The First Debate

The first Indiana Senate debate of 2012 was this Monday. In this debate we had our Democratic and Republican nominees, as well as the Libertarian Party candidate Andrew Horning (whom I had never heard about before watching the debate). The Libertarian candidate has not featured in any polls I've seen nor have I seen him mentioned in the national or state press coverage of the race but there he was on stage with the two-party candidates. The Libertarian candidate gave the usual libertarian diatribe. Talk about the Founding Fathers, the Constitution, taxation being theft, government programs being Ponzi schemes and what have you. He won't take a big chunk of the electorate but in a race as close as this he might be the spoiler candidate who will siphon off enough votes to ensure a Donnelly victory.

Donnelly focused on his bipartisan credentials and his Republican opponent's denunciation of bipartisanship. Donnelly also mentioned Dick Lugar repeatedly and expressed his admiration of the exiting Senator. Mourdock expressed how important principles should be in Washington and that his opponent lacks them. He linked his opponent to Obamacare (which is unpopular in Indiana) and President Obama (who is unpopular in Indiana). Mourdock tried to appear more moderate in the debate than he was in the Republican primaries and on the early campaign trail. He accused Donnelly of distorting his record and twisting his words to make him look extreme. Even in a state as solidly red as Indiana, implying that Medicare is unconstitutional is a very risky statement to stand by and Mourdock tried to make the case that he had never said any such thing. Donnelly responded by paraphrasing Mourdock's speech where he implied that Medicare and Social Security were unconstitutional, and he explained how Mourdock is being dishonest about what he said and did not say.

Donnelly came out a winner on that specific issue but overall I felt that both candidates did OK. I don't think this debate will have much of an impact on the race, except raising awareness of the Libertarian Party candidate who did alright (unlike the Libertarian candidate, for instance, in the first Missouri Senate race debate who came off as a clown). Neither Donnelly nor Mourdock came off as unsenatorial. Neither said anything that will change this race one way or another. I think this race will be tight until the end but I look forward to seeing fresh polls that include the Libertarian candidate. He might be a game-changer. There are a lot of disgruntled Republicans in Indiana who are not completely sold on Richard Mourdock.