Friday, January 20, 2012

A Brief History of the Rick Santorum Presidential Campaign


Almost a month before his sweeping victory in the Iowa caucuses, I put up this post on Rick Santorum (at a time when he was dead last in every single poll), and I noted, “Given the dislike for some of the current frontrunners, a good performance from Rick in Iowa could help give him some national exposure and the all important MO-mentum into some of the more conservative states”. Note the date: it was December 12, the fourth day of my wife’s chemotherapy, the day before she began whole body irradiation, and two days before her bone marrow transplant. Even in such distress, I was thinking this clearly, this predictively.

As it turns out, he won the Iowa caucuses. On January 6, I gave my analysis. I said, “he’s a smart, hard-working politician. He knows the system, and he knows how to use the system to his advantage, and he knows how to ‘get things done’ within it”.

Later, in this post, I noted that Ronald Reagan was a person who took the time to think through how conservative ideas and principles ought to play out in the real world. And I suggested that “The real heavy lifting of the Republican party will need to be accomplished not by someone who merely claims the mantle of Reagan, but by someone who can genuinely do what Reagan did, and that is, to think through the problems of the day, and understand how best to solve these problems with the best of conservative principles”.

Now NRO’s Terrence Jeffrey has picked up on my idea: “Santorum is clearly expressing his heartfelt beliefs — a rare thing among American politicians, and a thing, I believe, that is recognized and prized by voters … Santorum has shown the courage, including in last night’s debate, to lay out his own unique vision for the future of America”.

If Rick Santorum goes much farther in this election contest, I’m sure I’ll have an opportunity to explain why such a “bitter anti-Catholic” as myself can support a Roman Catholic for President. 

7 comments:

  1. The results of the Iowa event clearly can not be trusted.

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  2. It's true that the voting in some districts cannot be "certified", but whether Santorum lost by eight votes or won by 24, he did a remarkable thing.

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  3. I would not have a problem supporting Santorum. As you said John, he expresses heartfelt beliefs and for the most part they dovetail into my own. Unfortunately, given that Obama is the current President, virtually any Republican challenger will be sufficient to gain my vote. That being said, we could do worse than Santorum.

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  4. Hi EA, I think you expressed my sentiments exactly.

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  5. I've been surprised to see so much love for Santorum around here. Imagine if he were elected: the country's first Catholic president!*

    (*This is a joke, of course, at the expense of JFK's lukewarm faith.)

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  6. It would have been nice if Perry had endorsed Santorum instead of Gingrich.

    Or if Bachmann had endorsed Santorum.

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  7. "I've been surprised to see so much love for Santorum around here."

    Ironically, part of Santorum's attractiveness as a candidate to me is that he is Catholic. As a Catholic, he could be attractive to other Catholics who form a substantial voting bloc. He's also from Pennsylvania, which has 20 electoral votes. This is in addition to his moral views.

    He may be an ideal VP given his appeal to social conservatives and his experience in the Senate where the VP spends most of their time.

    Rubio in Florida is also a name that gets thrown around alot for some of the same reasons: conservative, Latino, Fla's electoral heft...

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