Posted on 02/21/2012 7:12:42 AM PST by Marguerite
HERE'S A THOUGHT for Presidents Day: President Santorum.
Did you just shiver?
How in the name of all that's holy is Rick Santorum atop national polls for the Republican nomination?
Get it? All that's holy? Maybe that's the answer. You know, the Tebow factor; the Jeremy Lin effect? Well, I have another theory.
I wrote Rick off after his strong showing in Iowa, a state that - in an example of what a wacky year this is - he officially won weeks later by one-tenth of 1 percent.
I predicted that after Iowa, members of the national media would find what Pennsylvanians found in 2006 - namely, that Santorum's core beliefs and personal traits are untenable in a general election.
They did not.
Instead, they continued to ignore him as he finished third or fourth in subsequent contests in New Hampshire, South Carolina, Florida and Nevada.
Then came three wins on Feb. 7: two in low-turnout caucuses in Colorado and Minnesota; one in a nonbinding primary in the "show-me state" of Missouri.
(His combined vote total in these three wins, by the way, was 35,296 votes fewer than he got in his third-place finish in Florida.)
Still, national media did not "show me" the roiling Rick whom many Pennsylvanians came to know and loathe.
To the contrary, they helped elevate him (as it did Trump, Bachmann, Perry, Cain and Newt) to the level of an alternative to the mushy Mitt Romney.
How did we get here? And how does this prove that GOP voters are nuts?
We got here via media overhype, Mitt's underdeveloped political skills, finance laws allowing rich guys to keep any campaign afloat and the fact that stuff Rick says plays well in primaries, which forces candidates to appeal to base voters.
Yes, polls change, as we've seen. But some things do not change.
For example, everybody knows that Santorum doesn't like gays in relationships and doesn't like gays in the military.
But he also doesn't like women in the workplace, doesn't like women in combat, doesn't like women (or men) using contraceptives.
He says that contraception is "harmful to women" and society, and that "radical feminism" ruined society by encouraging women to work outside the home, which is one reason an Inky reviewer of his 2005 book, It Takes a Family, called Rick "one of the finest minds of the 13th Century."
(This is an asset in many GOP primaries.)
The problem is that women vote in national elections. They vote more than men. They've done so in every presidential race, by proportion since 1980 and by raw numbers since 1964, says the Rutgers Center for American Women and Politics.
Santorum's beliefs energize women's fundraising and turnout.
As to his personal traits, think preachy arrogance and doctrinaire judgmentalism.
Over the weekend, he slammed government-supported public education as "anachronistic" (he home-schools his kids), and said that President Obama's agenda is based on "some phony theology . . . not a theology based on the Bible."
If you're shaking your head thinking, "Here we go again," believe me, I feel your pain.
But, he perhaps said it best in a recent Fox interview: "He believes he's the smartest guy in the room and he should tell people what to believe and how to run their lives."
He was talking about Obama. But his words are a perfect self-assessment.
... on Pennsylvania taxpayers' $100,000 tuition money, while he and family lived in Virginia, where he still lives today.
I’d vote for him in a heartbeat.
Gosh, Mr. Baer, projecting much?
That statement could use a little citation, if you please?
You’d rather have Pres. Romney??
Darn! This is too obvious for a troll alert. Rick’s got my vote for sure, now! He’s going to make all you libtards stop fornicating!
I think Milton Friedman has some well-thought-through insights on these questions. One of the links below is kind of long and bad resolution, but well worth the time to listen. Links below.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dgyQsIGLt_w&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfdRpyfEmBE
So what that he lives in Virginia, I believe Newt also lives in Virginia.
"Geez you guys are nutso for wanting Santorum- you guys should pick Romney!
"Yeah!
"Romney's the most 'electable' guy you got- heck Romney could even beat OUR guy Obama!
"Really- he could!
"That's why you should pick Romney- boy we'd sure be scared if you picked Romney"
More proof that these so called journalists are scared sh!tless of him.
So are you for Romney or Obama, Marg?
“Did you just shiver?”
No, I have been doing that since the day Obama took office!
Then they will probably abort.
Completely agree! We need more moderate candidates to be our nominees, candidates who are politically correct and certainly won’t challenge “A woman’s right to choose”.
Sounds like you’ve posted a piece justifying why all should support Romney.
No thanks. Not in a million years for this voter.
I ain’t no liberal, at not in the current sense of the word. :)
I ain’t no liberal, at not in the current sense of the word. :)
You really are pathetic. Try making your case for Newt instead of tearing down Santorum, Frenchie...
That “online home school” attack against Rick was the biggest phony non-issue I have ever seen raised. Members of the Teachers Union held an OWS style vigil on the front lawn of his Pennsylvania home in an attempt to prove that he really did not live there. Literally thousands of children are home-schooled in this state with online resources paid by their school district. Being a Member of Congress he clearly never gave up his Pennsylvania residency.
But hey, the crotchety old voters around here decided they’d rather elect The Late Gov. Casey to end the war in Iraq and begin kicking that money back to them in the form of free prescriptions and bus rides.
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