It’s obvious that former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum is gaining momentum in the Republican nomination race for president. Let’s be clear; Democrats are quite confident that our candidate – incumbent President Barack Obama can beat any of the current candidates in November, but our confidence goes up with a Rick Santorum nomination. Why? Because we well know that Mr. Santorum is far right of the majority of Americans.
I have to admit, I may have miscalculated in earlier posts that Rick Santorum had a chance at the nomination, but that’s because I actually gave Republicans more credit when it came to choosing their candidate. I figured that they’d understood clearly that even if they like Rick Santorum and support his stand on most of the issues, he still wouldn’t do well with independents which they need to win over to take over the White House. It’s getting to look I was wrong.
I suppose I underestimate the aching need for ultra-conservatives, whom Santorum’s policies represent, to have their candidate to stand for what they believe in, even if it means losing the general election to Obama in November.
It surely also has a lot to do with former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, who had been the frontrunner and expected winner of the nomination – that is up until recent state primaries and caucuses in Colorado, Minnesota and Missouri in which Rick Santorum won. Romney has never really won the support of rank and file Republicans because of issues with his credibility as a real conservative. His record as governor of the liberal state of Massachusetts, as far as his health care bill which the Democrats and President Obama credits for their similar health care bill, the Affordable Care Act and his support for gay rights and abortion rights while governor, puts in question his true conservative credentials.
Republicans really don’t have a candidate that they can entirely get behind and who they honestly believe can beat Obama, no matter how confident they try to paint themselves as. With a Rick Santorum nominee, they have a candidate who is far right when it comes to gay rights, abortion and especially the most recent issue that has been in the news and at the front of many American’s minds of late and that is contraception. It’s also not just Mr. Santorum’s stand on these issues but for the fact that from what he has said in the past, makes one believe that he would use the office of the presidency to push those issues on the rest of America if he was elected president. And, for many Americans; that is a scary thought.
Republicans find themselves in this position because they have allowed themselves to be painted into a conservative corner that they cannot get out of. They’re also living in the past, believing that moral issues will help them win over Americans. What they don’t seem to either accept or either are too blind to see, is that Americans are a great deal more liberal than they were twenty or thirty years ago and attacks on women’s rights, gay rights and especially birth control, will only cause them to alienate more Americans, not gain their support.
A Rick Santorum nomination doesn’t just improve the numbers for President Obama in the general election but it also motivates not only Democrats and liberals but independents as many take seriously their availability to contraceptives and a Rick Santorum possible presidency threatens that. Mr. Santorum will also have a difficult time moving toward the middle if he wins the nomination and faces a general election as he’s made statements that cannot be backed off from as far as gay rights, abortion and most importantly, contraception.
So yes, this is a battle that Democrats would relish with a Rick Santorum nomination. Democrats will be jumping in glee if in the end; Republicans make the mistake of choosing Santorum for their nomination. But maybe Republicans figure they’re in for a penny, they might as well be in for a pound.