Tea Party Ascendancy Doesn’t Faze Lugar

The rise of the tea party movement has sent many establishment Republicans into a panic. Indiana Sen. Dick Lugar isn’t one of them. While most Republican congressmen are doing all they can to prove their conservative bona fides in an effort to avoid primary challenges, Lugar isn’t budging from his moderate positions, The Hill reports.

He has rejected the Republican call for a two-year ban on congressional earmarks. And he is a staunch backer of the START treaty with Russia, posing for pictures in support of it with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass.

Lugar says he will vote to consider the defense authorization bill, which includes a repeal of the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, as long as Democrats allow a fair amendment process. And he’s one of nine Republican senators who didn’t join a legal challenge to the new healthcare law.