Richard Lugar’s campaign just sent out a truly astounding email. The email reprinted in whole an article from Mike O’Brien titled Dan Parker’s favorite Republican. Although the article wasn’t written by Lugar, it was enthusiastically pimped in its entirety by Lugar’s campaign, thus indicating Lugar’s basic agreement with it. The article reeks with contempt for conservatives in general and TEA Party voters in particular – including this astounding paragraph:

A group of people who believe nothing about President Obama somehow trust him implicitly when he says that Richard Lugar is his favorite Republican.  The Tea Party should be attacking the president for that, not Lugar.  But it’s no surprise that the Tea Party fell for yet another of the Obama campaign’s political tactics.  Why can’t we win the Senate back again?

Well that certainly is one way to go about a Republican primary – call a significant portion of the primary electorate morons and blame them for the party’s electoral failures. But Lugar (speaking through O’Brien) was not done. While accusing Richard Mourdock of carrying the Democrats’ water, the article enthusiastically carried the Democrats’ water:

While President Obama spent last week unveiling another deficit budget, our Republican presidential debate focused on the contraception issue.  Today’s headline in the Wall Street Journalreads, “Obama Proposes Tax Revamp”, as he proposes lowering the corporate tax rate to 28%.  The headline on Drudge shows Rick Santorum claiming that the great Satan has his sights set on America.  I don’t know why we can’t attract young people to this party.

This portion of the article was also included in Lugar’s campaign email. Pop quiz, Lugar campaign – who, specifically, is responsible for the fact that Republican debates have become contraception circuses? Is it because the Republican candidates themselves are out on the stump talking about how contraception should be outlawed or is it because the Press-Democrat has been actively using the issue to drive a wedge between Republican candidates and voters?

Any campaign that had the slightest respect for conservatives or TEA Party voters would never have dreamed of sending this article out in an email. Lugar’s campaign is dropping any pretense that it even wants the votes of conservatives. Let’s hope conservatives get the message.