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America's Best Senators - Richard Lugar: The Wise Man
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Candidate
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| Contributor | Monsieur |
| Last Edited | Monsieur Jan 27, 2008 06:52pm |
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| Category | Profile |
| Media | Weekly News Magazine - TIME Magazine |
| News Date | Saturday, April 15, 2006 12:00:00 AM UTC0:0 |
| Description | In an airport in the Russian city of Perm, a minor diplomatic crisis broke out last August. In violation of an international treaty, local border police refused to allow the plane of Senators Richard Lugar and Barack Obama to depart without being inspected. Instead of pitching a fit, Lugar, the powerful Republican chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, curled up on a chair—ignoring the overpowering smell of a broken toilet—and took a nap. The Russians eventually backed down. "He is a quiet, intelligent, steady force," says former Nebraska Senator Bob Kerrey, Lugar's former colleague. But make no mistake, Kerrey adds, "he's unmovable when he reaches a conclusion about what ought to be done."
That level of conviction helps when, as one of America's leading internationalists, you're a defender of free trade and an enemy of farm subsidies, yet you represent a state dominated by manufacturing and farming. It's also a bonus that Lugar's thinking has often proved to be ahead of the curve. In the 1980s, Lugar led the push for democracy in the Philippines and South Africa when the Reagan Administration was still backing undemocratic regimes there. And Lugar, 74, has long been an ardent advocate of developing alternative fuels as a way to wean the U.S. from foreign oil—an approach endorsed by Bush in January. |
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