Why Santorum May Win


"If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual [gay] sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything. Does that undermine the fabric of our society? I would argue yes, it does. ... That's not to pick on homosexuality. It's not, you know, man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be. It is one thing."
- Rick Santorum, April 7, 2003
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It takes fierce political skill and intuition to package extremely unpopular views for mass consumption and succeed. It takes uncommon political discipline to express unpopular and rigid views to an audience who doesn't share them, and get them to love you in spite of it. Rick Santorum has accomplished all of this, and more, and is only a few missteps away from securing the nomination of his party for the Presidency.

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"One of the things I will talk about, that no president has talked about before, is I think the dangers of contraception in this country.... Many of the Christian faith have said, well, that's okay, contraception is okay. It's not okay. It's a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be."

- Rick Santorum, October 18, 2011

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His unyielding, intolerant stance on contraception, homosexuality, abortion, social welfare, and a bevy of other social issues makes many Republicans and Independents look very suddenly like a crowd of hand-wringing social moderates. You see, Republicans are a fearful bunch, but they are also also deeply pragmatic. He pulls pages from Revelation to describe his mandate to serve the greater good at every opportunity, but there is a sense among Republicans: 'how far will he go with this?' Even still, many of them still come away feeling like he may be the one to beat Obama.

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"In far too many families with young children, both parents are working, when, if they really took an honest look at the budget, they might find they don't both need to. ... What happened in America so that mothers and fathers who leave their children in the care of someone else — or worse yet, home alone after school between three and six in the afternoon — find themselves more affirmed by society? Here, we can thank the influence of radical feminism."

- Rick Santorum, 2005, It Takes a Family 

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Let's get it out of the way, ok? He is not to be underestimated. He is a wacko, a dangerous one, and if he gets the nomination, liberals, civil libertarians and moderate Republicans are all in for a nightmare. Santorum's one year plan is to campaign against he notion that poverty not is an institutional ailment, to campaign against science, against the environment, and against the very working class voters who are currently enthralled with him.

His eight year plan, however, is much more radical. A successful Santorum Presidency would perniciously roll back the tide of social progress gains over the last hundred years and take us back to a Biblical society, one in which a certain kind of Christianity informs the Executive Cabinet, and, even worse, the Supreme Court. If you are a woman with an iota of concern about your rights, or someone with even the slightest degree of faith in individual liberty and the fundamental Christian tenet of social compassion, you need to be alarmed that Santorum has come this far. You need to be actively campaigning against what he stands for.

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"This is a spiritual war. And the Father of Lies has his sights on what you would think the Father of Lies would have his sights on: a good, decent, powerful, influential country - the United States of America. If you were Satan, who would you attack in this day and age?" 

- Rick Santorum, 2008

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In regards to Santorum's success, there are two main factors in play: one outside his control, and the one a direct result of his efforts.

Santorum's campaign, first of all, inherited a special set of circumstances. There is a dense and narrow band of citizens desperate for the candidate who, in their view, is authentic enough to unseat Obama. They are terrified that an African American man has taken the highest office in the nation. To them, he represents 'the other,' an ideal that, for them, runs counter to comfortable notions of lantern-jawed, Caucasian leadership and national pride. There is no other possible reason that a President who has governed as a moderate, rolled back civil liberties, dealt a major blow in the War on Terror(tm) and compromised to a fault with Tea Party Republicans is still being called a Socialist, a Muslim, and a Terrorist.

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"Radical feminists have been making the pitch that justice demands that men and women be given an equal opportunity to make it to the top in the workplace."
-Rick Santorum, 2005, It Takes a Family
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The extended Republican primary, during which Romney remained the presumptive nominee, extended Santorum an uncommon amount of time to foster credibility with the voting public without close media scrutiny. During this time, Mitt Romney suffered from an authenticity problem, while Santorum, with his coal mining family pedigree and a relaxed, engaged stage presence, wowed audiences with his authenticity.

However, the GOP establishment - this includes party elders and pundits - never at first considered Santorum's broad appeal. Instead, they clung to Romney's faltering but reasonable campaign, treating him like the front runner even as Santorum hammered him in debates. Santorum gained a strong and steady foothold with Republicans terrified of a candidate not being able to stand up to cult Obama. Once it was clear it was a real, genuine horse race, the frothy surge of Santorum coverage gave him a stiff bump in the polls, which has by any measure made him the front runner. His position at the head of the pack has only in the last week or so, afforded him the sort of scrutiny that would have capsized his campaign had it begun months ago.

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"All the people who live in the West Bank are Israelis, they're not Palestinians. There is no 'Palestinian.' This is Israeli land."
- Rick Santorum, November 18, 2011
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Santorum hasn't just been blessed with timing and circumstance. He has also been blessed with - by any standard - an uncommonly successful career, and uncommon ambition. He has had years to fine tune his message and his strong glad-handing skills toward constituents. He has thrived in a region of the country largely sympathetic to his deep religiosity. He is a true believer in good, evil, God, Satan, and the dangers of modern society, but his politically crafty approach to his beliefs is his real weapon. Santorum cloaks deeply intolerant rhetoric in fiercely smart, moderate language, making it less scary to people who might otherwise give pause to the paranoid, apocalyptic feelings that he lets slip now and again.

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"The idea that the Crusades and the fight of Christendom against Islam is somehow an aggression on our part is absolutely anti-historical. And that is what the perception is by the American Left who hates Christendom. ... What I'm talking about is onward American soldiers. What we're talking about are core American values."
- Rick Santorum, February 22, 2011

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Santorum links financial and social concerns to end-times sermonizing because he can't help himself. It's what he genuinely believes. His conviction informs his authenticity, and his authenticity informs his strength with voters. He listens to them. He responds directly to their questions. He looks them in the eye. He doesn't stammer and stumble through his sentences like Romney or Obama. He sticks around for public events. He makes constituents feel involved in the election process. These are all remarkable qualities for a candidate, and it's the main reason Santorum has done so well, despite the inherent unpopularity of some of his views.

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"The question is — and this is what Barack Obama didn't want to answer — is that human life a person under the Constitution? And Barack Obama says no. Well if that person — human life is not a person, then — I find it almost remarkable for a black man to say, 'We're going to decide who are people and who are not people.'"
- Rick Santorum, January 19, 2011

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The qualities that inform Santorum's intense confidence - his authentic religious convictions - may also ultimately take him down. They have kept him largely unpopular with his own party. They have alienated huge swaths of a potential Republican base more concerned about the business of running the country than some grand religious mission to uphold old fashioned values. They make him downright nightmarish to voters like me, who consider religious freedom and social welfare the foundations of our society and our humanity. To us, Santorum is an affront to everything that makes us human, and that he is a practiced, somewhat nasty politician, makes him more than just frightening. It makes him evil.

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"Is anyone saying same-sex couples can't love each other? I love my children. I love my friends, my brother. Heck, I even love my mother-in-law. Should we call these relationships marriage, too?" 

- Rick Santorum, May 22, 2008

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The news business has struck gold with the Republican primary. That Santorum has made it this far is every news producer's fantasy. He is, by all accounts, a real political rarity: a certified nut job with authentic religious fervor and the deep political gifts to convey it to even those who might be inclined to disagree with him. In this sense, Santorum's strengths are his weaknesses, and vice versa. His campaign is in a perilous but prominent place, but an exciting one for people who make a living off covering politics.

There are those who feel that a Santorum nomination would be the best possible outcome. He is, after all, they feel, un-electable. A nomination for him, they insist, means an automatic second term for Obama. They may be right. But is giving this man and his vile, ugly intolerance a full year with which to saturate the airwaves with his hate worth it? Is it worth the risk?

We must be mindful citizens and voters. In following a compelling political narrative, we must be careful not to inadvertently usher in another long, national nightmare for the United States of America. Politics is a game, and  it's being covered like one, but in the end, even the slightest tactical miscalculation could result in a future that no concerned, conscious, educated citizen would ever want for their children.

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