Paul Zummo writes a great piece at American Catholic about Rick Santorum and his puzzlement as to why Catholic conservatives aren’t supporting Senator Santorum. Why?
The guy’s a conservative. He’s Catholic. Really Catholic.
I think at some level this kind of stuff becomes self fulfilling. With Rick scoring so low in the polls, when people are asked who they want for President they kinda’ think saying Santorum is tossing their choice away so they pick from between the current batch of big names like Romney, Gingrich, and Cain (still?).
Paul Zummo lists a number of other valid reasons including Santorum’s endorsement of Specter over Toomey. I can tell you I lived in Pennsylvania and I spoke to many pro-lifers who felt betrayed by Santorum over his endorsement and they thought they couldn’t do worse on that issue with Bob Casey, the son of a famous pro-life Democrat. (How’d that work out for ya’?)
There’s a part of me that doesn’t want to go for Rick because I think he’s easily demonized. It was the same reason I was skittish about Sarah Palin. The media has done so much damage to Santorum and Palin that trying to get them elected would be difficult.
But I think for the time being when asked by anyone and everyone I’ll say I’m throwing my weight behind Rick Santorum. Honestly, if I had my druthers of which one to pick, I’d pick Rick. I trust him the most. It ain’t even close actually. Well, wait I also trust Ron Paul to never lie to me but I just don’t like what he says some of the time.
But check out Zummo’s piece. It’s definitely worth a read. I think he’s right on.
December 2, 2011 at 2:56 pm
Off topic, but for clarification, the Archbishop of Military Services has made it quite clear that NO Catholic chaplain in the military can perform homosexual marriages on or off military installations and can not use anything Catholic for these unions. Get your facts straight before shooting off at the hip, geronimo.
December 2, 2011 at 2:57 pm
Santorum's problem is that he refuses to concede that the single issue that matters this year is the economy
Yeah, this. He's the only one that understands that culture impacts economics, and he's been lampooned for daring to discuss things beyond simple financing. His website is also impressive as his is the only one that I've seen that discusses cultural and social issues in a meaningful way.
December 2, 2011 at 4:23 pm
Why not Santorum? Come on, that's too easy. He's too close to the neo-con ideology, and we've already been through THAT mess. He doesn't have enough experience. And the experience he does have couldn't get him re-elected to his senate seat. Lastly, he's completely un-electable, especially against Obama. I'm sure he's a great guy, but if we want to win we need to get this field narrowed down to two or three serious contenders ASAP.
December 2, 2011 at 4:24 pm
Dirtdartwife, actually, not that I want to defend the guy, but geronimo didn't say anything about Catholic chaplains. The new face of our finest fighting forces includes, unfortunately, same-sex weddings on military facilities by military chaplains (just not the Catholic ones).
December 2, 2011 at 4:36 pm
I'm not a Paulista or whatever, but I'm also not a neocon. Rick Santorum wants to go to war with a third of the globe, and that would rule him out for me. But Catholics don't like him primarily though for the same reason as everyone else. He's just not likable. He's grumpy, bitter, and a scold–as others have said. His temperament is just not the kind that can win over hearts. He lost his reelection bid in Pennsylvania by double digits. He would lose in the general by even more.
December 2, 2011 at 4:48 pm
People keep using the term neocon. I do not think it means what they think it means.
December 2, 2011 at 5:07 pm
Santorum is nothing but a neo-con. His so-called "grasp of foreign policy" is the same diasterous interventionist idiocy that got us dragged into the morasses called WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, and the ongoing farce in the Mid-East. We need a president who will mind America's business instead of making enemies by meddling in the politics of other countries.
December 2, 2011 at 10:34 pm
Yep, if you think that it was a mistake for the US to defeat the Third Reich and Imperial Japan in World War II, Ron Paul (R.Pluto) is your boy.
December 2, 2011 at 11:58 pm
Michelle, this is what geronimo said "By the way, did you know that camo-wearing homos can even get married in a base chapel now? That's what you're fighting for – keep up the good work, ladies." I was just clarifying it for the Catholic chaplains lest that ambiguous, broad-stroked comment makes someone start to think Catholic chaplains are being forced to perform same sex unions in military chapels when Archbishop Broglio has come out in full force making a very clear statement that they're not allowed. Yes, I am aware that the Protestant chaplains can do what they wish, but our Catholic ones can not. So at least there is SOME level of dissent in our military, kwim?
December 3, 2011 at 1:12 am
And actually, I feel bad for the Protestant chaplains who don't belong to a hierarchy like the Catholic Church and don't have a higher authority to protect them from being coerced into doing things against their conscience, which is what will happen. There are many Protestant chaplains who are unhappy about the turn of events. Yes, I suppose the new atheist chaplains will rejoice in the changes, but many others are going to think a little church in a small town is a better way to serve God.
December 3, 2011 at 2:55 am
Actually, the more I read on this forum of bloodlust and killing for Israel (Israel-tards? Israel-bots? Catholics for Israel Firsters???)the more I want to donate to Ron Paul! You can't refute his arguments, you can't deny his integrity, you can't stand the Constitution or rule of law and you are scared to death of Middle Easterners doing back to the US what the US has been doing to them. And voting for any of these Neocon RINOs guarantees that that is what you are going to get. Every one of them with the exception of Paul is a CFR stooge, a bankster puppet, warmongering (and how many have ever served in the military??) and NWO elitists. I do realize that these forums are planted with CIA and Zionist trolls, the heavy use of name calling and refusal to address substantive points, smug assertions and smears are dead giveaways. And this forum is full of all of those things.
December 3, 2011 at 4:18 am
WWII was made possible, partly by Wilson's desire to make the world safe for so-called democracy. The US enterance into the 1st World War was none of our business. It was strickly a European affair. Our meddling lead to the fall of the major empires in Europe, and was a great contributing factor in the rise of communism, nazism, and fascism. and now, our meddling in the Mid-East is aiding and abbedding the rise of Islamic dictatorships. Can you say, "Allah Akbar"? Sound a heck of a lot like Il Duce, Heil Hitler, and Hail Comrade doesn't it?
December 3, 2011 at 4:45 am
"I do realize that these forums are planted with CIA and Zionist trolls, the heavy use of name calling and refusal to address substantive points, smug assertions and smears are dead giveaways. And this forum is full of all of those things."
Blogging while the tin foil hat is cutting off the blood supply to your brain is always a mistake.
"Can you say, "Allah Akbar"? Sound a heck of a lot like Il Duce, Heil Hitler, and Hail Comrade doesn't it?"
One of the hysterically funny aspect of the Paulbots is the alternate history realm they resolutely refuse to leave. In their world all that goes wrong in the world is a result of US foreign involvement. Ergo, if the US simply retreats to Fortress America the Earth will be a paradise. A typical example is the blithe indifference that Paul has to Iran obtaining nuclear weapons. If Israel and Iran go to war as a result of such a development, that is no concern of the US, as if the US and the world would not sustain devastating consequences from a nuclear war in the Middle East. Their ideological forebears in the America First movement similiarly believed we could simply sit World War II out on the sidelines. The consequences of such an isolationist foreign policy were brought home to this country dramatically 70 years ago. If the Paulbots ever got an attempt to actually implement their unicorns and fairie dust foreign policy I suspect that we would again have another Pearl Harbor style attack with nuclear weapons.
December 3, 2011 at 1:45 pm
I am…
December 3, 2011 at 4:03 pm
The charge that I made that American meddling in foreign affairs has only made situlations in the world worse is true. I never said that "all that goes wrong in the world is a reslt of US foreign invovlement". The events we got messed up in where already bad. I never said that retreating to Fortress America the Earth will be a paradise. We will always have trouble on this earth, we Americans just don't have to make it worst by our meddling. One only has to read the books of William Lederer (The Ugly American and A Nation of Sheep) to realize our government, irregardless of what party is in charge, has constantely made a bad situlation worse.
The attack on Pearl Harbor wasn't the result of an isolationist foreign policy. It was the result of FDR's bungling and outright treason in foreign affairs. One only has to read Stinnet's "Day Of Deceit" and Toland's "Infamy" to realize the government knew years in advance that Pearl would be the most possible target of attack by the Japs. Both books also show that information that could have prevented the attack on Pearl was surpressed by the government. Heck, do an internet search on Pearl Harbor treason, (but watch out for sites that are extreme politically) and you will soon discover that the evidence for this is overwhelming.
Finally, we won't have another Pearl Harbor if we follow these simple rules: 1. Impeach or don't elect anyone who promises to make the world a better place by promoting changes of government overseas or uses such slogans as "making the world safe for democracy" or "New World Order". 2. Pay attention to our intelligence gathering services and act on the information we receive to prevent new Pearl Harbors and 9/11's. 3. Withdraw for all overseas military commitments and stop all government foreign aid cold turkey. 4. Tell all foreign governments that, we wish to be nobody's enemy, that we will form no entangling alliances, but if you wish to wage unprovoked war with us, we will fight you, defeat you, and you will get no Marshall Plan aid afterward from the US Government. 5. Finally, a museum called "The National Museum of Unicorns and Fairy Dust" will be built so all Americans can see the folly of our past government policies. It will be more fun to visit than Disneyland!
December 3, 2011 at 4:45 pm
“America’s security can be assured only within a world community of strong, stable, independent nations, in which the concepts of freedom, justice and human dignity can flourish.
There can be no such thing as Fortress America. If ever we were reduced to the isolation implied by that term, we would occupy a prison, not a fortress. The question whether we can afford to help other nations that want to defend their freedom but cannot fully do so from their own means, has only one answer: we can and we must, we have been doing so since 1947.”
Dwight D. Eisenhower, State of the Union Address 1959
The idea that the US can huddle in security behind the Atlantic and the Pacific in a day where the entire US could be devastated by a nuclear strike in hours is fanciful. US retreat in the world will simply embolden the worst elements in the world, as US isolationism post World War I did. The type of foreign policy dreamed up by Ron Paul will simply ensure a very large war at the end of it, with the United States ill-prepared to wage it.
As for the actual historical facts about the attack on Pearl Harbor, the best study, that shatters the "FDR Knew!" paranoia is Gordon Prange's The Verdict of History.
http://www.amazon.com/Pearl-Harbor-Gordon-W-Prange/product-reviews/0140159096/ref=cm_cr_dp_synop?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending#R1SURCPYINEQ67
Much ineptitude yes, treason, rubbish.
In regard to US meddling making the US worse. Due to US meddling the Third Reich, Imperial Japan and the Soviet Union are one with Nineveh and Tyre. I believe this US "meddling" manifestly made the world better, and without US intervention the world would be a very darker place indeed today.
December 3, 2011 at 5:44 pm
Gordon Prange was a court historian. He did what he was told. Toland accepted the conventional history of Pearl until further research forced him to change his mind. Stinnet had ascess to documents that were unavailable to past historians, and came to the same conclusions Toland did. And for the benefit of truely intellegent, openminded people, the meddling that Wilson did in WWI helped cause the fall of the German, Hapsberg, and Russian Empire's and what took their places? The USSR, Nazi Germany, and Fascist Italy. After WWII, our meddling gave Eastern Europe to the USSR and a Cold War that lasted 50 years. Without US intervention, the chances of this happening the way it did would have been reduced. And because of our meddling, the world did become a very dark place for millions of Chinese and Europeans trapped behind the Iron Curtain. Listen to George Washington folks, and stay out of other countries problems and business!
December 3, 2011 at 6:18 pm
Spot on Donald! Keep up the great work.
Paulbots are isolationists and naive as far as foreign policy goes.
December 3, 2011 at 6:30 pm
Wow this has got to be the most paranoid, conspiracy theories, fault finding, blame America for all the problems of the world, etc, that I have ever come across on this blog!
If I had a nickle for every time the word neocon or warmonger showed up in these comments, well I'd be rich.
All I can say is if we all keep this up, that Occupier in Chief is going to weasel his way into a second term; then we all really be up the creek.
Lisa
BTW one thing Santorum nailed was the break down of the family!
December 3, 2011 at 8:26 pm
Frankly, there's not a single candidate I can get excited about … Newt, Herman, Rick, Ron, Roy, Roquefort, Rutabaga — whoever and whatever. And the snarky ad hominem attacks made by their backers on this blog make none of them any more attractive. In fact, if I didn't think a vote on a third-party candidate would be a vote for BHO, I'd join The Blogger Who Must Not Be Named in the "plague o' both your houses" corner.
I really, really wish the GOP could go back to the storied "smoke-filled room", hash out what they wanted from a candidate, draft the poor sap who best fit the description and then tried to rally the party around him/her. But since we're stuck with this expensive exercise in silliness called the primary system and I went independent some time ago, I'll just have to wait until things sort themselves out.
Feh!