Sunday, September 11. 2005
Check out this perfect gem...
Show your puppy love. Put your pooch in his own cool doggie t-shirt from American Apparel. He’ll be the envy of all the pups in the park. Let him wear a doggie-cool design so he can express what he’d like to bark out loud. Do it up in doggie style!
Tom Ferrick's column in today's Philadelphia Inquirer takes Santorum to task for "doing the waffle" over Bush policy in Iraq.
As pointed out on this blog (and others) a little over two weeks ago, Rick's claim that he has publicly expressed concerns about Bush's Iraq policies can not be backed up by any evidence. Santorum, clearly looking at summer polls that showed public opinion has moved against Bush on this issue, lamely responded that lack of evidence didn't matter. "I do a lot of interviews on TV, on radio, with print reporters who don't happen to write everything I say," he said. "The fact that it hasn't turned up in print doesn't mean I haven't said it."
Ferrick says that opens up some other possibilities, including: "Maybe he never made any critical statements but didn't want to admit it because he would look like an administration lapdog. Weef! Weef!"
Giving Santorum's staff their due, Ferrick points out that they did find this 2004 statement he made in 2004 about the security situation in Fallujah.
"There are concerns - I have concerns - about tactics and decisions that were made," Santorum said. "I think you'll find a lot of Republicans who are very willing to second-guess our tactics in Fallujah, for example."
He added: "And, in my opinion, it was not the right call, but you know what? That's not my decision."
Weef! Weef!
John Brabender, Santorum's media consultant, said: "This shows he is not afraid to stand up to the administration, or to say things could be better."
I'm not making that up. Brabender really said that.
Santorum's problem here is a political one. He has supported the administration's policy in Iraq and has not criticized any significant aspect of it. In short, he has been a loyal soldier.
But he faces a tough reelection campaign. He sees the opinion polls that show the public turning against the war. He knows others have raised legitimate questions over strategy, tactics and progress of the war.
So he's doing the waffle.
If it were Arlen Specter, we'd all shrug and say: Well, what else is new?
But this is Rick Santorum, the guy who has made his rep as a no-nonsense, straight-talker.
There's no mistaking Santorum's usual style, his take-no-prisoners prose. Want a sample?
Here's a Santorum statement criticizing the President for "once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell Congress how much this operation will cost. And, he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be away from home." , and as Ferrick notes today, that last statement was not aimed at Bush. It's Santorum in March of 1999, criticizing President Clinton's policy in Bosnia. Santorum goes to great lengths to portray himself as courageous and independent -- as Ferrick says, "a no-nonsense, straight-talker." As noted time and time again on this blog and this website, that image doesn't stand up well against the facts. In this instance, Santorum wants people to believe he's been a bulldog, when the facts say he's just a lapdog.
Saturday, August 20. 2005
Rick Santorum's book tour was designed, no doubt, to boost the Senator's popularity -- both nationally and in PA -- though there were news reports that some Santorum advisors thought even publishing this book was a crazy idea, much less promoting it as aggressively as Santorum has. It's possible those Santorum aides were right. SurveyUSA interviews 600 adults in each state every month and asks each person whether they approve or disapprove of the job their United States Senator is doing. Coming in dead last this month among the nation's 100 Senators was -- you guessed it -- Rick Santorum. The survey was released Friday morning, and it shows Rick with a -4 net job approval rating, with 46% disapproving of the job he's doing and 42% approving. Before he started showing up on every news-talk show that would allow him a few minutes to promote "It Takes A Family," Santorum's approval rating had been relatively steady -- coming in at 44% in May and at 45% in both June and July. Between July and August (coinciding with his book tour), the rating dropped 3 points, to 42%. But his disapproval rating has been climbing over the summer -- coming in at 38% in May and rising to 46% in August. It's a net change of 10 points overall. During his July 28 appearance on CNN's "Inside Politics," Rick's incredible bravado allowed him to claim that his book represents "the mainstream of thought in Pennsylvania." Well, apparently not. Apparently, Rick is actually completely wrong on this point -- as well as completely outside the "mainstream" of Pennsylvania.
Thursday, August 4. 2005
Due to some activity by those nutty bloggers over at (of all places) redstate.org, an item from Jon Hurdle at Reuters came to our attention earlier today about how Rick Santorum "differed Thursday with President Bush's support for teaching an alternative to the theory of evolution known as 'intelligent design.'"
The article claims Rick told National Public Radio that intelligent design lacked scientific credibility and should not be taught in science classes. This kind of surprised us -- Rick being known in the "intelligent design" community as an ally and all that. But we listened to the NPR interview and he did, in fact, say it.
Click here to listen to it yourself
"I think I would probably tailor that a little more than what the president has suggested...I'm not comfortable with intelligent design being taught in the science classroom."
I guess Rick doesn't care that this is a 180-degree turn from what he said in The Washington Times back on March 14, 2002 --
"Research has shown that the odds that even one small protein molecule has been created by chance is 1 in a billion. Thus, some larger force or intelligence, or what some call agent causation, seems like a viable cause for creating information systems such as the coding of DNA. A number of scientists contend that alternate theories regarding the origins of the human species — including that of a greater intelligence — are possible.
"Therefore, intelligent design is a legitimate scientific theory that should be taught in science classes.
"Yet, opponents of intelligent design contend that by including the theory in the new teaching standards, the separation of church and state will be weakened. This is false. Proponents of intelligent design are not trying to teach religion via science, but are trying to establish the validity of their theory as a scientific alternative to Darwinism."
That's an article he wrote, by the way, not some reporter misquoting him out of context. He either doesn't care about this incredible flip-flop, or he hasn't yet heard of the Internet, where just about anyone can find stuff he wrote three years ago in about 30 seconds. To read more about Santorum and the issue of "intelligent design," read the SantorumExposed.com issue page titled " Why does Rick Santorum want to leave teaching a world-class science curriculum behind?"
Wednesday, July 27. 2005
"Just when he seemed to take himself out, he pulled himself back in."
That's the lead graph in Steve Goldstein's Philadelphia Inquirer article, posted today after a Santorum breakfast with reporters.
Yes, even though Santorum said in an online chat with The Washington Post on Monday that his "intention" is not to run for president in 2008 -- today, he's backpedaling.
Goldstein quotes Santorum: "The reason I leave this little window open is because I have no idea what's going to happen between now and 3 1/2 years from now," he said in a breakfast meeting with reporters.
Santorum, who is facing reelection to his Senate seat next year, said it would take "a strange, remote set of circumstances" to alter his plan not be to a candidate for the GOP nomination for the White House.
"It would be easier for me to say no, absolutely, positively, under no circumstances. But in my mind that wouldn't be honest," Santorum said. This flip-flopping on whether he'll run for president in 2008 seems relatively harmless, right?
But it isn't harmless when he does it over things like Amtrak funding (saying he'll fight the president on funding cuts on one day, and a few days later voting against an amendment that would have saved the funding). Just ask some of the 3,000 Pennsylvania Amtrak employees if they think his flip-flopping is harmless.
And it isn't harmless when he proposes a $250,000 cap on pain and suffering awards in medical malpractice cases for us, but his wife sues a chiropractor for twice that amount, seeking $500,000 for her pain and suffering. Rick calls their lawsuit a "private family matter" -- this from the guy who believes the rest of us have no right to privacy.
Yeah, this may all seem harmless -- but it isn't. It's a very bad pattern.
Echoing Goldstein's piece, CNN ran a short bit on "Inside Politics" today (see below) -- and they promised to try to "pin Santorum down tomorrow on Inside Politics, when he's a guest." That's a lot of fun for them, but we'd sure like to see them "pin Santorum down" on some of his more egregious flip-flops, like those above.
Monday, July 25. 2005
Read late last night on Eschaton that Rick will be online with The Washington Post TODAY (Monday, July 25) at 1 p.m. ET promoting (and "discussing") his new book, "It Takes a Family: Conservatism and the Common Good." To join in the fun, click here. To submit your questions and/or comments before or during the chat, click here. And, of course, Rick will be appearing at 11:00 tonight on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" (see Brian's Sunday post, below). Books tours make for a busy schedule, eh?
Monday, July 18. 2005
I'm gonna climb out on a limb here and guess that Santorum is a guy who likes to see his name in the headlines -- but still, I doubt he's been happy about what they said over the weekend (heck, for that matter, over the last 10 days). In newspapers all over the country, there was a whole lotta Santorum exposing goin' on. You can check out the plethora of stories on our Santorum In The News page. The absolute must-read was Tom Ferrick's column in The Philadelphia Inquirer -- questioning whether "the Wacko Factor comes into play" with Santorum such that he fits "Winston Churchill's definition of a fanatic - a man who can't change his mind and won't change the subject." I had a long conversation about Santorum just about 2 weeks ago with a Philadelphia activist, lawyer and Republican. During the hour or so we sat over our coffee, he must have used the word "fanatic" to describe Rick about 15 times -- he was totally convinced that sometime within the next year, everyone would see Santorum this way. After last week, it may be sooner. Anyway, back to Ferrick:
Santorum's people have a stock response to criticism of his wilder comments: Rick is an honest, bright guy who speaks his mind. So there.
I agree. Judging from his recent comments, I'd say that Rick Santorum has one
of the finest minds of the 13th century.
If you haven't read it already, be sure to check it out.
Friday, July 15. 2005
From Religion News Service:
Santorum did not address the substance of the criticism and on Thursday fired back at Kennedy and Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., accusing them of dredging up his 3-year-old comments for political purposes because the Pennsylvania Senate election is considered the next year's premier contest.
"It's sort of sad that they would use religion and this tragic time for purely partisan, blatantly political purposes," Santorum said. "I guess there is no depth in which they will stoop, including impugning and digging up very, very difficult times and difficult feelings and emotions from people who were harmed by that scandal."
So, according to Santorum, it’s not what he wrote in 2002 and then restated this week that’s at issue here. It’s some sort vast left-wing conspiracy. Oh, and apparently one other thing:
At the time he wrote the column, Santorum said he was working hard with people within the church "to resolve that scandal, to bring the people who were involved to justice, to begin changes within the church so this would not happen again -- none of which I'm aware that either Sen. Kennedy or Sen. Kerry did."
Santorum then took Kennedy to task for not strictly adhering to "proper orthodox formation within the teachings of the Vatican."
"I don't think Sen. Kennedy would follow that very closely," he said, adding, "I don't think Ted Kennedy lecturing me on the teachings of the church and how the church should handle these problems is something I'm going to take particularly seriously."
Santorum also held a conference call yesterday with members of the Catholic press, during which he refused to take questions from a reporter from the Harrisburg Patriot News
Read more about this controversy: Words about Boston from '02 come back to bedevil Santorum, The Philadelphia InquirerRomney begs to differ with Santorum remark, The Boston Globe
Wednesday, July 13. 2005
Update: Senator Kennedy appeared on CNN's Inside Politics this afternoon to reiterate that Rick needs to apologize to the victims of priest sexual abuse, their families and the people of Boston. Watch the video below:
As we posted in our "Rick on the Record" section (last entry on that page) -- Rick Santorum actually managed to link (and blame) Boston to the recent clergy sex abuse scandal.
Yesterday, as reported in The Boston Globe, he refused "to back off on his earlier statements connecting Boston's 'liberalism' with the Roman Catholic Church pedophile scandal, saying that the city's 'sexual license' and 'sexual freedom' nurtured an environment where sexual abuse would occur."
''The basic liberal attitude in that area . . . has an impact on people's behavior," Santorum said in an interview yesterday at the Capitol. ''If you have a world view that I'm describing [about Boston] . . . that affirms alternative views of sexuality, that can lead to a lot of people taking it the wrong way," Santorum said.
As reported by the Associated Press, today Senator Kennedy (D-MA) launched "a rare personal attack on the Senate floor," calling Santorum "self-righteous and insensitive." Kennedy also "called for Santorum to apologize to the people of Boston and Massachusetts," saying "The people of Boston are to blame for the clergy sexual abuse? That is an irresponsible, insensitive and inexcusable thing to say."
Senator Kennedy is right, of course, but saying irresponsible, insensitive and inexcusable things is a well-established pattern for Santorum. We're not holding our breath waiting for this apology to occur.
Sunday, July 10. 2005
A good day to talk about the weather would be a day like today – when Hurricane Dennis is bearing down on millions of Americans in Florida, Alabama and Mississippi.
CNN reports that as Dennis came ashore, “the storm snapped limbs, tore off roofs and knocked out power to tens of thousands of residents.”
No doubt those thousands of residents, having lost television and internet service with their power, were left to scramble for something like battery-operated radios so they could tune to local stations for reports on the path and strength of Dennis – reports they could get from the National Weather Service.
Folks in Florida, Alabama and Mississippi owe no thanks to Rick Santorum for that, because, believe it or not, Santorum recently introduced Senate Bill 786 to limit the information the National Weather Service can provide the public.
Who would benefit from such a bill? The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette says it would “favor the interests of private entities, such as AccuWeather, which is based in State College, Pa. AccuWeather has a great reputation and it can succeed on its own merits; it shouldn't need Sen. Santorum to act as its rainmaker.”
We’d like to agree, but there’s the matter of that April 12 Santorum campaign fundraising event in State College, where a $2000 contribution came in from Joel Myers, the CEO of AccuWeather. Two days later, Santorum introduced his bill.
Barry Myers, AccuWeather’s executive vice president and Joel Myers’s brother, told the Associated Press “it was ridiculous to think there was a correlation between the ‘modest’ donations and the filing of the bill.” But the AP also reported that the Myers brothers “have donated more than $11,000 to Santorum and the Republican Party since 2003, according to FEC filings compiled by PoliticalMoneyLine, a campaign finance tracking group.”
Not everyone agrees the correlation is “ridiculous,” including Senator Bill Nelson of Florida -- Florida, where an awful lot of people rely on information from the National Weather Service.
Nelson’s press secretary said the contribution "certainly raises questions about motivation as to why someone would push a policy that is so obviously crummy.”
In fact, Nelson thinks it’s such a crummy bill that he wrote to President Bush about it, noting it “would bar weather service forecasters from giving one-on-one interviews to media” and “could inhibit pilots' access to data the weather service provides to the Federal Aviation Administration online.” He also noted that when Florida was socked with four Hurricanes last year, the weather service Web site received 9 billion hits. 9 billion!
It’s not too surprising that Santorum could turn even the weather into a controversy – but, given the circumstances, we’re now going to keep a suspicious eye on that bill.
That's the headline from a little tidbit Gar Joseph wrote in Friday's Philadelphia Daily News about Santorum's book, "It Takes A Family." Apparently, Joseph doesn't think publishing the book is the savviest thing Santorum's ever done:
What could hurt is Santorum's view that married women ought to stay at home.
That horse left the barn long ago. And Santorum is right, liberals are to blame.
What killed the housewife was equal rights for women. Back in the 1950s, women had few career choices. And women who did work faced discrimination in pay and in duties.
Today virtually any job, even race-car driving, is open to a woman.
Barring a takeover by Islamic clerics, there is zero chance this society will revert to the housewife era. Not to mention the impact that removing married women from the work force would have on the economy.
If Santorum is smart, that's one opinion he'll keep to himself.
In fact, we wouldn't minding hearing Santorum's opinion on that.
Tuesday, July 5. 2005
On Friday, when the first woman on the Supreme Court -- Sandra Day O'Connor -- announced her retirement, that Master of the Obvious, Rick Santorum, revealed this gem to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: "the next Supreme Court justice could make it easier for conservatives to curb some abortions."
Well, duh. Hope he didn't hurt himself straining to come up with that original thought. Next he'll be telling us things like "Paris Hilton can't act."
Anyway, proving that he quickly memorized the right wing's Friday talking points, Rick told the Trib-Review "we don't want a judicial system that sees itself as the supreme branch of the government" and "judges should not be reinterpreting the Constitution at the drop of a hat."
Pennsylvania's other Republican Senator, Arlen Specter (who happens to chair the Judiciary Committee), had some strong words for Democrats who, like Santorum, are voicing their own vision of the next Justice. From Sunday's Meet The Press:
"When Senator Kennedy makes a statement that if the president doesn't make a nomination in accordance with Senator Kennedy's core views of the Constitution, that he's laying down a marker. You could say he's picking a fight. I don't think that's the best way to proceed," Specter said. "The very day that Justice O'Connor retires to come up with fighting words isn't in the best way to approach the issue."
Perhaps Senator Specter could have a word with his junior colleague, Santorum, about "laying down a marker."
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