DANCE WITH THE ONE WHAT BRUNG YA

RICK SANTORUM


A couple of weeks ago, Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum seemed to be inching more and more towards the center of the political spectrum after spending the last several years in Crazywingerville in an effort to siphon some votes from his surging Democratic opponent, Bob Casey Jr. I would assume that Santorum thought a none too subtle shift to the middle, coupled with the GOP-funded Green Party candidacy of Carl Romanelli might be enough to for him to eek out a November victory against an opponent in Casey who I've heard nothing but mediocre things about.
But with the chances of Romanelli even making the November ballot fading due to (surprise!) GOP signature chicanery coupled with the fact that he's not drawing nearly enough off of Casey as was originally hoped, it appears that Santorum has dropped the facade of moderation altogether and go lockstep with the Bush administration come hell or high water. Sunday's appearance/debate with Casey on Meet the Press signaled this shift. And all indications are that Santorum succeeded in nothing more than shovelling dirt onto his own political grave.

Some "highlights" from Santorum:
- began the debate with a show of support for embattled Defense Secretary Don Rumsfeld, whom he said is doing a "fine job";
- put forth no plan for dealing with the quagmire in Iraq, instead signaling his continued support for "stay-the-course";
- still continues to believe that there are WMDs in Iraq when even his own president has dispelled that notion;
- falsely claimed that Iraq and al Qaeda were in cahoots on 9/11 (another assertion that his own president has denied);
- supports Bush's illegal wire-tapping;
- thinks Bush has been a "terrific" president and has supported him 98% of the time;
- reiterated his support for Social Security privatization;
- crudely referred to Casey's dead father when discussing Casey's support for Plan B contraception, saying his dead father "would be very upset" with him; and finally,
- revealed that he spends about a month every year actually living in Pennsylvania.
(Full transcript can be found here.)

So, this is Rick's strategy. There'll be no slide to the middle for him after all. If he's going down, he'll do so being his true Bush stooge self. And I suppose that I can sort of respect that he's staying true to himself, regardless of the fact that I personally find his true self nothing short of loathsome.