He thinks about them all the time. Bother listening to Rick’s speeches on the difference between the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence? Probably not I would guess. I generally don’t care about Libertarians in the broad scope of things. I do not want them to have any Presidential power though. Read some Murray Rothbard, Lew Rockwell or some vintage Ron Paul to see how out of step this ideology is and that they are not Conservatives, they hate Conservatives. It is about time someone stands up and make the delineation between the two. I have no interest in the whole “If it feels good do it” party.
BTW, I notice you were sprinkling a bit of your hatred of Catholics in your long long long screed.
“He thinks about them all the time. Bother listening to Rick’s speeches on the difference between the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence? Probably not I would guess.”
I’ve never heard anything really substantial from him, especially when it comes to solutions. Anyone can copy winning rhetoric that is popular (which libertarian/conservative philosophy is), but actually doing something with it is something else entirely. I’ve never actually heard Santorum define conservatism or libertarianism. He throws out all these family and social issues talking points, and also stuff about “getting government out of our way”, but he does not define what “getting out of the way” actually means or what he’ll do to accomplish that. If he does believe it, why does Santorum not support a form of the fair or flat taxes? Why does Santorum not favor privatization of social security, even though we have both the strength of argument and the momentum to do it? Why does he not support a myriad of good “libertarian” (really, conservative) issues that would do a lot of good for the country? He does offer a Balanced Budget amendment, but it seems more like something he throws out there to compensate for the vacuum that is his platform.
If you look at Herman Cain’s campaign, you would understand the power of actually “acting on a philosophy” provides. Your rejection of it shows you do not really comprehend the message or the popular support most Libertarian ideas, outside of the Ron Paul heresies on foreign policy, have with the country at large.
Ron Paul could have been a great contender, since a lot of what he says makes a lot of logical sense. It’s a new way of thinking of things that has the ideological strength to really abolish the leftist progressive agenda. His problem is that he is very literally a dupe of the Russians and Islamists. Nevertheless, at least on most domestic issues, libertarian philosophy is already the fundamental part of Tea Party thinking. You need to put a wet finger in the air and feel the direction of the wind. The wind tells me that great and “radical” ideas stand the best chance of winning, because they can unite us not just against Obama, but even AFTER Obama is gone. Once our common enemy is gone, we’ll lose the good Mojo which makes it possible for us to push real reform to begin with. We need something beyond a common enemy to unite the party for generations to come. Championing big ideas is the way to go about it. Championing radical reform is the only way to make our movement a living one.
Santorum, honestly, doesn’t have anything worth fighting for beyond the social and religious issues. That’s a problem. You want us all here to fall in love with Santorum’s personality or perception of character, but I’ve never seen a Santorum supporter ever applaud Santorum for some idea in his actual platform. That’s a sign.
Personality platforms only work on the short term. There is no staying power, and the problems facing this country are so big that we can’t sacrifice ourselves on the altar of personality again for another candidate. We did that for Bush. Liberals did that for Obama. It’s what drives our politics. It’s what’s keeping us on this downward spiral to begin with.
As for your crack about Catholicism. If I “hated Catholics”, I wouldn’t be supporting Newt Gingrich. Your bigotry and lack of real thinking skills is profound. And all that I said is true regarding them. It is no secret that the leadership of the Catholic Church in the U.S. and Europe has been embracing a social-progressive message for many decades. There are few “conservative” Bishops who truly fight back against it. Many of them are in bed with the illegals and with the libs on many issues. There is definitely a philosophical theme with many modern Catholic teachings that promotes this embrace of the platitudes Libs preach all the time. The Pope opposed the war in Iraq, accepting the leftist propaganda on this issue. They’re also against the death penalty, soft on gun rights, and many other issues, primarily due to the cultural damage they’ve received from the sex abuse scandals. They’re afraid to get into real fights that make them look bad since they dislike bad press. Their instinct is to play along to get along, which, interestingly, is also Santorum’s instinct. If not for contraception or abortion, no one would wink at the weakness of Catholic leadership and pretend it is not there to everyone else. It’s simply a reality. The idea that the Catholic Church is a bastion of conservative politics is quite silly.