“Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.” Ronald Reagan
Primary Election results festivities will happen at Republican HQ beginning at 6:30 PM on May 8. We'll have food and refreshments to enjoy while we watch the results come in. Please join us for this event. We would appreciate any food or beverages that you would like to bring.
From The New York Times
Once Every 36 Years, Primary Fight for Indiana Senator
INDIANAPOLIS — At age 80, Richard G. Lugar, one of the longest-serving members of the United States Senate, is getting a crash course in what a campaign looks like.
At his campaign office here the other day, Mr. Lugar smiled politely while volunteers boxed up thousands of yard signs to distribute to Indiana’s 92 counties. He spoke with admiration of the sophistication of his campaign’s mobile, computerized, microtargeting phone bank, with which, he explained, volunteers “can just press a button and they’re on line with somebody.” He described how his campaign had, in essence, gone “to school” on the methods of campaigns around the country.
Mr. Lugar, who has not had a primary challenger since he first won election in 1976 and last contended with a race where the margin was close in 1982, is locked in a Republican primary fight for the seat he has held for six terms with the May 8 election fast approaching. A poll conducted late last month, the Howey/DePauw Indiana Battleground Poll, showed Mr. Lugar leading Richard E. Mourdock, the state’s treasurer, 42 percent to 35 percent among likely primary voters, an advantage that is within the poll’s margin of sampling error of plus or minus five points.
Craig Dunn, the Republican chairman in Howard County, said he was stunned last year when he asked the 15 members of his local steering committee how many would vote for Mr. Lugar. “Not a hand went up,” said Mr. Dunn, who has supported Mr. Mourdock, as did, his campaign said, nearly three-quarters of the party’s county chairmen back when he announced plans to run more than a year ago. (Mr. Lugar’s supporters say those numbers have since shifted and shrunk.) “This never would have happened to Dick Lugar in his prime,” Mr. Dunn said.
Mr. Lugar sees his troubles as a product of forces outside Indiana. “You can say, ‘Why in the world are we having such a time?’ ” he said. Then he offered an answer to the question: “Because there are others in America who are very interested in this, sort of as a battleground, or I’d even say a playground, for their thoughts.”
To hear others tell it, Mr. Lugar, the product of a more genial era of politics, faces a confluence of opposition. Tea Party groups and organizations like the Club for Growth and the National Rifle Association are questioning his conservative credentials, some pointing to positions he has taken in favor of the bank bailout, President Obama’s Supreme Court nominees, the New Start nuclear arms control treaty, and more.
Meanwhile, some Indiana residents, including active members of the Republican Party, say they wonder whether Mr. Lugar, in all those years in Washington and around the world in his influential role on the Foreign Relations Committee, has failed to come home enough for ordinary Lincoln Day dinners and the like. Along the way, some say, he lost touch. And just below the surface is an uncomfortable question about age and how long in Washington is too long.
Beyond Indiana, much is at stake. Democrats hoping to hold on to a majority in the Senate see a glint of opportunity to take a Republican seat — a possibility that polls suggest is more likely if Mr. Lugar loses and leaves Mr. Mourdock, 60, to face Representative Joe Donnelly, a Democrat, in November. Tea Party members view the potential defeat of Mr. Lugar as a crucial chance to prove their muscle as some observers try to declare their movement over.
“If we win, the Tea Party goes into a higher level as a credible force,” said Greg Fettig, a supporter in Indiana. Last fall, he said, 55 of the state’s Tea Party groups convened and overwhelmingly favored Mr. Mourdock. Organizers at FreedomWorks, a national group that has helped build the Tea Party movement and has assisted efforts here, have already begun likening this race to Mike Lee’s defeat of Senator Robert F. Bennett, a fellow Republican, in Utah in 2010.
But others say that the strength and unity of the Tea Party here have been overblown, and that Mr. Lugar, a former Eagle Scout, Rhodes scholar and Navy officer, has clear wells of strength. These include more money in the bank than his opponent and support from Mitch Daniels, the popular governor who, as a student, worked for Mr. Lugar when he was mayor of Indianapolis in the 1960s and ’70s and stayed on for years.
Mr. Daniels, who asked Mr. Lugar to be godfather to one of his daughters, fended off assertions that Mr. Lugar might not be conservative enough or had compromised too often across party lines. Mr. Lugar’s supporters say he has pressed for less government spending and a balanced budget amendment, and fought President Obama’s health care overhaul and regulations that stifle business.
“It’s ironic and it’s just inaccurate to suggest that somehow he’s not very strongly Republican in his viewpoints,” Mr. Daniels said.
Lately, Mr. Lugar has taken blow after blow. A challenge that he did not meet a residency requirement for candidates because he lives much of the time in McLean, Va., failed. However, he was required to change his voter registration to the farm his family has owned for decades, rather than the Indianapolis house that he sold in 1977. Then his office announced that he was returning $14,500 to the government for nights he had spent in Indiana hotel rooms during adjournments — a technical oversight of a Senate expenses rule, but one more reminder of his long time away.
All the while, the onslaught of ads and critiques came, denouncing Mr. Lugar as a friend of President Obama, recipient of an F-rating from the N.R.A., and someone who once opposed a ban on earmarks and supported the Dream Act.
Mr. Lugar, who dismissed claims of a closeness to President Obama, is unapologetic for working the other side of the aisle, an approach that in the 1990s brought the accomplishment for which he may be best known — a program, with Sam Nunn, a Democratic senator, for disarmament in the former Soviet Union.
“It’s a fact of life,” Mr. Lugar said, “if you are a legislator for any period of time, and if you are attempting to pass what you believe is very constructive legislation for the country, either domestically or in terms of foreign policy, that in the Congress of the United States, you’re going to deal with members of the other party.”
Mr. Mourdock has told audiences, like the one at a recent Rotary breakfast in Noblesville, that bipartisanship has taken the nation to the brink of bankruptcy. “The time for being collegial is past,” Mr. Mourdock said in an interview. “It’s time for confrontation.”
A former coal executive who remains far less known among Indiana voters, Mr. Mourdock lauded Tea Party members for their support and grew teary-eyed when reflecting on the devotion of a large Tea Party group he addressed several years ago. Still, Mr. Mourdock, who first won election as state treasurer in 2006, recoils at the way he says Mr. Lugar has tried to paint him: in Mr. Mourdock’s words, as a “wild-eyed Tea Party candidate.”
Back inside Mr. Lugar’s campaign office last week, volunteers gushed over his debate performance a night earlier, his first such debate in a dozen years after Democrats did not even field an opponent in 2006. Pamela Altmeyer Alvey, a volunteer, recalled how friends, including one who is upward of 80, had voiced doubt about Mr. Lugar before the debate but sounded different now. “They said, ‘He was so vibrant!’ ” Ms. Altmeyer Alvey told the senator.
If finding himself in a battle now, in his 36th year in the Senate, feels insulting or painful or a little awkward, Mr. Lugar is not saying. “I’ve long since forgotten about whether it’s odd,” he said. “This is just what I do all my life. And so we just take each day as happily as possible, look at it as optimistically as we can.”
Lugar Damaged By Big OOOOOOOPS
The residency questions that have clouded Sen. Richard Lugar's re-election campaign are shadowing him again, with the senator deciding he must reimburse taxpayers for hotel stays in Indianapolis.
Lugar's campaign said it has determined that about $4,500 in Senate office funds was improperly used to pay for hotel rooms dating to 1991, the farthest back records were available.
The snafu is likely the last thing Lugar wanted as he fights for his political survival.
"This is bad," said Robert Dion, a political science professor at the University of Evansville. "It's the impression that it leaves of a veteran lawmaker who doesn't live in the state, who is out of touch and who is not even on top of the details of his own job."
Lugar has been dogged by criticism for months from Democrats and his Republican primary opponent, state Treasurer Richard Mourdock, over his residency.
Lugar sold his Indianapolis home in 1977 when he was first elected to the Senate. Since then, Lugar has lived in Virginia, though he continued to use the street address of his former home as his "official" residence on everything from his voter registration to his driver's license.
On visits back to Indiana, he has stayed in hotels.
Rules bar reimbursement for hotels in senators' home areas while the Senate is in recess. Andy Fisher, a spokesman for Lugar, said the office reviewed its records after being asked about the issue by the Washington online news outlet Politico.
Lugar blamed the problem on staff errors.
"This week, it came to my attention that my office filed paperwork improperly during some periods in recent years," Lugar said in a statement. "This allowed some payment for official Senate business expenses during adjournment periods that otherwise would not have been allowed. Upon our discovery, my office brought this to the attention of Senate Disbursing so that repayment could be made.
"I was unaware of this problem until now and am sorry that it was not prevented or caught and corrected at the time," he said.
By itself, a $4,500 error might not be much of a political headache, and Fisher stressed that Lugar has given back more than $5.4 million to taxpayers in unused funds over the years.
But for Lugar, it's more like a political migraine that he can't shake off. He'll be fighting it again on March 30, when he goes to court to appeal a Marion County Election Board's 2-1 party-line ruling that he and his wife, Charlene, cannot continue to use that 1977 home as their voting address.
"It's just this drip, drip, drip of bad news, none of which by itself is fatally damaging," Dion said. "The story won't go away. You just can't put it behind you because there's these little hiccups every time."
It may not be fair, Dion said, saying that few would expect a senator to personally handle "every dime of every expenditure." But the cumulative effect undermines Lugar's attempts to get voters to focus on issues he'd rather talk about.
In fact, Lugar began running a new TV ad this week accusing Mourdock of engaging in attack politics over the residency issue when the issues should be jobs and gas prices.
The ad quotes The Wall Street Journal as calling the residency attacks "low-rent politics" and cites an Indianapolis Star editorial that called them "nonsense."
"Hoosiers need jobs. Gas prices are skyrocketing. Yet Richard Mourdock and his D.C. cronies have nothing to offer but the politics of personal destruction," the ad states. "Special interest money. Low-road politics. Not the campaign Hoosiers need in these serious times."
Fisher, a longtime aide in Lugar's Senate office who recently moved to the campaign staff, said the issue over the hotel bills -- which are being reviewed to verify Lugar really does owe the money he has volunteered to repay -- is "a bookkeeping matter."
"This is small in comparison to the issues that we're trying to talk about in this campaign," he said.
"The big problem really here is that Lugar's opponents are running a destructive political attack campaign rather than focusing on important issues," he said.
Democrats -- who hope the divisive GOP primary between Lugar and Mourdock will leave an opening for their nominee, U.S. Rep. Joe Donnelly, in the November election -- made it clear Thursday that they have no intention of putting the hotel issue to bed.
Dan Parker, chairman of the Indiana Democratic Party, said Lugar should release the internal audit his office has conducted of his expense reimbursements.
"After reimbursing taxpayers for rooms that he improperly billed them for, it is essential that Senator Lugar make public the results of that audit," Parker said in a statement. "It's a shame that it's come to this. Indiana's senior senator paying back taxpayers for staying in hotels when he could have just maintained a residence here."
Mourdock, asked about the issue Thursday at a news conference he'd called to tout his endorsement by Indiana Right to Life, was more subtle.
If he is elected, he said, "I won't be paying for hotel bills in Indiana because I live here."
Lugar Homeless As Marion County Election Board Tosses His Registration
A Marion County panel's decision that U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar and his wife cannot legally vote using a former address likely would be easy to remedy.
But that fix -- perhaps by registering to vote using the Lugar family's Marion County farm, in which they share ownership -- might only give fire to tea party claims that Lugar has become an absentee senator. He's deep in a fight against a Republican primary challenger, Indiana Treasurer Richard Mourdock.
So Lugar plans to appeal a decision that his spokesman decried Thursday as a partisan attack by the Marion County Election Board's two Democratic members.
"The case that our legal team laid out today is pretty substantial," spokesman Andy Fisher said. "This was a political action by the Marion County Election Board and not a legal action."
The Election Board voted 2-1 to find that Lugar and his wife, Charlene, are ineligible to vote in their former home precinct on Indianapolis' Westside. The Lugars sold the house in the 3200 block of Highwoods Court in 1977, after his election to the Senate, and have lived ever since at a house in McLean, Va., a suburb of Washington, D.C.
They have returned to the Wayne Township precinct to vote and still use the home's address on their driver's licenses.
Lugar's attorneys cite a provision of the Indiana Constitution that says individuals serving the state retain their residency in a precinct during their absence from the state.
In a new affidavit filed before Thursday's hearing, Lugar said: "Our intent was and always has been to remain Indiana residents."
Over the years, they have received backing, often in nonbinding opinions, from the Marion County Board of Voter Registration and three Indiana attorneys general, most recently last month by Greg Zoeller, a Republican.
But the Election Board's attorney, Andrew J. Mallon, delivered a 19-page legal memo Thursday that concluded the Lugars weren't just absent from their residence.
They abandoned it, he said, and forfeited their right to use it for voting purposes.
The board acted on a petition filed by Greg Wright, who says he is a certified fraud examiner. He was represented by Indianapolis attorney Gary Welsh, also a blogger who has criticized Lugar during the campaign and accused the senator of voter fraud. Both are Republicans.
"My overriding concern has been that other future senators and congressmen will take Senator Lugar's suggestion" by moving full time to Washington, Wright said after the board issued its decision. "I don't think that is what the framers of the Constitution had in mind."
His challenge was only the latest to Lugar's residency.
Mourdock has made an issue of Lugar's address in his Republican primary challenge, saying the senator no longer fits the constitutional requirement of being an "inhabitant" of the state he represents.
Last month, a separate challenge based on Lugar's residency -- focusing on his ballot eligibility -- was unanimously dismissed by the Indiana Election Commission.
That makes Thursday's victory largely symbolic for those seeking to unseat Lugar.
The Election Board's Democratic members, Chairman Mark Sullivan and Marion County Clerk Beth White, said they respected Lugar and did not think that he and his wife knowingly violated Indiana election law by voting using their old address, but they still found it improper.
The lone Republican member, Patrick J. Dietrick, dissented and charged that White and Sullivan "utterly failed to consider the circumstances of this alleged violation of election law."
According to Election Board attorneys, the Lugars could submit new voter registration forms that list a physical address in any Indiana county with which they currently have a connection.
Lugar co-owns a farm in Decatur Township with his siblings, but the house on the land is rented out to tenants. He has said he would not feel honest claiming it as his residence for voting purposes.
U.S. Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind.
» The issue: Whether the senator and his wife, Charlene, can use the address of their former home on Indianapolis' Westside as their voter registration address to vote in that precinct. They sold the house in 1977 after his election to the Senate, and they have lived in a house in McLean, Va., since. Lugar's residency has become an issue in his Senate re-election bid.
» What was decided: Voting 2-1 along party lines, the Marion County Election Board's two Democrats found the Lugars ineligible to vote in their former home precinct using that home's address. But under the board's decision, the Lugars could register to vote in any Indiana county using an address with which they currently have a connection -- such as the family's Marion County farm.
» What's next: Lugar's spokesman said the senator plans to appeal the ruling, which likely would start in Marion Circuit Court.
IndyPolitics.org Interview With Howard County Republican Chairman
The Chairman of the Howard County Republican Party says now that Dan Burton is not running for re-election, the race is not only wide open, but a couple other candidates might get in.
Craig Dunn says he’s gotten calls from three of the candidates still in the race as well as from some others who are thinking of getting in. Burton announced Tuesday that he would not run for another term, sighting family health reasons. That means it’s an open air contest for former Congressman David McIntosh, former U.S. Attorney Susan Brooks, former Marion County Coroner Dr. John McGoff and real estate attorney Jack Lugar.
Dunn spoke with Indy Politics and touched on the following areas.
His reaction to Burton dropping out of the race.
Whether it was really family issues or the new make up of the 5th District that compelled Burton to drop out of the race.
The four Republican Party candidates seeking to unseat incumbent Dan Burton all agreed the nation needs a simpler tax code and changes to encourage economic growth in the country.
As was the case in 2010, Burton is facing numerous challengers in the Republican Party primary in the 5th Congressional District. Challengers Susan Brooks, Jack Lugar, John McGoff and David McIntosh answered questions Saturday at the Century Club breakfast at Elite Banquet and Conference Center.
Craig Dunn, party chairman, expressed disappointment that Burton decided not to participate.
The four participating candidates said they would support some form of a flat tax as a means to simplify the tax code.
McIntosh said he would support a flat tax proposal, but would maintain the mortgage and charitable donation deductions.
He said the flat tax should be in the range of 18 to 20 percent and he would eliminate the planned 2013 tax increase.
Brooks said 43 to 49 cents of every dollar earned goes to pay taxes.
“We need a simpler system,” she said. “We have a complex tax system. The wealthy companies can afford to pay lawyers and accountants to find loop holes in the tax code.”
Brooks called for a broader tax base and incentives to reward investments and savings.
Lugar said he supports a flat tax and is investigating the “fair tax.”
He said he is concerned about taxing purchases, which might make them forego those purchases.
McGoff said former presidential candidate Herman Cain started the discussion on tax reform.
“We need to think about a different way of taxation,” McGoff said. “I would support a simple flat tax. We would have a lot of unemployed accountants, but people would have more money to spend.”
Two of the four candidates said they would have supported the federal government bailout of Chrysler to keep jobs in Howard County, but were generally opposed to the concept.
Brooks said she generally opposed stimulus packages and bailouts but that job preservation is critically important.
“We have to look at every proposal and how it will affect jobs,” she said of the Chrysler bailout. “In this particular case with thousands of jobs at stake, I would have voted to keep 4,500 jobs in Howard County.”
McGoff, making his third run to unseat Burton, said without the Chrysler bailout, Howard County would have gone under and he said he would have voted for the legislation.
“Government regulation caused the problem,” he said. “We need less taxation and regulation. The $800 million stimulus package created very few jobs.”
McIntosh said he would have voted no because government should not take over a private company. He said companies behave differently when they depend on government subsidies.
“It’s not the right role of government,” he said.
Lugar said he opposed government stimulus packages, calling it a “slippery slope”.
“We need to look at real solutions,” he said. “Bailouts create a situation where companies depend on government assistance.”
Lugar said the stimulus and bailout packages are part of the reason the federal government is facing a deficit.
The four candidates all favored a balanced budget amendment, but had different ideas on how to reduce government spending.
McGoff said cutting taxes would raise revenues, noting the increased revenue during the administrations of Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush.
He said since Congress could not agree on a method to reduce the federal deficit, there will be $1.2 trillion in mandatory cuts over the next decade, mainly in military spending.
McGoff said Social Security is taking in less money than it spends and the same situation will be taking place in Medicare.
He said Congress should look at privatization of Social Security and a voucher system for Medicare.
McIntosh said it is critical for the federal government to get to a balanced budget and that the nation has to decide what are its needs and wants.
“We need to do the same job with less money,” he said. “In the area of entitlements we need to look at a private sector competitive model.”
McIntosh also called for caps in government spending.
Brooks said the federal government should follow the model of Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels in making government more efficient.
“In Washington [D.C.] we need to cut spending and be more efficient,” she said. “Make Washington much leaner.”
Lugar said the nation didn’t have a revenue problem, but a spending one. He said there is a lot of “fat” in the federal budget.
• Ken de la Bastide is the Kokomo Tribune enterprise editor. He can be reached at 765-454-8580 or via e-mail at ken.delabastide@kokomotribune.com
New Mourdock Video
Massive Voter Fraud Uncovered In St. Joseph County
Suspected fake petition pages to place Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton on the ballot during the 2008 Indiana primary passed through the county voter registration office on days when the Republican head of the office was absent, The Tribune has learned (Erin Blasko, South Bend Tribune). The pages in question bear the stamped signature of Republican Linda Silcott, indicating Silcott was not in the office at the time to sign the documents by hand. By comparison, most of the other, non-suspicious pages examined by The Tribune contain Silcott's written signature. Meanwhile, 13 more St. Joseph County residents whose signatures appear on the petitions, including former South Bend mayor and Indiana governor Joe Kernan, have come forward to say they did not sign the documents, and the Indiana Republican Party has called for a federal investigation into the matter. "How deep does this problem go?" state GOP Chair Eric Holcomb asked. "Is it isolated to St. Joseph County or was it a broader, coordinated effort across the state? ... Who forged the signatures and why?" Typically, petition pages in St. Joseph County are signed by hand by both the Republican and Democratic members of the Board of Voter Registration. In early 2008, however, Silcott missed a number of days of work because of the death of her husband. Consequently, her first deputy, Mary Carrol Ringler, often stamped Silcott's signature on the pages. Each of the suspected fake petition pages bears Silcott's stamped signature, indicating the documents passed through the office on days when she was off. Though Ringler was the only person permitted to use the stamp, she kept it in an unlocked desk drawer, Silcott said. In addition, Ringler only began working in voter registration on Jan. 22, 2008. The suspicious petition pages are dated Jan. 28 and 29 and Feb. 4 and 5, within the first two weeks of her arrival. Ringler told The Tribune Tuesday she could not recall how often she used the stamp during the 2008 primary. "Honestly, I don't know," she said. "I know I didn't do a lot petitions that year because I was brand new." Pam Brunette's written signature also appears on the backs of the suspicious petition pages. She is the Democratic member of the Board of Voter Registration. Brunette did not respond Tuesday to a call seeking comment about the stamped pages. She said last week that voter registration workers "are not handwriting experts, so our job is basically making sure the papers are complete." As part of a joint investigation, The Tribune and Howey Politics Indiana reported Sunday that dozens, if not hundreds, of signatures on petitions to place Obama and Clinton on the Indiana primary ballot in 2008 were faked in St. Joseph County. Before that story was published, The Tribune spoke with more than 30 people whose names appeared on the petitions. All but one confirmed not signing the documents. In addition, a forensic document analyst identified a number of suspicious pages that appeared to have been filled out by a single person. Since then, Kernan, now owner of the Silver Hawks, and 12 others have also told The Tribune they did not sign the documents. "No, not at all," Kernan said when asked if the signature next to his name on the Obama petition looked like his own. "Nor does the printing look like mine." The Office of the Secretary of State did not respond Tuesday to a request for comment on this story. Earlier requests by phone and e-mail also went unanswered. The Obama campaign, meanwhile, referred the matter to the Indiana Democratic Party, which issued this statement Tuesday: "The 2008 presidential petitions ... were approved and certified as valid by the Democratic and Republican members of the local ... Office of Voter Registration. But even an isolated instance of misconduct ... should be thoroughly investigated, and we support such an inquiry."
Martha Lake Named Treasurer of the Year
Treasurer of the Year Martha Lake
Howard County Treasurer Martha Lake was named Treasurer of the Year by the Association of Indiana Counties at a recent awards dinner. We are proud of all of Martha's great accomplishments and happy that she serves the taxpayers of Howard County so well!
Karickhoff Receives Honor
Rep. Karickhoff awarded Midwestern leadership institute fellowship
State Representative Mike Karickhoff (R-Kokomo) has been awarded a fellowship for the Council of State Government’s 17th annual Bowhay Institute for Legislative Leadership Development. He was among 37 lawmakers chosen to participate along with members from 10 other Midwestern states and three Canadian provinces.
According to a press release issued by the Council of State Governments, Rep. Elaine Nekritz, the co-chair of the institute’s steering committee stated, “The Bowhay Institute is one of the premier leadership training programs in the nation. The legislatures in the region have benefited greatly from the skills their members have gained through this unique educational experience. Many of the graduates now hold leadership positions in their states.”
The Council of State Governments also stated the since 1995, 550 lawmakers have graduated from the Bowhay Institute from 11 Midwestern states. These legislators are chosen to participate through a competitive, nonpartisan selection process.
Rep. Karickhoff will attend the program August 12-16 in Madison, WI.
“I am humbled by this opportunity to attend the Bowhay institute,” said Rep. Karickhoff. “This is a terrific opportunity to develop leadership skills with other legislators across the Midwest and I plan to take full advantage of it.”
Pile Of Debt Would Stretch To The Moon
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Ronald Reagan once famously said that a stack of $1,000 bills equivalent to the U.S. government's debt would be about 67 miles high.
That was 1981. Since then, the national debt has climbed to $14.3 trillion. In $1,000 bills, it would now be more than 900 miles tall.
In $1 bills, the pile would reach to the moon and back twice.
The United States hit its legal borrowing limit on Monday, and the Treasury Department has said the U.S. Congress must raise the debt ceiling by August 2 to avoid a default.
The White House is trying to hammer out a deal with lawmakers to cut federal spending in exchange for a debt-limit increase.
Most people have trouble conceptualizing $14.3 trillion.
Stan Collender, a budget expert at Qorvis Communications, said the biggest sum most Americans have ever handled -- in real or play money -- is the $15,140 in the original, standard Monopoly board game.
The United States borrows about 185 times that amount each minute.
Here are some other metrics for understanding the size of the national debt and United States borrowing:
* U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has said the United States borrows about $125 billion per month.
With that amount, the United States could buy each of its more than 300 million residents an Apple Inc iPad.
* In a 31-day month, that means the United States borrows about $4 billion per day.
A stack of dimes equivalent to that amount would wrap all the way around the Earth with change to spare.
* In one hour, the United States borrows about $168 million, more than it paid to buy Alaska in 1867, converted to today's dollars.
In two hours, the United States borrows more than it paid France for present-day Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa and the rest of the land obtained by the 1803 Louisiana Purchase.
* The U.S. government borrows more than $40,000 per second. That's more than the cost of a year's tuition, room and board at many universities.
"That usually gets their attention," Doug Holtz-Eakin, who was chief White House economist under President George W. Bush, said in an email. "I have two kids, so every 10 seconds, the feds borrow more than I paid lifetime."
* The Congressional Budget Office projects the total budget deficit in fiscal 2011 at about $1.4 trillion.
"The net worth of Bill Gates, roughly around $56 billion, could only cover the deficit for 15 days," said Jason Peuquet, a policy analyst with the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. "The net worth of Warren Buffet, roughly around $50 billion, could only cover the deficit for 13 days."
Scenes From Lincoln/Reagan 2011
Indiana GOP Lines Up Behind Mourdock In Senate Race
Being Known As Obama's Favorite Republican Won't Help Lugar's Campaign
Republican Sen. Dick Lugar is getting a primary challenge from the right.
Indiana Treasurer Richard Mourdock will kick off his campaign against Sen. Dick LugarTuesday, setting up the longtime Republican lawmaker for a potentially competitive primary. Mourdock told Roll Call that he will reveal a list of supporters that includes more than 75 percent of GOP county chairmen in the state.
Ted Ogle, chairman of both the Bartholomew County and 6th Congressional district Republican parties said he would be among the county chairmen endorsing Mourdock.
Mourdock said last week that he’s still trying to recruit county chairmen, so he would not disclose a specific number of endorsements, giving only the 75 percent figure. Ogle said Mourdock’s endorsement figure sounded right to him. Mourdock said his establishment support is a sign he is not running as an outsider.
“Certainly I expect Sen. Lugar’s campaign team to say I’m some tea party candidate and we’re charging the walls of the Republican fort, and in fact, it’s exactly the opposite,” Mourdock said in an interview.
Lugar senior adviser Mark Helmke dismissed Mourdock’s support but did not dispute the figure.
The county chairmen aren’t the only supporters Mourdock is trying to rally. During a trip earlier this month to Washington, D.C., he reportedly met with Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) and former Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), as well as a number of conservative organizations, including the Tea Party Express, the National Rifle Association, Americans for Tax Reform, the Club for Growth and the National Republican Trust Political Action Committee.
Several of those groups backed conservative insurgents against establishment favorites during Republican primaries in 2010. The most prominent example was the Tea Party Express and the Club for Growth boosting attorney Joe Miller’s candidacy against Sen. Lisa Murkowski in Alaska. Miller defeated Murkowski in the primary, but she won re-election in a historic write-in campaign.
Already the Tea Party Express has said it wants to unseat Lugar, writing supporters in a fundraising e-mail recently, “We need to build a massive warchest to win more campaigns for constitutional conservatives and defeat people like Dick Lugar.”
When Roll Call asked about the meetings in D.C., Mourdock declined to disclose that he had sat down with the groups. “I’m not going to say who I met with and who I haven’t,” he said.
Hoosiers for Conservative Senate, an umbrella organization for tea party groups in Indiana that want to defeat Lugar, is hoping to choose a candidate that it can rally around. Mourdock said he would welcome their support, but it will take more than a tea party candidate to defeat Lugar.
“What’s more important to me than their endorsement is the fact that when I do a parade in Warsaw, Ind., 20 people show up and they’re willing to wear my T-shirt,” he said, adding that he hopes the 2,500 volunteers who helped with his re-election campaign for state treasurer in 2010 would pitch in again.
Mourdock said he respects Lugar but disagrees with his votes for the two newest Supreme Court justices, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor, and his efforts helping President Barack Obama pass the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty. He said he didn’t think many other Republicans, including oft-mentioned state Sen. Mike Delph, would ultimately decide to run for the Senate.
Mourdock, who lives north of Evansville, previously lost bids for Congress in 1990 and 1992. Both times he got 45 percent of the vote against then-Rep. Frank McCloskey (D). Mourdock then served two terms as a Vanderburgh County commissioner from 1994 to 2002. He was elected state treasurer with 52 percent of the vote in 2006 and re-elected with 62 percent of the vote in 2010, getting more than 1 million votes and leading the Republican ticket.
Lugar Confirms It's Motel 6 When He Makes It Back To Indiana
Richard Lugar's Chief of Staff confirmed today that the 78 year old Senator does not have a home in Indiana. The Senator apparently stays in a hotel during his infrequent visits to the Hoosier State. While this may raise residency issues with some, it appears that this revelation will be nothing more than an extremely embarrassing news item.
Deficit Is Too Damn High
New Presidential Address
Election Day In Howard County
Clean Sweep In Howard County
Howard County Republicans won every contested race on November 2. Each of our state-wide candidates carried the county. Jackie Walorski lost in Howard County by 15 votes but showed a 3,000 vote improvement over 2006.
For Your Entertainment
I went to lunch with some Democrats the other day and one of them made a joke about Dan Quayle's spelling ability. Submitted for your entertainment. Craig
Extreme
Money For Nothing
It's Democrats Like This One Who Rammed Healthcare Down Our Throats
Scenes From Lincoln/Reagan 2010
Governor Daniels Speaks On The "Indiana Way"
Former Congressman Bud Hillis Receives Lifetime Achievement Award
Former State Senator Jim Butcher Accepts Lifetime Achievement Award
Governor Daniels Greets The Karickhoffs
Heath VanNatter Discusses Legislative Issues With Jamie Shepherd and Troy Parton
State Senator Jim Buck and Sally Tate Enjoy The Fellowship
Governor Daniels Mixes With The Crowd
The Mikliks and Jill Dunn Chat About Local Politics
Former State Representative John Smith and Debbie Smith Sport Their "Mitch Daniels For President" Buttons
Paid For By The Howard County Republican Party, Craig L. Dunn, Chairman
