Lugar shares insights with Munster club

MUNSTER | U.S. Sen. Dick Lugar treated the Munster Rotary Club
on Tuesday to a comprehensive review of American national and
foreign policy.

His audience at Centennial Park treated Lugar with the respect
due an elder statesman who needs their support as he faces a sharp
challenge in the upcoming spring primary.

“You make me proud to be a Rotarian,” said one of about 100 who
applauded Lugar’s 40-minute speech.

Lugar faces competition from Republican state Treasurer Richard
Mourdock, who has Tea Party support.

Lugar said his re-election campaign is running well with $4
million in his war chest and boasts a 49 to 28 percent lead in an
independent poll conducted last fall by Franklin College.

Lugar on Tuesday touted his Republican bona fides, having voted
with his Republican colleagues more than 90 percent of the time,
including 12 votes for a balanced budget.

“The need to curtail government spending is abundant,” he said,
including farm subsidies many Hoosier farmers have come to
cherish.

He expressed confidence in the American economy as being
superior to Europe’s, although he worries that the potential crash
of its currency, the Euro, could spell serious trouble for America,
too.

He argued for the proposed Keystone pipeline, which would
transport Canadian oil more than 2,100 miles to the Midwest.
“Canadians have said that if Americans don’t want that oil then
they would send it to China, which wants every barrel.”

He said environmentalists have delayed its approval for more
than three years, but he recently won Senate approval of a law to
force President Obama to make a decision on the matter next
month.

“Our energy sources are becoming depleted. I’m in favor of all
forms of alternative energy, but we need this reliable source,”
Lugar said.

Lugar said he would advise Democrats in the Indiana General
Assembly to stop boycotting debates on a Republican-sponsored
right-to-work bill and instead offer amendments, vote and move on
to other issues.

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