Is Rick Santorum trying to save the GOP from Sarah Palin?

Don't get out your hedge trimmers just yet, Rick - Image via Wikipedia Rick Santorum is testing the waters in Iowa for a possible presidential run in 2012 according to Jonathan Martin in Politico. But what I think he’s really doing is a favor for his friend Mitt Romney, hoping to undercut Sarah Palin’s votes within the Republican Party’s ‘base’ of religious voters, and, in his view, possibly saving the GOP in the process.

As Jonathan explains, Santorum is probably tilting at windmills – he’s just not electable:

But having been thumped by 18 percentage points in his bid for a third term and out of office since 2006, Santorum may have a difficult time appealing to a savvy Hawkeye state electorate that is likely to have a full complement of social conservatives to choose from.

“One of the things we’ve seen from the Iowa caucuses is candidates that appeal to the base do very well,” Santorum said when asked how his conservative profile would fit the state. “I think historically that’s always been sort of a key in Iowa. Whether I do or not, I don’t know—I mean, we’ll see.”

But I think that’s not really at issue here. Santorum just wants to cockblock Palin so that religious voters in Iowa will continue to pick doughy white guys like him instead of her.

I guess that would be a doughy orange guy. For starters, let’s go back to February 2008 when Mitt Romney was already virtually knocked out of the presidential race because of his poor showing in early primaries. Santorum took to the radio and came out swinging against John McCain, and had this to say about Romney in an appearance on Laura Ingraham’s show:

If you’re a Republican, if you’re a Republican in the broadest sense, there is only one place to go right now and that’s Mitt Romney.

That’s a pretty strong endorsement from one man to another he knew at that time would not be the GOP’s presidential candidate. Santorum was throwing his weight behind Romney not just out of spite, but because he believes in Mitt in the long-term. He knew McCain wasn’t going to win and was trying to elect his party’s eventual standard-bearer with his big mouth.

So that takes us to Palin. I don’t think Santorum cares for her, on a personal or political level. First, let’s look at the personal. When asked about the revelation that Bristol Palin was with child, this is what Santorum told The Hill about how Palin was dealing with her family:

You don’t want to see have a child going out, and obviously, getting involved in sex outside of marriage. That’s not a good thing. … You take something that is not a good thing, which is for her to be engaged in that activity, and you take what happened, which is a pregnancy, and you turn it into the best thing possible, which is that you love her, you support her, and you love and support that baby, and that’s what Sarah and her family is doing.

So, Bristol was doing something that Santorum was critical of, but thankfully Sarah was showing love and support for her and her baby. Many other conservative pols, as that article showed, were happy to leave it at statements that Palin’s family should not be a campaign issue. Santorum passed judgment on her daughter’s pre-marital behaviors, which is his coded way of saying, “if she was a better mother, she wouldn’t have this problem.”

Next, onto the political. Santorum appeared on Greta van Susteren’s Fox News show shortly after Palin announced she would resign as Alaska’s governor, and said the following:

Her biggest fans that I know is my wife, Karen (ph), and she loves her, and she felt really bad that she quit. She felt like, number one, it hurt her, it hurt Sarah. And number two, it hurt women in politics. And although my wife is not an elected official, she was very much a part of my career and she was always trying to promote women in politics. And it looks like, you know, she couldn’t take it, and that’s not a good thing for women.

And you know, I’m — I’m speaking for my wife, not for me. I’m not — I’m not telling you how I feel about it. That’s how she feels about it, and I think that’s — that’s probably going to — going to hurt. It’s going to hurt her.

That’s a pretty rough start. Saying of Palin, “My wife doesn’t like you,” is pretty much Santorum-speak for, “You are a two-bit former sportscaster snowbunny who doesn’t belong anywhere near Washington (where I’ve lived all the time for the past 15 years even though I pretended I was a senator from Pennsylvania for awhile). If my wife, a good, common Christian Republican woman is offended at your quitting the governorship, imagine how everyone else is going to feel.”

I think it’s — you say 70 percent, you know, but that’s a question, you know, Would you vote for her for president against a Democrat? I mean, most Republicans will get 90 percent of the Republican vote, not 70. So I don’t think that’s necessarily a strong number for her, unfortunately.

Translation: A lot of Republicans are as creeped out by you as I am. There’s no way we’re letting you run away with the nomination by putting together a psychotic populist coalition of crazed birthers, Creationists, gun nuts, and security moms.

The proof will ultimately be in who is funding Santorum’s politcking over the next four years. If you see Santorum and Romney getting a lot of donations from the same people to whatever pre-campaign PACs they set up, their efforts will obviously be coordinated. And watch for Santorum to constantly find ways to steadily and sneakily stick shivs in Palin’s belly like he did on that Greta appearance in July. Then you’ll see why he’s really flying to Iowa on a regular basis.

Was not aware that Santorum was a part of Operation Leper.
His actions against the Palin children during Election2008 to throw it for Romney are reprehensible.

The McCain/Palin ticket was up 8 pts. days prior to September 18th.
Obama was losing until the DNC played their October surprise on the economy
and the RomneyTeam attacked Gov. Palin and her children to throw Election2008.

David Frum: "Frum was indeed a critic of Palin, calling her nomination a "huge mistake" during an October 13 Early Show appearance."

David Frum: "Two of our most plausible candidates for president in 2012 are leading Mormons: Mitt Romney and Utah governor Jon Huntsman."

David Frum: "I have a lot of regard for Mitt Romney as a man and politician.
Let me say for the record: If Romney emerges as the Republican nominee, I will support him without qualm."

Late in October, The American Spectator's The Prowler revealed:
"Former Mitt Romney presidential campaign staffers, some of whom are currently working for Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin's bid for the White House,
have been involved in spreading anti-Palin spin to reporters, seeking to diminish her standing after the election.
'Sarah Palin is a lightweight, she won't be the first, not even the third, person people will think of when it comes to 2012,'
says one former Romney aide, now working for McCain-Palin.
'The only serious candidate ready to challenge to lead the Republican Party is Mitt Romney.
He's in charge on November 5th.'"
The Prowler added: "Some former Romney aides were behind the recent leaks to media, including CNN, that Governor Sarah Palin was a 'diva' and was going off message intentionally."
The Romney supporters in the McCain campaign had access to internal polling which indicated well in advance of the November 4 election that McCain had no chance to win.
So they began working to position their man Mitt for a run in 2012. Just two days after the election,The Palmetto Scoop reported:
"One of the first stories to hit the national airwaves was the claim of a major internal strife between close McCain aides and the folks handling his running mate Sarah Palin."
"I’m told by very good sources that this was indeed the case and that a rift had developed, but it was between Palin’s people and the staffers brought on from the failed presidential campaign of former Gov. Mitt Romney, not McCain aides."
"The sources said nearly 80 percent of Romney’s former staff was absorbed by McCain and these individuals were responsible for what amounts to a premeditated, last-minute sabotage of Palin."
These aides loyal to Romney inside the McCain campaign, said The Scoop, reportedly saw that Palin would be a serious contender for the Republican nomination in 2012 or 2016, which made her a threat to another presidential quest by Romney.
Erick Erickson, who organized Operation Leper, said:
"Here’s what I think: I think there are some staffers on the McCain campaign who seriously screwed up the roll out of Sarah Palin, to which Governor Palin herself objected.
These staffers are now out trying to finish her off thinking, as typical D.C. types do, that if they don’t do it to her, she’ll do it to them. They just never understood who Palin is or what she is about."
"Likewise, I do think there are some staffers and others who expect Mitt Romney to run again in 2012,
they decided McCain could not win, and decided to undermine Sarah Palin and her chances hoping it would ingratiate themselves with Mitt Romney."

"Who's the Palin Leaker from the McCain Campaign? (Mark Wallace, Romney pimp)
National Review Online The publication of a Vanity Fair profile of Sarah Palin
appears to have opened old wounds in the McCain campaign.
... the source of the “Diva” leak was Nicolle Wallace’s husband."

Who benefits most from Sanford meltdown? Californian (that's right) Mitt Romney

"Peeking Out From the McCain Wreckage: Mitt Romney"

"Someone's got to say it: IS MITT ROMNEY RESPONSIBLE FOR OBAMA'S VICTORY?"

"Vanity: Team Romney Sabotaged Palin and Continuing to Do So?"

"Romney Supporters Trashing Palin"

"Romney advisors sniping at Palin?"

The Washington insiders need to be stopped and the 535 sociopaths on Capitol Hill need to be dis-elected, post haste.

Democrat *and* Republican.

All of them.

The U.S. Congress is totally out of control.

This article is trying to create a wedge between Palin and Santorum. Don’t fall for it. Palin will be a great candidate, I fully support her, and she is my first pick for President in 2012 but let’s not create a candidate to worship. That is not what American needs. We can see the disastrous results of that kind of behavior right now.

This is a really over analyzing piece. Rick came out against McCain because he despised how McCain was the chief blocker of the conservative agenda in the Senate. I think many people held their nose in support of Mitt. When I heard Rick later in the primary process he was more against McCain than actually supporting someone else.

Over analyzing continues as if the guy wants to run, we can't automatically assume it is to block Palin. It is also stupid to suggest that a conservative Christian would run to take conservative Christian voters away from Palin so a non Christian can win the nomination.

If the guy wants to run let him. We are the side of ideas and freedom.

Santorum is probably tilting at windmills – he’s just not electable . . .

As much as I like Rick, I have to agree. He even got thumped here in SW Pennsylvania, his home turf, in favor of the empty suit Bob Casey, Jr. Granted, most of the electorate thought they were voting for Bob Casey, Sr. instead of Barack Obama, Jr.

I like Rick Santorum.I hope the premise that he would help a friend(Rommey) who is far from being a conservative against a true conservative like Sarah Palinis wrong.
This is the sort of thing that keeps the Republican Party losing elections.
I would vote for Santorum in a second
I would vote for Palin in a second
I would never waste a vote on Rommey

I think both you guys nailed it. This is an over-analysis of matters.

What Santorum said about Bristol in no way reflects the way the author describes it.

I feel this is an attempt to create wedges among Republicans in an effort to divide and conquer.

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