By J.J. Jackson
Rick Santorum, a former Senator from my home state of Pennsylvania, is out wading through the political swamp and exploring a potential run for President. How do I know this? I know this because he and or his surrogates are sending me, seemingly tirelessly, emails discussing what he thinks on issues, where he is stumping, what straw polls he is winning this week and so on. Let’s see if after this article if they want to keep doing that.
Mr. Santorum lost his last reelection bid several years ago. This loss was to an incompetent, bumbling man whose claim to fame was that he was the son of a well liked former, and now deceased, Governor of Pennsylvania. That man's name is Senator Bobby Casey Jr. This is a man, who in case you are unaware, spent much of his time in government running for a higher office than the one he already held. And what is really sad is that to this day I still meet people who think that Bobby Casey Jr. was actually once governor of the Commonwealth and cite it as the reason why they voted for him. When I dutifully inform them that they are confusing the junior Casey with his father in they get utter looks of bewilderment on their faces. Yes, such is the average intelligence of voters here in the Keystone State it seems.
Santorum also lost because, as is a truism that must be obeyed, liberals who hated his guts waged a relentless smear campaign against him. See, Mr. Santorum, then Senator Santorum, lived out of state. But his children took advantage of the Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School System for their education. They claimed that he was cheating the tax payers by doing this. However, the fact that he maintained a residence in Penn Hills, the Pittsburgh suburb that I also live in, and paid taxes on that residence, including school taxes, was unimportant to the debate and rarely brought up by the frothing at the mouth liberals who were determined to see him gone from office. Their argument though basically came down to saying that even though Mr. Santorum paid taxes in Pennsylvania like any other resident he was not allowed to partake of the perks that other residents were. Don’t try to figure it out. Just know that this is how liberals feel on issues. Remember, they live by the old axiom that "All men are created equal. Some are just more equal than others." And they get to determine who is more equal.
Anyway, the former Senator is back and trying to make waves. I suppose he is serious about running for President. But should Americans be serious about voting for him?
I would say no. Oh, Santorum’s supporters will hit all the red meat talking points for sure in trying to drum up support for him. They will undoubtedly lean heavily on his persona as a strong Christian to accomplish this.
But let's review the facts. Back in 2006 I wrote an article [1] that just sent Santorum’s people and supporters into orbit. See, I was at a town hall meeting in Monroeville where Mr. Santorum was speaking, taking softball questions and giving his take on issues. At that event his campaign was handing out a little booklet called “50 Things You May Not Know About Rick Santorum.” I joked in my article that the booklet should be more aptly named “Many Things Conservatives Wished They Did Not Know About Rick Santorum”.
This article got released literally at the 11th hour in the tight race for Senator that year and two things happened. First, many sites who regularly published my work flat out refused to publish this one. It was not because the article was inaccurate however. It was simply because I attacked a so-called and self-professed conservative and told the truth about him. A few sites even told me to never ever send them any more articles as well as they were declining to publish me further. Such was the pre Tea Party attitude of many conservative sites. Oh, and by the way, all those sites that refused to publish that article? I outlasted them. Yep. I’m still here. They, on the other hand, have all since folded and gone the way of the dodo bird.
To this day I proudly display that article on my site under a section titled, “The Rejected Collection”. So far, only two articles have made it to that prestigious list.
Anyway, the article that I wrote detailed what Rick Santorum was trying to put out there as reasons essentially why liberals should not hate him so much. It included a list of many things he supported with absolutely not a single shred of constitutional authority for them. The list included his proud support for stripping workers of their hard earned money to pay old age pensions to others under Social Security because the system was unable to support itself without such contributions. It also stated his proud support for Food Stamps, disbursement of federal funds to build power plants, programs that interfered with free market economics such as the Telework Incentive Act, the Milk Income Loss Contract (MILC), and many other things.
Oh yes, the list was indeed long. People supporting Santorum blindly demanded all sorts of irrational things from me upon this article getting wide spread publication. Some even threatened to report me to non-existent authorities to have my site shut down if I did not retract the article which they called a “lie.” It was a great time in my career as a writer because it was probably the first time that I had en masse ticked off Republicans on such a scale.
This happened even despite the fact that I ended that fateful article with a tepid endorsement of Rick Santorum because, “the thought of Senator Bobby Casey is even scarier,” than the thought of another term for Santorum. At the time speaking the truth and letting conservatives and Republicans know who they are voting for was much more taboo than it is today. Although it is still quite taboo among many segments of the non-thinkers out there who inhabit the Republican Party.
Make no mistake, Rick Santorum has not changed. Sure, he is trying to spin what he believes as he runs around today trying to paint himself once again as a staunch conservative. But he is still the same unconstitutional program supporting, big spender he was while he was in the Senate. Bet money on that without hesitation.
America does not need a man like this as President. So let us all unite together and nip his candidacy in the bud. Then we can get on to finding a serious and strong conservative capable of telling the teat suckling little piggies that there will be no more free milk.
America needs that sort of person. It does not need a President Rick Santorum.
[1] If Santorum Is “Conservative” We’re In Trouble
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J.J. Jackson is a libertarian conservative author from Pittsburgh, PA who has been writing and promoting individual liberty since 1993 and is President of Land of the Free Studios, Inc. He is the Pittsburgh Conservative Examiner for Examiner.com. He is also the owner of The Right Things - Conservative T-shirts & Gifts The Right Things. His weekly commentary along with exclusives not available anywhere else can be found at Liberty Reborn.
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