Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
Indiana's Attorney General Steve Carter was the keynote speaker during Kosciusko County Republican Central Committee's Lincoln Day Dinner Thursday at 2517 Restaurant in Warsaw.
Carter, who faces re-election this year, said "I'm proud to be your attorney general and pleased to serve in office."
Carter listed a few successes of the office commenting that such pursuits have covered a range of subjects.
One of the first things the AG's office established during Carter's term was the telephone privacy list to block telemarketing calls. He said the average household was receiving 12 unsolicited telephone sales calls a week and he figures more than 1.4 billion unwanted calls have been stopped. The state's program led to a national no-call list.
Carter has even had to deal with the supernatural, shutting down "Miss Cleo" commercials and retrieving $3 million for Hoosier consumers bilked by the "clairvoyant."
He also found it interesting that the state has a hypnotist licensing board "to make sure hypnotism is occurring properly in Indiana."
He said the state was unsuccessfully sued by the relatives of the late Timothy McVeigh when the convicted Oklahoma City bomber was incarcerated at the U.S. Penitentiary in Terre Haute.
When Carter took his oath of office, there was a backlog of 12,000 consumer complaints, which have now been addressed.
Recently the AG's office has investigated voter fraud in Carter's native Lake County.
"Somehow I've got a lot of work to do as a state lawyer, " he said of the 12,000 lawsuits against the state.
He said the current administration, under Democrat Joe Kernan, is "out of ideas, out of energy and out of talent" pointing to the resignations of the heads of the Department of Motor Vehicles, the National Guard and the Department of Natural Resources.
The Family and Social Services Administration is under investigation and has hired an outside council.
"If we had had strong leadership eight years ago" he said the state wouldn't have to work on ethics, have hiring oversights or lose employees to private agencies.
He said the same sex marriage issue is one appropriate for legislative debate, otherwise the matter will be settled by unelected judges.
"Citizens should decide policy, we should be allowed to do that."
He spoke of the need to re-elect President George W. Bush and to put a Republican in the governor's office.
Central committee chairman Mike Gavin allowed GOP gubernatorial candidate representatives to speak five minutes each.
John Myers, a Whitley County attorney, spoke on behalf of Mitch Daniels and John Elliott on behalf of Eric Miller.
Local candidates were introduced: Larry Ladd for county council; Sharon Christner and Marsha McSherry for clerk of the circuit court; Kent Adams and Rebecca Smith for county treasurer; John Sadler for county coroner; Brad Jackson for the northern district county commissioner seat; Ronald Truex for middle district commissioner; David Wolkins for state representative district 18; and Ryan Mishler for state senator district 9.
Gavin said applications for state delegates are still being accepted.
