Greg Fettig co-founded Hoosiers for a Conservative Senate with Monica Boyer. Hoosiers for a Conservative Senate mobilized grassroots activists across Indiana with the goal of unseating incumbent establishment Republican Dick Lugar in the primary for US Senate and electing a conservative to replace him. Richard Mourdock defeated Lugar in Indiana's May 8th primary.
In this video, Fettig talks about how he and Boyer mobilized Indiana for the effort. He explains the hurdles they encountered along the way and how they overcame them. He lays out the strategy that grassroots activists followed in Indiana. He and Monica Boyer recognized the difficulty of organizing disparate grassroots groups across a large state.
To do so effectively, they set a single goal (defeat Lugar) and agreed to a caucus process by which the groups around the state would endorse one candidate.
Fettig has written a book, Tea Party on Safari, about what he, Boyer, and Hoosiers for a Conservative Senate accomplished in Indiana.
Richard Mourdock has defeated six-term Senator Dick Lugar, 61% to 39%, in Indiana's Republican primary.
Dick Lugar is a statesman. I had my doubts about that, but it was driven home when I learned that Lugar would debate his opponent Richard Mourdock. Roy Blunt never did that in his 2010 primary for US Senate here in Missouri. That's the typical path for a well-known candidate: simply ignore the competition and deny your unknown opponent the opportunity to raise their name recognition. Lugar didn't do that. He debated Richard Mourdock and that choice contributed to Mourdock's margin of victory.
Lugar must have known he was in trouble. As I reported earlier, he spent $46k in February on polling and didn't leak any of it to the press. Campaigns only leak positive news, so he must not have had any. And yet he went ahead with that debate. That solidified my respect for Indiana's senior senator.
Those of you who tirelessly manned the phones for Lugar--I know it's a tough day--but you are the heroes of Lugar's campaign. I can't even imagine what it must have been like calling into an electorate opposed to your guy 60/40, but you did it 1.5 million times. I'm sure that was demoralizing.
If you were part of that operation, then you need to plan to be Republican heroes in November. The GOP presidential nominee is going to need your help--probably not in Indiana, but almost certainly calling into an electorate somewhere in the country that's more favorable than the one you just faced. This primary was preparation for the general election and you are now battle hardened. Good work.
Richard Mourdock's heroes were the countless people across the state that followed the advice in Phyllis Schlafly's 1964 book A Choice Not an Echoand simply took over the party. Schlafly endorsed Mourdock last October. Here's Schlafly talking about the Tea Parties and political strategy:
In St. Louis, I've been impressed by the new media skills of Tea Partiers. Indiana Tea Parties have shown that it's possible to marshal the Republican party to a Tea Party candidate. I'm sure it was a wild ride, but you need to teach the rest of us how to do that.
There are many contributing factors to Lugar's loss, but I think the biggest one is encapsulated in Richard Mourdock's campaign slogan: "It's Time." Lugar served America as a faithful and bipartisan cold warrior with particular attention to international affairs. In recent years, he pushed green energy issues. For instance, he supported Indianapolis based EnerDel with earmarks and, I believe, the occasional favorable word to the Department of Energy to help that battery manufacturer secure more funding.
Lugar's bipartisanship may have been his undoing because there is simply nothing more bipartisan than additional spending. Spending is the lubricant of bipartisanship. That's what legislative logrolling is all about.
The US has about $15.7 trillion in debt. The age of more spending is behind us; therefore, bipartisanship is increasingly a thing of the past. And that debt curtails our need for international statesmen. Regardless of whether we want to be involved around the world, our financial obligations necessitate that we wont be spending as much overseas. We're entering a time of introspection driven by the fundamental need to reduce our debt. I think Hoosier voters understood this.
The leaders of each age are molded by issues of their time. Lugar's bipartisanship, international outreach, earmarks, and opposition to gun issues (which I suspect was a result of his time as mayor of Indianapolis) are simply lodestones in today's political environment. There are similarities between statesmen from different eras, but these tend to be personal characteristics: humility, humor, resolve, vision. Both Dick Lugar and Richard Mourdock have evidenced these characteristics. Because Mourdock is new on the scene I encourage you to watch these two videos which capture his conviction:
Dick Lugar's time as an active statesman is coming to an end. I'm confident that Richard Mourdock will fill the vacuum left by his departure. He wont replace Dick Lugar, but he will honor Lugar's service in the cold-war by working tirelessly to address our country's fiscal problems.
Indiana can be proud that it has groomed men like Dick Lugar and Richard Mourdock--statesmen of their respective eras--for service to this country. As a fellow American, I'm grateful that you have.
Polls in Indiana's primary have not yet closed. Conservative Hoosier voters are voting to decide whether or not to retire six-term incumbent Dick Lugar in favor of Tea Party favorite Richard Mourdock. Meanwhile, the presumptive Democrat candidate for US Senate in Indiana, Joe Donnelly, has abandoned any hope of ever being known as Obama's favorite Democrat. With the primary behind him and the clear understanding that Indiana's electorate is to his right on most policy issues, Donnelly has decamped for the hallowed ground of "bipartisanship." Donnelly, who is currently serving in the House of representatives, has joined the chorus of conservatives calling for President Obama's Attorney General Eric Holder to be subpoenaed, reports The Daily Caller:
Indiana Democratic Rep. Joe Donnelly told The Daily Caller on Tuesday that he supports the House oversight committee’s efforts to enforce the congressional subpoena of Attorney General Eric Holder over Operation Fast and Furious.
“One of the duties of Congress is to provide oversight of the Executive Branch,” Donnelly told TheDC. “There has been a serious allegation of federal law enforcement misconduct and we need to get to the bottom of this issue without playing partisan politics.”
Thank you to all the tools in Indiana's Democrat base that supported this sellout. Now we might just see an investigation of Fast and Furious and some justice for Eric Holder.
Here are some video highlights from Saturday's Rally for Richard Mourdock in Indianapolis. The rally was sponsored by FreedomWorks. Michelle Malkin keynoted the show. Hoosier Tea Parties deserve the credit for providing the manpower and hard work that's gone into the get-out-the-vote (GOTV).
Below are videos of several of the speeches Saturday. Thanks so much to Alex of ConservativeTVOnline.com. He is by far the best St. Louis-based Tea Party videographer--we all aspire to be as good as him some day!
I was surprised to learn that Richard Mourdock has a sense of humor. I haven't seen that side of him in the videos I've seen of him before. The video above which was recorded about a week ago. Mourdock cracks a couple of jokes at a gathering of conservatives and Tea Partiers in Madison, Indiana, and then says something profound while talking about the kick-off of his campaign in February of last year. Here's my rough transcript [from 3:12 to 4:35]:
When we began our primary on February 22nd, 2011, I knew it was going to be a long, long slog until May 8th, 2012. When we gathered at the Arch Garden... there were about 200 people gathered that day. And I did something that I know shocked all of them, but I did it to make a promise to them and to put a vow upon myself which was to begin that announcement of candidacy that day by saying that we were going to do something at that moment that we would do again on the night of May 8th, 2012, when this campaign ends--regardless, how this campaign ends. And that is, we began with a round of applause in tribute to a person who's given great public service for more than 50 years of his life, and that is Senator Dick Lugar. He deserves the respect of every single one of us even though we may have times we disagree with him. If you've ever met Mr. Lugar, he is a wonderful man. He is a gentleman--he truly is. He's a very nice guy. I had people--after our debate the other night when the audio went off--they saw us still on camera talking and joking. It is impossible not to like Dick Lugar.
Professor Jacobson of LegalInsurrection no longer feels sorry for Dick Lugar because Lugar still refuses to commit to endorsing Mourdock if Moudock should prevail on Tuesday. Why is Lugar doing that? Poor advice from his campaign staff. That's just more ground that Lugar is ceding in the waning days of this election.
FreedomWorks sponsored a Rally for Richard Mourdock in Indianapolis. That rally was coordinated with a state-wide get-out-the-vote effort. Mourdock is running to be the next US Senator from Indiana. He will face incumbent Dick Lugar in Tuesday's Republican primary. H/T to my two St. Louis-based photographers!
Sen. Richard Lugar told reporters this afternoon at a hastily called press conference in Indianapolis that Mourdock was "unqualified" to serve in the Senate and pleaded with Democratic and independent voters to request Republican ballots in next Tuesday's primary to save him from defeat. Lugar also continued to rebuff attempts to agree to support Mourdock if he wins the Republican primary.
No person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty Years, and been nine Years a Citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State for which he shall be chosen.
Lugar sold his Indianapolis home in 1977. He was ruled ineligible to vote from that address earlier this year. He's now registered to vote from a family farm. A farm that Lugar's own spokesman, David Wilkie, said this about: "There’s no house at the farm that you would stay in, so far as a physical residence..." Dick Lugar, Indiana's Senior Senator and world renowned statesman, inhabits an open field. Really? Does this octogenarian stay in a tent?
The point is that Dick Lugar does not in any meaningful sense inhabit Indiana, and, in light of the Article 1, Section 3 of the Constitution, that makes him look ridiculous when he asserts that his opponent is unqualified.
Calling Mourdock "unqualified" was a mistake. Refusing to support Mourdock if he wins was also a mistake. Lugar's greatest political strength is his reputation, but with those two petty slights, Lugar has ceded the high ground. And Richard Mourdock planted his flag on that hill with the message in the video above: this race isn't about me or Dick Lugar--it's about America. It's not about petty politics; it's about building a better country together.
I saw a tweet: "Here's Reagan aide Peggy Noonan's argument for @dicklugar in the #INSen..." and I just shook my head. Peggy Noonan's Case for Dick Lugar is hardly persuasive:
The most recent polls suggest Dick Lugar, the senior U.S. senator from Indiana, first elected in 1976, is on track to lose his primary on Tuesday. I hope he doesn't for a number of reasons but one big one: the Senate needs grown-ups. The entire American government needs grown-ups, from Capitol Hill to the White House to the executive agencies. This is no time to lose one.
It's an A-team of endorsements if you want to win the moderate middle between the two parties, but they do nothing to help a candidate in a primary. In fact, I think they hurt Lugar's chances next Tuesday because each of those endorsements (excepting Daniels) come with the sort of baggage that reminds voters why they might want to vote for the guy running against Lugar--Richard Mourdock.
A friend forwarded an email they received from CatholicVote.org. CV is encouraging Catholics across Indiana to support Richard Mourdock in next Tuesday's primary. Here's an excerpt from the email with a snapshot of the full email below:
Dear Friend of CV,
The CatholicVote Super PAC is rolling.
Our focus this week is on defeating Senate Republican Richard Lugar in the hotly contested Indiana GOP primary race slated for next Tuesday.
Not convinced? Ask yourself if Richard Lugar is the kind of Senator you want to see back in the Senate:
Senator Lugar voted to approve Justice Sotomayor and Justice Kagan for the Supreme Court.
He voted with Sen. Harry Reid to provide taxpayer dollars for embryo-killing stem cell research1... and refused to support a ban on research using tissue taken from aborted children.2
And two years ago he refused to join his fellow Senators in a lawsuit challenging Obamacare.3
A restful night at in the humble accommodations of New York's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel: $346.61
A seven block limo ride from the Waldorf-Astoria to dinner: $459.50
A bite to eat with friends at the elegant St. Regis: $7,321.84
Marking the one year anniversary of Dick Lugar's extravagant trip to the Big Apple with a rally to replace him: Priceless!
Fiscal conservative Richard Mourdock needs every Hoosier Republican's vote on Tuesday May 8th. Join Michelle Malkin and Freedom Works this coming Saturday, May 5th, in Indianapolis and around the state to help the grassroots movement that is fighting to restore fiscal sanity in Congress.
* The dollar totals are from Lugar's July 2011 FEC report.
Dick Lugar has announced that his campaign will target cell phone users browsing the internet in zip codes where Richard Mourdock events are taking place.
The targeted ads will repeat the misleading claim, already debunked by FactCheck.org, that Mourdock cheated on taxes. This is yet another sign of Lugar desperation.
Oh, no, he's cast the net much wider than that!
Above is a screen capture I made a week ago of a Lugar ad. I live in St. Louis, Missouri, which is certainly closer to the precincts that will be voting in Indiana's May 8th primary than Dick Lugar's Virginia residence, but, alas, I am no more eligible to cast a ballot in that election than he is.
That's what Dick Lugar has spent to build what may be the largest phone-banking operation ever for a state-wide race in Indiana. And the number above is likely lower than the total cost.
Beginning in May of last year, Dick Lugar began sending checks to Suite 337; 6348 N. Milwaukee Ave.; Chicago, IL 60646. That's the address of a UPS Store and the suite number (337) appears to be the box address of two companies. These campaign disbursements were for "office equipment" according to the Senator's FEC filings. Here are the 21 expenditures that I found:
The data is a little odd. There are multiple expenditures on the same day, months with as many as four payments, months without any payments, a huge range of expenditures ($9.77 to $20,747.54), and seemingly two different names on the checks--the first check went to "Victory Solutions" while the other twenty payments were to "Sherman Consulting".
I believe the Victory Solutions in question is the Ohio-based Victory Solutions specializing in phone banks and Voice Over IP (VoIP) for conservative campaigns and causes. Sherman Consulting is a Chicago-based conservative consulting company which lists VoIP and Telecom support among its core competencies. I suspect that Sherman was the "systems integrator" on the phone bank build-out and Victory was their subcontractor providing OEM phone banking equipment, VoIP boxes, and their custom software. If that's the case, then why are the payments to Sherman Consulting listed as "office equipment"? Wasn't Lugar buying "consulting services" with some of those dollars? Is Sherman a reseller of Victory's phone banking system? If it's really "office equipment" that Lugar bought, why so many expenditures?
Indiana does not allow political robocalls. That means a campaign needs hordes of volunteers to pick up the phone and call people (if the campaign is going to get their message out that way). Now, Fox News reported yesterday that the Lugar campaign has made 1.2 million phone calls. If you're making that many calls, then you'll want a phone system that can handle volume efficiently.
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — After running a big chunk of George Bush's grass-roots effort in Ohio in 2004, it struck Shannon Burns that it must be possible to make all those thousands of phone calls more efficiently. So he invented a way.
The automated phone system Burns designed, called Victory VOIP, has allowed volunteers for Bush's would-be successor, Republican presidential nominee John McCain, to make thousands of calls to voters in the time it used to take to make hundreds. Burns' Cleveland-based company, Victory Solutions LLC, is now working for dozens of campaigns from federal to local in 16 states."
Furthermore, Victory's system lets volunteers make calls from their home. With a computer and your home phone, you're able to connect to Lugar's central phone bank through Victory's VoIP device. The system will call the next number on the list for you. It's a great bit of technology.
Nonetheless, it's odd that Dick Lugar sent $100k to a UPS box in Chicago with payments to two different companies one of which is based in Ohio. That's a lot of money for "office equipment." Why not find a Victory Solutions reseller in Indiana or buy direct?
I went through Dick Lugar's latest FEC reports this evening. I only looked at his April filing and his pre-primary filing. Since polling was in the news today, I wanted to see how much the senior senator from Indiana had spent on polling.
Lugar made four payments to New Jersey-based National Research Inc for "polling research". Here are the dates and dollars for those expenditures:
Date
Expenditure
02/21/12
$46,252.00
03/12/12
$11,167.00
03/26/12
$16,167.00
04/09/12
$10,000.00
$83,586.00
Simply put, two months ago he spent $46,252 on polling and nothing National Research told him was worth forwarding to the press.
Indiana Sen. Dick Lugar has fallen behind state Treasurer Richard Mourdock by five points, according to a new poll released exclusively to POLITICO.
The survey, taken Tuesday and Wednesday by Wenzel Strategies on behalf of Citizens United, places Mourdock at 44 percent and Lugar at 39 percent. Nearly 17 percent remain undecided with just 12 days to go until the Indiana Senate primary.
Notably, Dick Lugar's over-hyped press conference yesterday afternoon was in the middle of the two day sample, so the full effect of that has probably not been factored in, but, honestly, the press conference was such a dud I doubt it moved any voters. Jim Shella covered it for WISH 8:
After building up expectations about surprising new revelations about Richard Mourdock, the final announcement yesterday--that twenty years ago Mourdock indicated that he supported the fairness doctrine--was a let down. Whatever Mourdock's position in 1992, he certainly does not support the fairness doctrine today. Mourdock spokesman Chris Conner had this to say about the Lugar press event:
“This is a truly pathetic attempt by the Lugar campaign to manufacture media attention as their campaign hemorrhages in the polls.”
INDIANAPOLIS (April 25, 2012) – Indiana State Treasurer Richard Mourdock, conservative U.S. Senate Candidate in the Republican Primary on May 8th against 36 year incumbent Dick Lugar, announced the airing of “Too Long” a TV ad recapping how the Senator has lost touch with his conservative Hoosier roots.
“After 36 years in Washington, D.C., Dick Lugar has truly lost touch with his conservative Hoosier values by voting for Obama’s liberal Supreme Court judges, amnesty for illegal immigrants, supporting higher taxes and even appearing in President Obama’s campaign commercials in 2008,” stated Mourdock spokesman Christopher Conner.
Last Wednesday, the Mourdock campaign released a poll showing Mourdock leading Lugar in this race 42% to 41%.
SCRIPT
SOURCINGS
VO: When Dick Lugar moved to Washington, he left behind more than his house. He left behind his conservative Hoosier values.
Voting for more earmarks,
Vote #8, S. Amdt. 1472 to S. Amdt. 1470 to S. 2038, 02/02/2012.
In Indiana, State Treasurer Richard Mourdock is blazing a trail to clear the way for future conservative grassroots (Tea Party) campaigns against entrenched interests and their proxies in the US Senate like Mourdock's primary opponent, Dick Lugar. Allysia Finley of the Wall Street Journal wrote about Mourdock's insurgent campaign earlier this week and concluded [emphasis added]:
Mr. Mourdock isn't endearing himself to the party's elders by picking a fight with Grandpa. But Republicans need fighters in the Senate, not diplomats. President Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid have shown no intention of negotiating in good faith with Republicans. So accomplishing tax and entitlement reform will require the GOP to win the war of public opinion. Indiana's gutsy and articulate tea partier is just the kind of guy Republicans need on the frontlines.
It's the establishment elders of the Republican apparatus in DC that have opposed Mourdock and fought instead to conserve the status quo. In winning the support of Indiana's GOP county chairmen, Richard Mourdock had taken the first step to state-wide victory. A step articulate by Phyllis Schlafly in her 1964 book: A Choice Not an Echo. I interviewed Schlafly about that book two years ago. Here she is talking about the importance of having a plan to take over the party:
Endorsements and grassroots support for a candidate are useless unless they are galvanized into the party apparatus. Utah provides two illustrative examples. In 2010 Tea Partiers were able to force Bob Bennet into a primary and ultimately elect Tea Party favorite Mike Lee. This year they've forced Orrin Hatch into a primary. Grassroots success in Utah is in part due to the unique system that state uses to select their candidates. At the state party convention, if a candidate does not receive 60% of the vote from the delegates, then they must run against the person who received the second most delegate votes in a state-wide primary. Hopefully, Dan Liljenquist will be able to unseat 36-year incumbent Orrin Hatch.
The system in Utah favors the candidates who are able to get their supporters to show up to the state convention. It also clears the field of tertiary candidates that bleed money and activists from the most credible challenger. I'd love to see that system adopted in my own state of Missouri.
In the 2010 US Senate GOP primary in Missouri, Tea Party favorite Chuck Purgason had good grassroots support; however, there were other, credible Tea Party challengers in that race. Purgason's real problem was that he was never able to overcome his money deficit. He simply couldn't afford the radio and TV airtime he needed to boost his name recognition.
Garnering a groundswell of grassroots support to transform the state party is the first step. The second step in the plan is money, lots and lots of money.
The reality is that state-wide elections are driven by name recognition. They are, sadly, popularity contests.
Unfortunately, conservative grassroots activists rarely have the money to make a difference. In 2010, when establishment conservative interests aligned with Tea Party interests, funding was readily available from establishment sources for Tea Party candidates. In 2012 that's no longer the case. Without the money to mount the air war on TV and radio, Tea Party candidates have little chance of beating their incumbent opponents.
The Mourdock campaign trumpeted the results of their latest internal poll which shows Richard Mourdock (R-IN) with 42% to incumbent Dick Lugar's (R-IN) 41% with a +/-4.9% confidence interval. The poll was conducted by McLaughlin & Associates. A sample of 400 likely Republican primary election voters in Indiana were interviewed for the poll on April 16-17.
This poll showed that Mourdock has improved his position over where he polled in January. His favorable rating, 46%, went up 11 points from where it stood three months ago while Lugar's favorable number dropped 10 points to 47%.
The most impressive aspect of the poll was where Richard Mourdock found his new support. As the chart below illustrates, Mourdock took his +6 point gain right out of Dick Lugar's hide:
What those numbers show is that there's a stream of voters migrating from Dick Lugar possibly through "undecided" and ultimately to Richard Mourdock. Because Mourdock's +6 and Lugar's -7 are both greater than the +/-4.9 margin of error, this poll shows that Mourdock has the momentum.
Going forward the challenge will be for Mourdock to maintain that momentum through the May 8th primary. Meanwhile, HotAir notes that Dick Lugar has his work cut out for him:
They had a debate and Mourdock’s suddenly outraising the incumbent and even establishment conservative magazines like National Review are ready to trade Lugar in for new blood. What’s a six-term incumbent who’s in trouble to do? Why, call in the big guns
And those big guns are Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (R-IN) and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ). Daniels I understand, but McCain seems like a tone-deaf choice. Seriously, if you're bringing in McCain to shore up your position with, presumably, conservative Republican primary voters, well, why not invite Arlen Specter, too?
EnerDel is a manufacturer of batteries for electric vehicles like the Think Global Pivco PIV3 car pictured at right. They've received a lot of tax payer money to research and build new "green" EV car batteries including $118 million in stimulus grants.
Dick Lugar
Sentor Dick Lugar (R-IN) was instrumental in steering that money to the "green" battery manufacturer. Lugar also earmarked $6.5 million to the company. But to top it all off, the spreadsheet data which accompanies the Good Jobs First report* (h/t: Instapundit) that came out yesterday, indicates that EnerDel recieved about $12 million from Indiana taxpayers. EnerDel was second only to Arcadia Resources, Inc. among Indiana companies receiving Indiana tax credits and rebates.
* The Good Jobs First report "Paying Taxes to the Boss" argues that state tax credit and rebate programs for corporations as well as state grants to companies are like your boss collecting and keeping state income taxes. I would argue that such programs are incentives offered by central planners at the state capital. In short, I disagree on the spin, but agree that they need to end.
Tea Party Conservative who began blogging at http://RebootCongress.NET when TARP passed. Email me: contact@RebootCongress.net. Help support my work: Donate Bitcoins
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