Instant analysis of Indiana Sen. Dick Lugar’s crushing defeat at the hands of state Treasurer Richard Mourdock in Tuesday’s Republican primary cast it as yet another example of a tea party-aligned GOPer ousting a prominent face of the party establishment.
And that instant analysis would be wrong. Lugar lost — and lost badly — for a number of reasons, the vast majority of which had nothing to do with the relative tea party-ness of his opponent.
At its heart, Lugar’s defeat was attributable to the fact that he broke the political golden rule: Never lose touch with the people who elected you.
Lugar, the Post continues, lives in Northern Virginia and stayed in hotels when he "went home" to Indiana. Exit polling showed many Republican Hoosiers thought it was time the 80-year-old Lugar retired. And Lugar ran a "flat-footed" campaign, focusing too much on his Senate experience in an era where incumbency is a hindrance. All of that explains how Lugar lost his bid for a seventh term.
But missing from this analysis is the answer to another question: Why did Richard Mourdock win, and why did he win so big (by 20 percentage points and over 120,000 votes)? The fact is that despite the Lugar campaign's efforts to paint the soft-spoken state treasurer as an extremist (not to mention the Republican Young Guns' paid advertisingattacking his conservative positions), Mourdock proved himself to be an able campaigner and a palatable alternative to Indiana's six-term senior senator.
Mourdock recently told THE WEEKLY STANDARD that he believes it was an April 11 debate against Lugar, broadcast on TV throughout the state, that turned the tide for him in the election. "My mission going in was to look confident, capable, and conservative,” Mourdock said. “And that’s what I did.” Republicans in Indiana apparently agreed.
In Carmel, Indiana over the weekend, a supporter of congressional candidate Susan Brooks was caught on video tape stealing campaign signs of opponent David McIntosh:
"It appears that former U.S. Attorney Susan Brooks has resorted to the type of gutter politics that one sees too often in Washington – and which everyone is getting sick of," McIntosh's campaign manager writes in an email, providing a link to this video:
One day before the Indiana primary, Dick Lugar has released a new ad accusing his opponent, Richard Mourdock, of wanting to "cut every single senior's Social Security." (Update: The ad was apparently released late last week.) The ad portrays an elderly woman talking about Mourdock's Social Security plan. "He's going to ruin people. Some can't get along without Social Security, every penny of it," the woman says. "Heaven help us, because Mourdock won't."
Big Government reports that the Young Guns Network, a group tied to House Republican leader Eric Cantor, has purchased another direct mail item supporting Dick Lugar over Richard Mourdock in the GOP Senate primary in Indiana. The item focuses on Lugar's support for ethanol subsidies and pro-environmental policies, while Mourdock's plan is called "extreme" and one that "means higher prices at the pump."
A new poll from Howey Politics and DePauw University shows Richard Mourdock leading Dick Lugar by 10 points in the Indiana Republican Senate primary. Among GOP primary voters, 48 percent said they would vote for Mourdock, the state treasurer, while 38 percent said they would vote for Lugar, the six-term incumbent senator. The poll shows Mourdock’s largest lead in the primary, which will be held on May 8.
The Chamber of Commerce is sending out a new direct mail item on behalf of Indiana senator Dick Lugar, the National Journal reports. "Hoosiers are concerned about job growth...And...Dick Lugar is standing up for Indiana," the mailer reads, noting Lugar's support for building the Keystone XL pipeline and his opposition to Dodd-Frank, Obamacare, and cap and trade. View the mailer here.
National Journal reports on a new poll that shows incumbent Indiana senator Dick Lugar leading his primary rival, state treasurer Richard Mourdock, 44 percent to 42 percent. The group behind the poll, the Lunch Pail Republicans, is a pro-labor organization supporting Lugar.
The Eric Cantor-affiliated Young Guns Network has recently jumped into the Indiana Senate primary on behalf of Dick Lugar, paying for mailers that criticize Lugar's opponent, Richard Mourdock, for wanting to cut federal education funding. Politico's Jonathan Martin reports why this could backfire--on House Republicans:
In speaking about U.S. defense, Indiana Senate candidate Richard Mourdock told the Times of Northwest Indiana that “There's always going to be a lot of duplication. We look today at the historical setup of Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard. There's a lot of duplication and bureaucracy right there. In the 21st century, is that necessary? I'm not sure that it is.”
Indiana senator Dick Lugar is out with a new television ad, the hardest hitting in the Republican primary race, pitting Lugar against state treasurer Richard Mourdock. The ad claims that Mourdock has "bad judgment" and makes "bad decisions." Watch the ad below:
State treasurer Richard Mourdock, a 60-year-old Republican candidate for U.S. Senate, says the stakes in the Indiana primary couldn’t be higher. “This race is for the heart and soul of the Republican party in the United States Senate,” Mourdock tells THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
The Young Guns Network, a group affiliated with House Republican majority leader Eric Cantor, is encouraging Democrats in Indiana to vote in the May 8 GOP primary for incumbent senator Dick Lugar.
Mitch Daniels, the popular two-term Republican governor of Indiana, has cut another advertisement on behalf of his political mentor, senior Republican senator Dick Lugar. "Our nation faces huge dangers," Daniels says in the 30-second spot. "And it'll take people with his big picture vision and broad respect to see us past it." At the end of the commercial, Daniels adds, "We're lucky to have Dick Lugar, and we need to keep him." Watch the ad below:
