Evan Bayh Needs To Come Back Home

Our junior Senator from Indiana, Evan Bayh, suffers from a chronic case of chapped index finger.

This painful condition results from constantly wetting your finger and poking it up into the air to see which way the political winds are blowing.

Senator Bayh, a former Indiana Governor, who grew up here in the heartland of America, was only moderately liberal in his politics while he lived amongst us Hoosiers. He didn't do much as a Governor, which can be a good thing, since so many politicians actively do us great harm.

And since he was the three things that too many Hoosier voters look for in a candidate -- handsome, articulate, and named "Bayh" -- the people of Indiana thought it would be a good idea to send him to the U.S. Senate twelve years ago.

For a while, he behaved not-too-badly, and actually seemed to remember that he worked for the voters of Indiana. But as so often happens to men with weak convictions, the trappings of Washington soon caused Senator Bayh to forget about the Hoosiers he was elected to represent.

In this past year of monumental upheaval in our government, with the arrogant Democratic majority in power determined to shove a socialist future down our throats, we needed level-headed and principled representatives who would stand up and articulate the concerns of Hoosier citizens.

In our hour of greatest need, Senator Evan Bayh betrayed us.

The fact that he was seriously considered as Barack Obama's running mate should have indicated to us just how far to the left Senator Bayh had tipped.

He was happy to be "on board" the Obama Express, and was the 60th vote in a number of crucial Senate actions, including the vote that forestalled a Republican filibuster of the Senate's health care debate, which made it possible for Obamacare to move forward in the Senate, and would have allowed it to eventually pass with a simple majority of 51 votes.

I have no doubt that during the final vote, Senator Bayh would have voted against Obamacare, so that he could claim in his re-election campaign that he "stood up" to his party in the end, and voted as we wished. He is a slick politician, but I believe he has under-estimated the attention span of Hoosier voters one too many times.

We will remember that he was the key vote in getting health care to the floor of the Senate in the first place. He could have taken a principled stand back then, when it could have made a difference. The plain fact is, Evan Bayh sold us out. And this is just one example.

On Cap & Trade, and the pork-laden Stimulus bill, and almost every other left-wing initiative, Evan Bayh was the faithful 60th vote who made sure no Republican objections could slow down Obama's march to socialism.

Suddenly, last week, in the wake of Scott Brown's stunning upset Senate victory in Massachusetts, Senator Bayh was on the news bewailing the fact that the Democratic Party has been taken over by the radical left, and needs to move back to the political center. Gee, Evan, you think? Whatever could have changed your mind? A gale-force wind from the east, perhaps?

Serving in the U.S. Senate for a six-year term gives a man a lot of time to wander astray if he is not firmly grounded in a consistent world-view. We need a Senator whom we can trust to do the right thing regardless of which way the wind blows. We need a Senator who understands that he is serving as our representative, not as a political free-agent.

So the question we have to ask ourselves this November is: Do we want to elect a new Senator who truly reflects our Hoosier values, and will do the right thing because of his deep convictions?

Or do we want to re-elect Evan Bayh, who always has his chapped finger in the air, and only considers us worthy of his attention once every six years when he needs our votes?