Posted on 04/10/2012 5:26:18 PM PDT by Steelfish
Rick Santorum Was The Most Conservative, Authentic and Resilient Candidate of 2012.
Tim Stanley April 10th
Rick Santorum's struggle touched a chord with many working-class Americans
Rick Santorum said goodbye on Tuesday afternoon. It was a classic performance from the Rickster – heartfelt, overlong, a little bitter. He pledged to go on fighting for the little people but acknowledged that the race was over, brought to a close by his daughter’s illness and poor polling. To most people this means that it’s now between Romney and Obama. The only minority report on that will come from Newt Gingrich.
You can imagine him happily switching the TV off after Santorum’s speech and saying, “Callista, it’s in the bag!” [“Plop!” goes the ice into the glass as Callista fixes herself another medicinal Martini. It’s going to be a long three months...]
Love him or loathe him, Santorum was the most interesting candidate of this season. Against insurmountable odds (including a false count in Iowa) he won 11 states and more counties that all the other candidates combined. His candidacy marked the entry of mainstream conservative Catholicism into the Republican Party at a national level.
He’s the first serious Catholic Republican contender since Pat Buchanan in 1996 – and a lot more serious than that (sorry Pat!). At the root of all his politics was a strict natural law view of the world – the concept that nature is an estate of God and it contains within it the template of moral order.
He wasn’t half as obsessed with sex as the interviewers who constantly asked him about it, and if they’d dug deeper they’d discovered that it was part of an over-arching philosophy of rights and responsibilities that is at the heart of the Western Catholic tradition. If John Paul II .....
(Excerpt) Read more at blogs.telegraph.co.uk ...
I am. Maybe Newt can still pull this out.
That was my exact thought.
More conservative, but hardly 'far and away' more conservative.
Too bad we all couldn't get behind one of these guys.
Fred Thompson Was The Most Conservative, Authentic and Resilient Candidate of 2008. How’d that work out?
Thanks for proving my point.
Now, could you just get on with taking some shots at, say, Newt? Romney? Paul?
Seems a rather odd thing to say today, doesn't it?
Gingrich is more accomplished and talented but not more conservative.
If the media weren’t so dumb I bet they could have asked Santorum many more gotcha questions than just the one about contraception, because he is far to the right of what Americans are comfortable with. As his comments on Kennedy may indicate, I doubt he believes in separation of church and state. He’s more like an old-fashioned Torie or ancien regime supporter than any candidate in recent memory, and those are the true right-wing extremists, not Nazis and fascists.
“The meanings of political labels shift over time, but if we are using the term “conservative” in its historical context, Santorum is one of the most conservative candidates that we have seen since at least Buchanan (I hope I’m not forgetting anyone obvious,) and probably will see for a long time.”
Even freepers thought he was too conservative for them.
It will now be a competition between Obama and Romney as to who will mandate the most free birth control pills and gay rights.
Save it. It’s been a delusional fiasco.
Now, could you just get on with taking some shots at, say, Newt? Romney? Paul?
Sure. But that doesn't get you off the hook for trying to talk about me behind my back.
That makes you a coward and a weasel and you'll just have to deal with that.
And I'll be helping you now.
Enjoy your prize.
He is also somewhat "flexible" (please recall the Pelosi/couch/global warmist lecture).
That said, on balance I like Newt, but my inner voice tells me that it's not in the cards for the good Speaker who (to his indelible credit, wowed us with the Contract With America, and some history-making debates.) His Fox interview told us that he was pessimistic about his future in the primary race. (He's backtracked, but he didn't need to).
We are on the same side, my FRiend, and I understand and support your loyalty to Newt.
You're right.
The attacks on Santorum on this site were especially obnoxious, because those criticizing him from left had the audacity to claim that they were the conservatives and that Santorum was the liberal. His critics would have been much less intellectually dishonest if they admitted that he was too conservative for them and that they were attacking him from the left.
That was purdy funny.
I do apologize for not pinging you when I had something nice to say about you. I thought you would take the description of your style as a compliment.
Prayers for Rick and Karen Santorum and their family.
No he wasn’t.
Our worst fears are now realized,that POS Romney will be the nominee.
There are times when I wonder why we even bother to try.
No mainstream definition of “conservatism” includes eliminating the establishment clause of the Constitution.
Most of the attacks on Rick’s record here were based on his big-spending ways under Bush, his backing of unions, his endorsements of Specter and Romney, etc.
“Too bad we all couldn’t get behind one of these guys.”
It’s not too late. But if we do, the conservative would likely be Goldwatered by the establishment.
You might have credibility around here if you for once had something meaningful to contribute.
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