hadn’t been supported by “The Enemy” (I don’t know if you mean Hillary or Barack, but it doesn’t matter I guess).
Secondly, you may be mistaking the word “Conservative” with the word “Republican.” Those two words are not interchangable. “Conservative” has historical meant less government, govt. closer to the people, slower change of government, and an individual rights platform. Granted, the Repub. party has transitioned some from that (and don’t get me started on Santorum).
I agree that conservatism does have a belief in personal responsibility. This can be at odds with “smaller government” at times. A better example of that tension is No Child Left Behind. Bigger govt. was intended to provide more responsiblity. However, in the individual mandate issue, the increase in personal responsiblity is much weaker than the increase in the scope of government.
To get back on subject, the only “pretense” I note is that Lugar seems to be moving to the right, at the same exact time that he has a primary challenger. That timing seems peculiar.
I didn’t cite the Republicans. I cited the Heritage Foundation. And, in any event, I do think conservatives would have supported it if proposed by a Republican. Because, at this point, I think conservatism is more or less an arbitrary term – more tied to tribal loyalties than to any ideological particulars. The tribe will support those measures originating with conservative think tanks like Heritage and Cato, promoted by Fox News and Rush Limbaugh, and introduced by a Republican. A rationale for why those measures – whatever they may be – will be constructed to ensure that they fit into “core conservative values.” That’s why you don’t see much more than token objections to farm subsidies or incontinent military spending.
George Bush, after all, got the support of conservatives and Republicans in 2004 even after he pushed through Medicare Part D in 2003. When Obama took office and deficits became important again, George Bush lost their support – retroactively.
The individual mandate inovlves little government action. The cost-shifting mechanisms and the gross inefficiencies of Medicaid (but not Medicare) do involve quite a bit of government involvement. But under an individual mandatye, you buy a private policy or pay a tax or a penalty.
Bill Krystol defined the Republican approach to healthcare cost reform in the mid 1990s. Oppose everything at all costs. Make no credible proposals. Otherwise, voters will see the Democrats providing a long needed social program that allows the self-employed, the under-employed, those burdened with pre-existing conditions and those that work for employers that are so unprofitable that they cannot pay for a basic socially expected benefit.
In my analysis, most people that aspire to conservatism quickly understand that, as Harold Lawsell said in 1937, politics is about who gets what, when and how. All politicans quickly learn that the American political system is not truly about checks and balances. It is about the “Checks.” Will my consitutents get more checks to help me get relected, will my opponendsm underserving or undesirable people not get checks or smaller checks, and will my core constituency have to write smaller checks to the government.
The root of this whole thing is that “conservative” means different things to different people. I would define conservative to be close to libertarian in many ways. If you want to say George Bush got the support of conservatives, that might be true, but it was begruding at best. It isn’t like we had much of a choice.
If you ask me to pick the penultimate conservatives, they would probably be Scalia and Ron Paul, not George Bush and Rush Limbaugh.
That’s fair enough, Paul. And I don’t have any problem with your definition of conservatism — I probably agree with a good bit of it as well.
The reality is that a political party has to win elections. And, to do so, it has to have a brand people identify with. I think the Republican Party uses conservatism as part of its branding (and liberalism as part of its counter-branding) – and different people identify with the brand in different ways. Social conservatives probably hear the word without identifying it with the sort of libertarianism permissiveness that permits all kinds of lifestyle choices so long as they don’t pick anyone else’s pocket or break their legs.
I would argue that to the extent conservatives are supposedly for “individual rights,” it is for a conception of individual rights rooted in the social and intellectual conditions of 200+ years ago.
Liberals are the ones for actual individual rights, with their position being informed by advances in our knowledge of how society and the world works over that time span that enable us to better understand the sources of authority and constraints on human freedom and how best to check them to maximize individual liberty in the real world.
The only difference between the Founders and modern liberals is that modern liberals have the same basic worldview but enjoy the benefit of more than two centuries’ worth of intellectual progress. Were the Founders alive today, with the same worldview as they had then but with the benefit of today’s knowledge, they’d be with the liberals. The supposed similarities conservatives like to claim they have with the Founders are only superficial, and completely ignore the intellectual foundations of the Founders’ conception of liberty. It’s the liberals who are their true heirs.
Steely…. Arguing about who is the “true heirs” of the Founders is a pointless waste of time akin to “Mom loves me more.”
However, you assert, without providing any evidence, that liberals appreciate individual rights more than conservatives. I don’t see it. It appears that conservatives generally care more about property rights and gun rights than liberals (as documented in McDonald, Kelo, etc.). Based on the Westboro Baptist Supreme Court decision, it appears Free Speech is close to a wash as well. And based on the decision to enact and reauthorize the Patriot Act, neither conservatives or liberals have a good record when it comes to those types of actions. What individucthat liberals believe more in “group rights” than in individual rights. If you disagree, please inform us on what individual rights liberals appreciate more?
You mean like government mandates that women have to undergo ultrasounds before abortions, or that gays can’t marry?
While I agree with the social positions of some current conservatives, I don’t agree that using the government to make everyone live and think the way I do is proper.
Because that’s not “less government” in any way, shape, or form.
Nixon’s favorite mayor is now declared too liberal, because he doesn’t want to punish immigrant’s children, has determined that a program born from the Heritage Foundation is not “the end of liberty, knows the “earmarks” debate is a joke, and his failure to genuflect to a movement which nominated and elected a carpet-bagging banking lobbyist, while mired in a financial crisis…
As a Democrat, I’ve never wanted to vote for him more. I mean, I guess i could vote for the Treasurer who can’t keep track of the Treasury and whose main public policy interest was screwing Chrysler’s worker and thus creating a hole in the ground where Kokomo used to be.
Paul C. ,
I Interestingly enough, the positions that you cite are all reasons I support Lugar. And I think he addresses my issues relatively well, although I am troubled that he has swung to the extreme right to challenge the Tea Party candidate.
I am still have not determined whether the Tea Party is Koch Brothers and the so-call Club for Growth astroturf or sterile grass-roots. But I don’t much care and do not think Tea Party members would have clue about their pedigree. As long as they keep government out of their Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid (for the unsuccessful Tea Party members that are dual-eligibles and/or sleep in the welfare beds in nursing homes.)
“I am still have not determined whether the Tea Party is Koch Brothers and the so-call Club for Growth astroturf or sterile grass-roots. ”
Why can’t it be both? Just like many organic, grassroot movements, they eventually are either supported by the major parties and absorbed in (such as Republican-supporting FreedomWorks acting as an arm to “bring in” Tea Partiers, or how the Democrats absorbed the Populist movement back in the…1890s?), or the movement ends because no one cares about the issues they raise.
Matt I am on my iPhone and cannot offer accurate dialogue tonight but you raise some good points I will try to reply in the am I am texting and engaging in some other. Motor ss activity right now s
Although this is offered in way of settlement
And should. In no way be considered an admission
Carlito: you sound to be a core Lugar voter. Good luck with that. I respectfully disagree. I prefer to actually think my elected representative enjoys and chooses to spend time in the same state I chose to live and acts accordingly.
However, I hope you have at least attended one local TP meeting before deciding the whole organization, state (country) wide has little merit and may be a front for some Wizard of Oz type controlling actions of thousands of millions from behind a well-financed curtain.
I think what some liberals and Democrats are more unaware of is how disconnected Lugar is with the Republican base.
And this isn’t some new development. It has been that way for a decade, possibly even more.
He is an infrequent attendee at party events, does very little fundraising for other candidates, and seems to be completely out for himself.
Not unlike his former colleague, Evan Bayh.
Compare that to the rest of the Indiana delegation. Carson, Rokita, Donnelly, Buschon, all come back to Indiana, state in touch with their constitutents, and are generally on good terms with their respective political parties. All are actually living within Indiana too, and to the best of my knowledge, most of Indiana’s delegation isn’t as wealthy as Lugar.
I also find it very ironic that many non-Republicans praise Lugar’s record, but nitpick Mourdock’s record. You know, Lugar has a record before he became a Senator. He ran for Senate against Birch Bayh when he was a sitting mayor of Indianapolis. The Indianapolis Star published the first in a series of corruption stories going on within the Indianapolis Police Department, which had ties to Lugar’s mayoral administration (mostly by ignoring the problem), the (Republican) county prosecutor, and the Marion County Republican Party. In that election, Lugar lost to Birch Bayh by over 70,000 votes, and didn’t even carry Marion County. Also in that election, the Democrats won the Prosecutor’s office for the first time in a decade or two. It isn’t all unlike when Steve Goldsmith ran for Governor, and also lost in part due to a police scandal that erupted.
Is he conservative enough? That’s debatable. But he is detached, and that is probably the most effective attack against him, moreso than any specific policy.
Matt: Good points. I see a lot of similarity between Bayh and Lugar. Both govern towards the middle, if not the fringe of the other party. Both seem to think they are above the law when it comes to residency requirements (Bayh’s was earlier when he was running for office, Lugar’s is after he ran for office), and both seem to be completely out for themselves.
Put another way, is a detached Lugar better than an engaged Mourduck for Hoosiers?
I haven’t seen Mourdock be able to articulate why that’s the case. I think we’ve been better off with a Senator who, I dunno, gets foreign policy and other things I’d expect from a Senator.
I’ve been represented by Dan Burton and Mike Pence in the past in the House. I don’t know often they came to visit Indiana, but I regarded both as wastes of tax dollars.
I mean, how did shooting up melons or playing golf all the time help Hoosiers? How did not passing any legislation since 2001 help Hoosiers?
I don’t think someone who doesn’t have foreign policy experience should be immediately disqualified. Lugar didn’t have any foreign policy experience when he was first elected either. He was mayor of Indianapolis.
Running in a primary is different than running in a general. Both should be making a play to the party’s base. And Lugar isn’t doing that, he’s relying on the establishment to basically get the base out for him.
Burton represented me for a few years. A waste of organic chemicals.
Probably nothing surprising, but it’s at least a bit disorienting when I see attacks on Lugar come floating across on the computer. I keep having to look to determine whether I’m seeing something from Mourdock supporters or from the Indiana Democrats. They both seem to be reading from the same playbook on this issue.
Mourdock obviously wants to beat Lugar. The Indiana Democrats probably feel that Donnelly’s chances are better against either Mourdock or against a weakened Lugar.
Well, well, Emperor Masson has no clothes. All your protestations and damnation of Charlie White over registering to vote for a few month period at a home he actually slept at, received mail and where his son lived warranted his being removed from office and criminally charged and convicted. Lugar uses someone else’s home to register to vote and obtan a driver’s license for 35 years and it’s all just much ado about nothing, not to mention illegally billing taxpayers for hotel visits to Indiana while claiming on his Senate travel reimbursement claim forms that he maintained a home at that home he abandoned 35 years ago. Can you really say that with a straight face, Doug?
Primarily because my understanding is that there are different residency requirements for U.S. Senators than there are for town councilmen and state officials; based in no small part upon the reality that federal officials’ place of work is necessarily in Washington D.C.
White was registered to vote at all times within one county and one town in which he served in an at-large elected position on the town council. His residency at all times was within the standards set out in the Bayh and Evrard decisions. And for that, you demanded he give up his office and go to jail. In Lugar’s case, You are essentially arguing that state law allows him to claim he does not have to maintain any physical presence within the state for voting registration purposes because he has been continuously absent from the state for 35 years. Makes a lot of sense to me. Not. Why don’t you bother reading Andrew Mallon, the Democratic-appointed attorney for the election board’s well-written analysis of the residency law requirement before you so casually dismiss it.
There you go with facts again, Doug.
All Lugar had to do is register at a place he could conceivably reside in either when he is in Indiana or when he retires from the Senate.
He registered at someone else’s address. That address is also used by the family that actually lives there.
No way is that even remotely legal, as far as voting in Marion County in that specific precinct goes.
Matt: you don’t beliieve Lugar is returning to Indiana when he retires, do you?
Evan Bayh sure didn’t. Dan Coats didn’t.
Did Coats retire? Is there anyway to make him that grifting, god-bothering SOB retire?
I also note that you havent addressed the fraudulent, multi-decades offenses by the Lugar’s either, Mr. Masson. A 35 year middle finger to a group of constituents detracts from the ‘distinguished solon’ persona that the media has only reluctantly started to part ways with..I expect better from a blog. Sad #Fail
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I have a question for Indiana Republicans. Lugar, by your telling, has apparently not lived legally in Indiana since 1977, and that’s only become an issue for you NOW?
Oh, partisan politics. Why do you only ask Republicans this question? Considering that the Indiana Democratic Party has latched onto this issue (in addition to the Mourdock campaign) it appears you should be asking all Hoosiers EXCEPT the Republicans that support Lugar?
I’ll answer it anyway. I wasn’t aware of this problem until recently. Were you?
Maybe this is a little childish or petty, but the name “Mourdcock” sounds like the name of the evil villian in a teenage sword and sorcery fantasy book. It has the Norse mord root meaning murder. It is not warm and fuzzy like Kennedy, Starr, Christie, Olson or Goodman.
But then again, Lugar is named after a classic German pistol.
Well said. This primary has been about all the wrong things. Mourdock is trying to keep the conversation away from the real issues. At least this ad shows some of the dynamic of the race: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wuVpHT5aOwQ&context=C4398619ADvjVQa1PpcFMMkG8sfx3JL-bkjsSn98fNj86RfHfVkFQ=