This from former Bush, McCain strategist, Mark McKinnon.
Santorum is a strong neoconservative who represented Pennsylvania in the House of Representatives and the Senate over a 16-year period and rose to the No. 3 leadership position among Republicans.
Santorum once grouped gay sex with incest, polygamy, and bestiality, and he believes consenting adults have no constitutional right to privacy when it comes to sexual behavior. He is a strong supporter of teaching intelligent design. He is anti-gay, anti-immigrant—supporting the most extreme anti-immigrant legislative proposals though he is the son of an Italian immigrant father—antiabortion, and anti-anything that smacks of progressive thinking, centrism, bipartisanship, or moderation in the Republican Party.
Santorum was one of only two senators who voted against Robert Gates to be secretary of Defense because Gates advocated talking to Iran and Syria, which Santorum said would be talking to “radical Islam” and would be a grievous error.
Santorum represents, in my view, much of what is wrong the in the Republican Party. While I disagree with him on some fundamental issues, I am much more concerned with his lack of character.
OK, just reading that is enough for many to just keep stepping on past Santorum, but the Republican Party has issues. There are many Rick Santorums' running around in the Republican Party. We see many of them showing up at these town hall meetings, they take marching orders from the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Hannity and in the end the elected officials of the Republican Party will not dare cross these people. But the following is enough for MANY to just say NO to Santorum.
I’m a pretty tolerant guy, but beyond his ideology, some of Santorum’s behavior is just a little bizarre. For example, Santorum has six children. In 1996, he had son born prematurely who lived for only two hours. He and wife brought the child home and introduced the dead infant to the rest of their children as “your brother Gabriel” and slept with the body overnight.
Despite his actions and extreme ideology, and the fact that he was defeated in his bid for re-election by the widest margin of any incumbent senator since 1980, Rick Santorum should be taken seriously. He is articulate, focused, and a tenacious campaigner. And ideological conservatives love him. His base will be narrow but passionate. They will mobilize and they will vote. Especially in early primary states like Iowa and South Carolina.
And that means there’s one word that should come to mind when thinking about a Rick Santorum presidential candidacy: dangerous.
Santorum taps right into that narrow part of the Republican Party that has strangled the party in attempting any moderation or centrist views. And McKinnon is RIGHT. Those voters will churn out in record numbers in the states like Iowa and South Carolina, giving any moderate a headache that will attempt to run for the Republican nomination.
Finally, Santorum's viewpoint, ideological beliefs are not main stream, it is extreme, that is why Rick Santorum is dangerous.
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