However, I can't blame Santorum for saying something that is consistent with his conservative Roman Catholic position. It was going to come out no matter what — unpopular faith-based positions always get trotted out for attention in campaigns if the candidate is a devout believer, and it's going to be happening soon with Romney's Mormonism. What Santorum did was link contraception with rampant sexual immorality, and that's an issue on which most conservative Christians will agree with him no matter whether they agree on contraception or not.
That linkage can be defended easily by pointing out that the liberals love sexual freedom based on the widespread availability of contraception, with abortion as a backup if it doesn't work.
As an evangelical Protestant who is not convinced birth control is sin, I'm not going to say what Santorum said. But I have equally unpopular religious views which I would not back down from if the issues were to be raised in a political campaign.
Being honest and being willing to offend people in a campaign is not something that annoys me in a conservative politician. The same forthrightness that got Santorum into trouble is what got him a lot of votes, including from people who didn't agree with him on the contraception issue or his fundamental Roman Catholic beliefs.
I believe Santorum could have recovered from the contraception issue. Most people who strongly opposed him on that wouldn't have voted against him anyway in the primary, but would have voted for him in the general election on the grounds that Obama is far worse.
I can't say that about Mitt Romney.
True enough, I certainly would have.
I just want to be clear about my point since you've been willing to discuss the issue.
I personally like Rick Santorum. I personally have no issue or problem at all with those that believe contraception is "not okay". I also believe that declining birthrates in the West is a real, significant problem.
I do not have any problem with contraception, but I am not in anyway worried about voting for someone who does. So long as they don't want to ban it and take our choices away, it is NOT an issue that personally concerned me about Santorum.
My problem with Rick is purely political. I don't believe someone that discusses those sorts of things has even the slightest chance of winning a general election. Therefore I see it as pointless to support them. I write those kinds of candidates off because I know they can't win. Electability really does matter. If being right were enough in life, we wouldn't have 16 trillion in debt, 4 dollar gas, 8.2% unemployment, etc, etc. The problem is, to change anything you have to win and I believe Rick Santorum would have, however well intentioned, made the issue of the election social issues like contraception and porn - which is EXACTLY what Obama and his minions want because they do not want to talk about the economy.
Because I have been involved with electoral politics for a very long time at many different levels, I've learned that it is insane to ignore political realities. We can wish that the regular guy (perhaps a neighbor), non politician, devout Christian who is super smart, conservative and would make great decisions could be president - but human nature is what it is and they will almost always lose to a polished, charismatic politician. There is just no escaping this fact. So we first must find a candidate who has at least a reasonable chance to win a general election (which means all the people, not just GOP primary voters). Rick Santorum simply wasn't that guy. He did well as a social conservative, but don't forget that some of that vote was simply a protest vote against Willard the RINO. Santorum basically got the same demographic that voted for Huckabee (and Robertson before he dropped out). Those guys simply can't win national elections.