Here are 21 things to help you get through hump day at work!
1)Tonight’s debate is BIG. It’s been almost a month since the four remaining candidates have faced off on stage and tonight’s debate might very well set the narrative for the rest of the week leading into the Michigan and Arizona primary contests:
It's been 26 days since the candidates left the stage at the last CNN debate in Jacksonville, Florida, and the growling hunger pangs of the media have grown louder even as the candidates grow weary.
There have been 19 Republican presidential debates so far, and while some may have debate fatigue -- including a few candidates -- the forums have nevertheless proved to be illuminating experiences.
They have garnered sky-high TV ratings and have become "event" television. They have helped to define several candidates while others fall from grace in front of the live cameras.
But for many voters, it has been the debates -- especially those that have preceded a primary or caucuses -- that have become the deciding factor when they choose who they want as the GOP nominee. They have provided a window into each would-be nominee, and offered insights into how they act under pressure. According to exit polls, many voters make up their minds after watching a debate.
2)In Michigan, Romney has finally regained a tenuous lead over Santorum:
Mitt Romney has regained the lead in a Mitchell/Rosetta Stone Poll of Michigan conducted for MIRS (Michigan Information & Research Service). The two frontrunners are now in a statistical dead heat with Romney (32%) having a 2% lead over Rick Santorum (30%) while Newt Gingrich (9%) and Ron Paul (7%) are far behind in a trial Republican presidential ballot test. About one in five voters remain undecided (22%). Eight days ago, Santorum had a 9% lead and twelve days before that Romney led by 15% in a topsy-turvy race.
3)Meanwhile, in Arizona, Santorum is gaining fast on Romney’s once overwhelming lead:
The Republican race for President in Arizona looks like a close one, with Mitt Romney leading Rick Santorum only 36-33. Newt Gingrich is third at 16% and Ron Paul fourth at 9%.
Santorum is better liked by Arizona Republicans than Romney, but the gap isn't as wide as we're finding in a lot of other states. Santorum's at +34 (61/27), while Romney's at +24 (58/34).
One thing to keep an eye on over the next week is whether Newt Gingrich can hold his support. 16% is pretty good for him compared to what we're finding other places right now, but only 46% of his voters say they're solidly committed to him. 40% of his supporters say that Santorum is their second choice, compared to only 25% for Romney. If Gingrich's supporters see he's not viable and decide to jump ship the race could get even closer.
We could have two Iowa-like nail biters next Tuesday night!
4)Santorum still holds a comfortable double digit lead in Washington state, the only other contest taking place before Super Tuesday (March 3rd). Of course, in this race nothing can be taken for granted and I suspect tonight’s debate will go a long way toward determining who the winner is in all three of these contests.
With Sunday's airing of "At Long Last Leave" on FOX, 8:00 Eastern, the family that defined dysfunctional hits its astonishing 500th episode—a mark reached by only two other primetime scripted TV series, Gunsmoke and Lassie. Neither of which was funny. And neither of which had a tenth of the social impact.
7)Washington Post reporter Glenn Kessler calls Mitt Romney a liar for accurately quoting Obama. The media really is going to pull out all the stops for Obama this year, aren’t they?
8)New national poll from Quinnipac: Romney and Santorum barely behind Obama in general election matchup!
9)New national Rasmussen poll: Romney and Santorum barely behind Obama in general election matchup!
10)Florida woman in vegetative state after hitting head on concrete after being tasered.
11)ESPN’s Bill Simmons on Whiney Houston’s wasted talent:
She's like Michael Jackson in this respect: All the craziness with her personal life these past 12-15 years ended up overshadowing the eight to 10 years before it. Young Whitney was like LeBron crossed with Tiger. Actually, you can't even compare her to anything. Let's say you rated a young female singer from 1 to 50 in five categories: likability, attractiveness, singing voice, pedigree and stage presence. Young Whitney was a 50 in all of them. Has anyone else ever cracked 45? One of the many fascinating subplots of the mid-80s: you had a male singer (Jackson), a female singer (Whitney), a boxer (Mike Tyson), a baseball pitcher (Dwight Gooden) and an actor/comedian (Eddie Murphy) who peaked at precociously young ages, convinced us they were headed toward becoming the "greatest (fill in the genre) of all time" … only none of them made it. Not one.
I would argue Whitney barely edges out Gooden as the biggest tragedy of the five. Eddie had a phenomenal nine-year run of SNL episodes, movies and comedy specials before his movie career went Barry Zito on us. Tyson had a number of memorable fights and made such an impact that I have been pushing for ESPN to have "Tyson Week" (like Shark Week) for this entire decade. Jackson had all the Jackson 5 stuff, "Off the Wall," "Thriller" and "Bad" before things started getting weird. But Whitney should have been the black Streisand: an iconic singer/actress who aged with her audience, lasted for decades and was mentioned in the first breath any time someone asked, "Who were the biggest female performers ever?" Instead, it was over for her in eight years. Incredible.
Weird religion: Satan is against America. Normal religion: "God damn America."
13)From an alert reader: Newly discovered alien planet is a steamy waterworld.
Scientists have discovered a new type of alien planet — a steamy waterworld that is larger than Earth but smaller than Uranus.
The standard-bearer for this new class of exoplanet is called GJ 1214b, which astronomers first discovered in December 2009. New observations by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope suggest that GJ 1214b is a watery world enshrouded by a thick, steamy atmosphere.
"GJ 1214b is like no planet we know of," study lead author Zachory Berta of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Mass., said in a statement. "A huge fraction of its mass is made up of water."
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GJ 1214b thus appears to have much more water than Earth does, and much less rock. The alien planet's interior structure is likely quite different from that of our world.
"The high temperatures and high pressures would form exotic materials like 'hot ice' or 'superfluid water,' substances that are completely alien to our everyday experience," Berta said.
14)Not so funny: Bureaucrats don’t enjoy D.C. man’s sense of humor.
15)Former President Eisenhower had three secret meetings, organized by sending out telepathic messages, with aliens in New Mexico.
16)Alec Baldwin: Andrew Breitbart is “a festering boil on the anus of public discourse.”
18)Winning the lottery is just a precursor to going bankrupt. And who needs that headache?
19)The top ten selling beers in America – and I don’t drink a one of them.
20)Five times the Witness Protection Program didn’t work.
Henry Hill, a member of New York’s Lucchese crime family and participant in the $5.8 million Lufthansa heist from New York’s Kennedy Airport in 1978, the largest cash theft in U.S. history.
IN THE PROGRAM: The Witness Protection program relocated him to Redmond, Washington, in 1980, and Hill, who’s changed his name to Martin Lewis, was supposed to keep a low profile and stay out of trouble. He wasn’t very good at either -in 1985 he and writer Nicholas Pileggi turned his mob exploits into the bestselling book Wiseguy, which became the hit move Goodfellas.
WHAT HAPPENED: When the book became a bestseller, “Martin Lewis” couldn’t resist telling friends and neighbors who he really was. Even worse, he reverted to his life of crime. Since 1980 Hill has racked up a string of arrests for crimes ranging from drunk driving to burglary and assault. In 1987 he tried to sell a pound of cocaine to two undercover Drug Enforcement officers, which got him thrown out of the Witness Protection Program for good.
“Henry couldn’t go straight,” says Deputy Marshal Bud McPherson. “He loved being a wiseguy. He didn’t want to be anything else.”
21)Entitlement Nation update: Who needs unemployment benefits when you can go on Social Security Disability?
I worked as a consultant doing disability mental evaluations for over 15 years (I no longer do) and one thing I can say is that claimants would often come in and claim mental stress if they just felt “worn out from working.” A nurse came in once and said that she just “couldn’t take it anymore” and was applying. She didn’t understand that just saying you’ve “had it,” didn’t qualify one for Social Security disability. However, the rules change and perhaps with the Obama economy, having “had it” is enough to qualify for some type of mental illness, especially given the jump in the awards of benefits for mental reasons since the recession. Maybe this is the new way the Obama administration is trying to “spread the wealth around” in a way that the average American will not notice. And it brings the unemployment rate down at the same time. A real win-win for the administration.
Are Social Issues Winning Issues for the GOP? February 21, 2012Matthew Cochrane
Many political analysts credit GOP presidential hopeful Rick Santorum’s surge to the recent spotlight on social issues in the news, fueled mostly by the Obamacare’s disastrous “contraception mandate.” Republican pundits mostly feel like this is a negative development, fearing that this will distract voters from the economy, what they feel needs to be the number one issue this fall. But I am beginning to wonder: could conservatives win on social issues in the general election against President Obama this November? The Wall Street Journal’s James Taranto certainly thinks so:
If you're a Republican in New York or another big city, you may be anxious or even terrified at the prospect that Rick Santorum, the supposedly unelectable social conservative, may win the GOP presidential nomination. Jeffrey Bell would like to set your mind at ease.
Social conservatism, Mr. Bell argues in his forthcoming book, "The Case for Polarized Politics," has a winning track record for the GOP. "Social issues were nonexistent in the period 1932 to 1964," he observes. "The Republican Party won two presidential elections out of nine, and they had the Congress for all of four years in that entire period. . . . When social issues came into the mix—I would date it from the 1968 election . . . the Republican Party won seven out of 11 presidential elections."
The Democrats who won, including even Barack Obama in 2008, did not play up social liberalism in their campaigns. In 1992 Bill Clinton was a death-penalty advocate who promised to "end welfare as we know it" and make abortion "safe, legal and rare." Social issues have come to the fore on the GOP side in two of the past six presidential elections—in 1988 (prison furloughs, the Pledge of Allegiance, the ACLU) and 2004 (same-sex marriage). "Those are the only two elections since Reagan where the Republican Party has won a popular majority," Mr. Bell says. "It isn't coincidental."
Of course, other conservatives disagree, believing this is a trap set by President Obama and the Democrats to distract independent voters from the bread-and-butter issues of the Republican Party. Hot Air’s Karl writes:
Bell’s suggestion that social issues did not exist before 1968 will come as a surprise to anyone who has heard about racial segregation, school prayer, pushback against censorship (whether from the Hollywood Ten, Hugh Hefner, Allen Ginsberg, etc.), the marketing of the Pill, passage of the Equal Pay Act, or the movements created after the publication of books like The Feminine Mystique, Silent Spring and Unsafe At Any Speed. It is fair to say that most of these issues did not become politically potent at the presidential level until the 1968 election. However, it is also fair to say that as the Democrats became captured by the New Left in the period from 1968-72, that party was pushed out of the mainstream not only on social issues, but also on economic and national security policy. Thus, it is difficult to conclude anything more than the Dems’ social liberalism was one factor pushing voters into the GOP column at the presidential level; the same center-right coalition kept Democrats in control of the House for decades after 1968.
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I agree that the GOP field needs to be ready to discuss issues beyond the economy. However, it is less clear to me that Santorum’s eagerness to aggressively champion social positions that will be just as eagerly mischaracterized and caricatured by the Democrat/media axis is the way to win the 7-10% of casual voters who at the moment are the swing vote in this cycle.
Rush Limbaugh, to his everlasting credit, isn’t having any of this, insisting social issues are a winner for the GOP.
Remember after the 2002 midterms, there were many surprises. The Republicans did exceptionally well. The conventional wisdom is that the first midterm after a new president's election, his party loses seats. That is a standard operating procedure, conventional wisdom bit. And it didn't happen in 2002. Furthermore, the exit polls sent shock waves through the political establishment. Things that had never come up as issues per se, mattered greatly to people as expressed in the exit polls.
One of the things... You'll remember this when I remind you. One of the glaring things that showed up in the exit polls was how much "values" mattered to voters. And we were all surprised. And I'll never forget the Democrats. Immediately upon the delivery of the exit polls, the Democrats (for a week or two) were publicly were saying, "Yeah, we're gonna have to get our house in order on the values. The values-based voters, we're not giving 'em enough. We're gonna have to make some adjustments." I remember it like it was yesterday. And all that is, when you hear "values-based voters," is we're simply talking about social issues, social conservatives. They were the primary reason for the 2002 midterms success, and Democrats gave the usual lip service for a couple of weeks.
And then, of course, they abandoned it because they never meant it in the first place. I bring it up just to reaffirm the point that Jeffrey Bell makes in his recent book that social conservatism has led to victory in presidential elections. It's the dirty little secret the Democrats know and the media know, and it's why the social conservatives (one of the reasons why) are so despised. They're also despised on principle. But they're also despised because there are so many of them, and they're thought to be hick, hayseed idiots who believe every syllable in the Bible, "And how stupid can that be?" in their minds. And they vote Republican, and they're anti-abortion. Oh, every ingredient necessary for a liberal Democrat to hate somebody, the social conservatives have -- and they joyously, happily propose it and vote it.
And the Democrats know full well. Why do you think Obama and the Democrats all of a sudden try to concoct this contraception issue? 'Cause they're losing the independents! They believe, from the age-old pages of their playbook, that if they can revive this notion that the Republican Party is nothing but a bunch of theologians that want to dictate from the pulpit in the White House, that they can scare the independents back to Obama's camp. They know they can't attract 'em with economic issues. They know they can't attract the independents back by being positive about Obama's record, 'cause there isn't anything there to be positive about. They know that social issues are a winner for the Republican Party.
Of course, the truth is that a full-spectrum conservative candidate is the best bet to defeat President Obama. Conservatives need not retreat from fiscal, social or national security issues before an undecided electorate. One thing political analysts and politicians seem to typically get wrong is to think that fiscal and social conservative issues are mutually exclusive, as if they are two separate branches of the same party. Instead, the conservative worldview encompasses both sets of issues quite comfortably. The line between fiscal and social conservatism isn’t between different people but down the middle of the conservative’s mind*. Jonah Goldberg explains:
It’s true that at the activist and leadership level there are people who care about social policy, foreign policy or economic policy to the exclusion of the other two. That’s just the nature of specialization. But it’s not clear to me that it works all the way down. All three factions exist within the conservative brain. Most conservatives believe in free enterprise, strong national defense and traditional values (variously defined). To be sure, there is a distinct libertarian faction on the right. But I don’t know that there’s a strong national defense faction that would otherwise be in the Democratic fold…
Conservatives do not have to retreat from social issues to win elections, nor should they. While until a few weeks ago, fiscal issues rightly dominated the day’s headlines, conservatives do not need to ignore social concerns to address economic ones. Winning elections requires agressively engaging our ideological foes on multiple battle fronts, not "strategic" retreats ceding whole issues to our opponents.
A Lutheran, a Baptist, and Five Penises Walk Into a Congressional Hearing February 20, 2012Matthew Cochrane
Last week several religious leaders testified before Congress on how the “contraception mandate” strips away religious rights. Many made several excellent points, including President of the Lutheran Church (Missouri Synod) Matthew Harrison:
One point Harrison makes that I would like to highlight, is how he claims his denomination is famously apolitical. I often wonder if these leaders see the irony of statements like this. Does he ever consider that if his denomination was more politically active in the first place that he might not be in a position of having to defend his religious liberty in front of Congress? In other words, if he had been more politically active in past elections, politicians might have been elected who protected his Constitutional religious rights more than the current administration? Regardless, at least, Harrison understands the fundamental threat to his religious liberty this current mandate presents.
Other religious leaders also testified before Congress. Here is Union University Professor C. Ben Mitchell:
Meanwhile, liberals look at the above testimony, and make wisecracks about what people with penises could possibly contribute to a discussion on birth control. Seriously. Forget about engaging in a thoughtful discussion on religious liberty, let’s make sexist jokes about penises and birth control!
Fortunately, a great many women, including Sarah Hoyt, are not buying this sexist tripe being pushed by feminists and liberals:
The republicans PROPERLY have pointed out this is a violation of the freedom of religion secured to us by the constitution. BUT because they oppose taking the founding document of the United States out in the backyard and screwing it like a two bit whore, they’re being accused of starting a war on women.
Because, the Catholic Church changed its doctrine yesterday, to refuse you free contraceptives, ladies. Yep, that’s the truth. And those mean, nasty, awful Republicans are conniving with the mean, evil nasty papists. And, yep, they are going to refuse to pay for your contraceptives EVEN IF YOU DON’T work for them, as the vast majority of women who in the US don’t. How nasty is that?
What kind of enormous, unyielding, painful daddy issues have you got to have to think that Uncle Sam has to force a CHURCH to pay for your contraception?
Of course, the compromise Obama offered is a complete farce. NRO’s Jim Geraghty explains:
One of the two statements below is true.
1)Providing co-pay-free birth control to all citizens represents such a national priority that it is worth raising the premiums for everyone who has health insurance.
2)Providing co-pay-free birth control to all citizens is not enough of a national priority that it is worth raising the premiums for everyone who has health insurance.
There is no option three. There is no way to require insurers to cover a good or service without raising premiums for everyone. Throughout this debate, our friends on the left have argued that birth control is simultaneously so inexpensive that insurers and employers have no reason to complain about being forced to provide it without co-pays AND that it is too expensive for consumers to purchase for themselves separate from their insurers.
No matter what Obama might wish, he cannot simply wave a magic wand and say, “Contraception is free.” Nobody is simply naïve enough to believe this. Not even the Catholic bishops who initially supported Obamacare but cannot abide by this mandate.
A liberal friend asked me if I thought Obama intentionally set out to take away religious freedom. Probably not. I doubt Obama set out to take away religious rights. Yet this is just one more natural consequence of Big Government. Big Government will always and inevitably lead to less freedom for people. This is just another unintended consequence of Obamacare. Just because it was unintentional, however, doesn’t make it any less real. If this mandate is not corrected, America will forevermore be changed and people of faith will have lost their liberty to worship and live as they choose. Hmm, didn’t Obama make a promise to that effect?
Chastity is Not a Joke: Thoughts on Foster Friess, Free Love and Contraception February 18, 2012Matthew Cochrane
Earlier this week, multimillionaire and Santorum supporter Foster Friess appeared on MSNBC and made a comment that caused quite a stir:
The overreaction in liberal circles was immediate. Acting shocked and outraged that someone could dare suggest chastity as a lifestyle choice in such an enlightened society as our own, liberals were quick to mock and scorn Foster’s outdated sentiments. Closer to home, TLM made the clip his Friday droll.
Once again, liberals seem to be missing the point. First of all, it’s not an old joke; it’s long-forgotten wisdom. You know, back in Foster’s day it wasn't considered funny for women to value chastity or to incorporate it into their lifestyle; it was considered wise and prudent. Feminists claim they want women to “have it all” yet they celebrate “free love” in society as if it has no consequences.
I work the midnight shift in my city and often stop in IHOP for a meal during the dead hours of the night. The waitresses working at this time are all single mothers stuck working the midnight shift at an all-night greasy diner because they made poor choices in life that robbed them of a future. How many attractive, bright girls do you know from high school who never got a fair shot at success because they got pregnant before getting married? If you’re my age, I’m guessing a lot. This is feminism’s cruel ruse: That women can succeed in life without practicing the virtues that ensure success.
If, as I do, you live in the country, you have dozens of neighbors like Miss Strader – nice high-school girls who babysit your kids; you lose touch, they move to the next town, and you bump into them a couple of years later doing the late shift at the diner or the general store; they’re 23 or 24, with three kids by three different guys. And they’re still nice, and still kinda pretty, if aged beyond their years. But life and its opportunities are fled. If you’re Britney Spears and you wake up after an almighty bender next to some guy you’d rather not face the grey morning after with, there are high-priced lawyers and managers and minders to make all the bad stuff go away. If you’re Britney at the KwikkiKrap, it’s not so easy. “Free love” is free in the same sense all those government programs funded by Chinese debt are.
This is a legitimate subject for debate – especially when Obama’s Leviathan has chosen one side in the debate, and is funding it lavishly. It’s very difficult to have a functioning economy with dysfunctional human capital – that’s as true for America as it is for Greece.
In the New York Times today, an article highlights the fact that most births to women under thirty happen outside marriage. In other words, what society used to stigmatize, is now the new normal. The downside to all this is that women buy this lie and, consequently, believe they can live without morals and not face the consequences. Unfortunately, life doesn’t work this way.
While these young, single mothers are robbed of their future, their children are also given a huge handicap in life that is rarely overcome. Rion Haskins in the National Affairs explains:
The third strategy is to do everything possible to increase the share of children being reared by their married parents. Good studies have linked lone parenting (or the shock of transitions between family living arrangements) with poor education outcomes, delinquency and crime, mental-health problems, lower labor-force participation, and a host of other bad outcomes for children. Unfortunately, Americans have perfected every known way of producing lone-parent families; we are especially good at having babies outside marriage, boosting their share of all births from about 5% in 1960 to nearly 40% in 2006. We also still have the highest divorce rate among Western nations. As a result, nearly 30% of our children live in lone-parent families at any given moment, and nearly half spend time living apart from at least one of their parents before age 18. Among black children, about 70% are born outside marriage and up to 80% live in a lone-parent family sometime during childhood (many for virtually their entire childhood).
In 2007, the poverty rate for lone-parent families was over 28%, nearly six times the rate for married-couple families. Research shows that if we had the same share of children living in married-couple families as we had in 1970, poverty would decline by almost 30% without any additional government spending. The growth of female-headed families is like a giant poverty-generating machine. Even if government programs to reduce poverty become more effective, they would have an increasingly difficult time just offsetting the powerful upward push on child poverty caused by the continuing growth of lone parenting.
Yet liberals like to ignore this reality and promote free love instead – damn the consequences. When someone like Foster dares to recall that society once valued virtues like chastity and modesty, society mocks him. We make him the “droll” of the week. Yet our economy can never fully recover until our culture does.
Someone called into Glenn Beck’s radio show today to complain to Pat and Stu (since Glenn was absent this morning) that they’re always criticizing Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich for not being conservative enough but they never criticize Rick Santorum for the times he has veered from the conservative path. Pat nicely reminded this caller that they have in fact questioned Santorum vigorously in interviews about these issues and sometimes they do disagree with the former PA senator. But I almost fell out of my chair laughing when the caller responded with “Mitt Romney,” after being asked which candidate he supports. Obviously, a cruel irony is when you nit-pick with Rick Santorum’s liberal record and your own candidate has a long, substantiated history with liberalism.
Chuck Norris did something similar the other day. In a Townhall article explaining why he is supporting Newt Gingrich instead of Rick Santorum, Norris combed through Santorum’s entire record and reduced it to a short list of conservative no-nos. He also points out how disingenuous it is for Santorum to pass himself off as the most conservative in this race since he supported Romney in ’08, and claims any real conservative would have supported Mike Huckabee in ’08, just like he did.
Although I like Chuck Norris, and I agree with him on many things, it’s one of the most ironic and disingenuous things for someone who is now supporting Gingrich, to talk about what a real conservative is. Clearly, none of the Republican candidates are perfect or perfectly conservative or Reagan reincarnate. All of the candidates have things in their past that we don’t like and aren’t proud of. If you look hard enough at any of the candidates’ records you will see the imperfections. However, some of them you will have to look at harder than others. And that is my point.
There is no doubt that, as a conservative, the person I want in the White House next year is Rick Santorum. There is no question as to who has the most conservative record out of the candidates remaining. I could make a huge list of reasons why conservatives should vote for Santorum, but I wouldn’t have enough time or space and Matthew has already done plenty of that on this site. And although there are legitimate reasons not to like Rick Santorum, I am continually baffled by people who are turned off by his record and then go on to support someone else with a record twice as liberal!
What is Santorum’s record? The Weekly Standard recently gave us his report card:
For each session of Congress, NTU scores each member on an A-to-F scale. NTU weights members’ votes based on those votes’ perceived effect on both the immediate and future size of the federal budget. Those who get A’s are among “the strongest supporters of responsible tax and spending policies”; they receive NTU’s “Taxpayers’ Friend Award.” B’s are “good” scores, C’s are “minimally acceptable” scores, D’s are “poor” scores, and F’s earn their recipients membership in the “Big Spender” category. There is no grade inflation whatsoever, as we shall see.
NTU’s scoring paints a radically different picture of Santorum’s 12-year tenure in the Senate (1995 through 2006) than one would glean from the rhetoric of the Romney campaign. Fifty senators served throughout Santorum’s two terms: 25 Republicans, 24 Democrats, and 1 Republican/Independent. On a 4-point scale (awarding 4 for an A, 3.3 for a B+, 3 for a B, 2.7 for a B-, etc.), those 50 senators’ collective grade point average (GPA) across the 12 years was 1.69 — which amounts to a C-. Meanwhile, Santorum’s GPA was 3.66 — or an A-. Santorum’s GPA placed him in the top 10 percent of senators, as he ranked 5th out of 50.
Across the 12 years in question, only 6 of the 50 senators got A’s in more than half the years. Santorum was one of them. He was also one of only 7 senators who never got less than a B. (Jim Talent served only during Santorum’s final four years, but he always got less than a B, earning a B- every year and a GPA of 2.7.) Moreover, while much of the Republican party lost its fiscal footing after George W. Bush took office — although it would be erroneous to say that the Republicans were nearly as profligate as the Democrats — Santorum was the only senator who got A’s in every year of Bush’s first term. None of the other 49 senators could match Santorum’s 4.0 GPA over that span.
This much alone would paint an impressive portrait of fiscal conservatism on Santorum’s part. Yet it doesn’t even take into account a crucial point: Santorum was representing Pennsylvania.
Based on how each state voted in the three presidential elections over that period (1996, 2000, and 2004), nearly two-thirds of senators represented states that were to the right of Pennsylvania. In those three presidential elections, Pennsylvania was, on average, 3 points to the left of the nation as a whole. Pennsylvanians backed the Democratic presidential nominee each time, while the nation as a whole chose the Republican in two out of three contests.
Among the roughly one-third of senators (18 out of 50) who represented states that — based on this measure — were at least as far to the left as Pennsylvania, Santorum was the most fiscally conservative. Even more telling was the canyon between him and the rest. After Santorum’s overall 3.66 GPA, the runner-up GPA among this group was 2.07, registered by Olympia Snowe (R., Maine). Arlen Specter, Santorum’s fellow Pennsylvania Republican, was next, with a GPA of 1.98. The average GPA among senators who represented states at least as far left as Pennsylvania was 0.52 — or barely a D-.
But Santorum also crushed the senators in the other states. Those 32 senators, representing states that on average were 16 points to the right of Pennsylvania in the presidential elections, had an average GPA of 2.35 — a C+.
In fact, considering the state he was representing, one could certainly make the case that Santorum was the most fiscally conservative senator during his tenure. The only four senators whose GPAs beat Santorum’s represented states that were 2 points (Republican Judd Gregg of New Hampshire), 10 points (Republican Jon Kyl of Arizona), 25 points (Republican James Inhofe of Oklahoma), and 36 points (Republican Craig Thomas of Wyoming) to the right of Pennsylvania in the presidential elections. Moreover, of these four, only Kyl (with a GPA of 3.94) beat Santorum by as much as a tenth of a point. It’s an open question whether a 3.94 from Arizona is more impressive than a 3.66 from Pennsylvania.
That’s a pretty conservative record!
Santorum Lacks Style.
As I mentioned earlier, there are very legitimate concerns for voters to have with Santorum, his record just not being one of them. If, however, one’s beef with Santorum is that he lacks finesse on the issues, vehemence in the debates, tact in interviews, and passion in his speeches – not only would those be legitimate concerns, they would be spot-on accurate.
We don’t do the conservative movement any favors if we say communication skills or "style" doesn't matter, or matters only very little. It matters a lot. Conservatives constantly recall Reagan's oratory legendary skills and, to this day, call him the "Great Communicator." Obama’s blend of style and oratory skills got him to where he is today, despite his lack of substance, which I believe goes to show how extremely important it is for movements to have people who can clearly explain and defend their positions. That's the appeal to Romney (who is tactful, concise and articulate) or Gingrich (who calls the media out on BS questions . . . and makes it look easy). I think we kid ourselves and ask for more defeats at the ballot box if we accept candidates who don't show a significant amount of style.
Let’s face it. Santorum is short on style. He often has trouble answering simple questions without giving a wordy speech. Santorum gets asked if moms would be allowed to work in his administration or if women should be in combat and he sits there and talks about it as if those are legitimate questions from legitimate journalist sources. And, sometimes, the answers he does give can be painful. For instance, when Bill O’Reilly asked him if states should have the right to ban contraception, Santorum answered with, “As you know, Bill, you're a Catholic, Catholic Church teaches contraceptive is something you shouldn't do.” No, Rick, quoting from Vatican II in your answer is something you shouldn’t do. The rest of Santorum’s answer was fine. And, in context, I understand why he brought the church’s stance into the conversation. But an answer like that is easily twisted and used against him later. It just isn’t tactful or stylish. And style is just not something we’ve seen in the Santorum campaign . . .
Until now . . .
Enter Foster Friess.
Yesterday, Andrea Mitchell was interviewing Foster Friess, a Santorum supporter, when this exchange took place:
First of all, I, as a woman, personally don’t have a problem with anything in Friess’ response and I certainly don’t consider it droll. Second, all he said is that if girls kept their legs closed they wouldn’t need contraception in the first place . . . which is true. Contrary to liberal dogma, abstinence is the most effective birth control and preventer of STDs.
But because this guy said something politically incorrect and supports Santorum, it was the perfect chance for the media to link him to Santorum, who they can then scrutinize and marginalize. And when I saw this, and I knew what was about to happen, I closed my eyes like I do on scary roller coaster rides and felt like Santorum . . . I . . . all of us were about to crash. But what did Santorum do when he was asked about Frost Friess’ statement? See for yourself:
My message to Rick Santorum.
Who the hell was that on CBS with Charlie Rose? Was that you, Rick Santorum? Rick Santorum, former senator of Pennsylvania?
If you really want to win the Republican nomination and beat Obama in November here’s what you have to do. Just keep doing what I saw you do in that video. Period. That’s it.
We know you don’t have a ton of money like some of the other candidates do, but you’ve made it this far which means your message is strong. Now all you have to do is bring it home. Do that in the debates. Show it in your speeches. Walk around with that aura surrounding you. Show people you have a backbone. Flex those conservative muscles.
For most of us, this is the most important election of our lifetimes. That means we need a candidate who can match Obama in substance and style, and having someone who can slap the media around when they get out of line. An appeal to such a candidate and the God of hosts is all that is left us.
