Posted on 04/13/2012 10:18:18 AM PDT by Josh Painter
Rick Santorum dropped out of the race for the Republican presidential nomination on Tuesday. Almost to a column, editorial and news account, the analysis centered on Santorum’s somewhat successful capture of conservative voters.
And there lies the mystery. How could a man seemingly so opposite of conservative have entranced so many voters who label themselves just that?
The easy answer is that as someone who made his religion such a prominent part of his campaign strategy... religious types who tend toward conservatism perhaps felt they’d found their man.
[...]
Indeed, if we ignore for a moment how very anti-conservative it is for any candidate to coddle certain commercial sectors, the simple truth is that to the extent that manufacturing jobs were ever glorious (a big reach on its own considering the proud history of sons and daughters of factory workers moving away from manufacturing locales), the very investors whose capital creates those jobs feel it’s yesterday’s news. That investors no longer value factory work explains why they migrated to China, and why a rising China has begun to similarly shed those jobs. For Santorum to then say he’ll bring them back not only smacks of a controlling, central planning gene, but it also speaks to a candidate divorced from reality in the economic sense. If Santorum were to actually succeed in reducing the manufacturing tax rate to zero, this wouldn’t alter the all-important investor perception of work that is no longer valued from a labor-intensive point of view.
Happily Santorum’s candidacy is in the rear-view mirror. Not so happy, however, is what his candidacy said about the beliefs of conservatives. If Santorum was truly their guy, it seems a movement once animated by the sunny, economically advanced dynamism of Ronald Reagan has taken a giant, impoverishing leap backwards.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
Because he’s not Mitt Romney.
ABO and ABR
and... they aren’t considering Newt.
That's exactly why.
Believe me, not all of us were
Because he is about 3 times more conservative than Mitt Romney.
I never understood the appeal of Santorum. He is a big-government social conservative and he’s never managed or governed.
Anjd because Romney has never expressed any sympathy for all the workers in manufacturing who lost their jobs, because the policies that enabled him to get rich, also destroyed jobs.
That and they'd already run through all the other "not Mitt Romneys."
Mitt isn't even a republican but a big govt LIBERAL. So don't say more conservative than. He doesn't belong in the GOP race.
Because anyone who has well defined beliefs and views will attract the attention of others who have well defined beliefs and views over someone who doesn’t hold any convictions. Even if you don’t agree with them on everything.
Yep!
I could add another few reasons that I, personally, supported him:
1. He's not a phony (unlike Romney).
2. He is honestly pro-life, and lives his pro-life beliefs, much like Sarah Palin (and unlike Romney).
3. He stands by all his convictions, including the currently unpopular ones (unlike Romney).
A lot of people admired Santorum even though they didn't necessarily agree with all of his public policy positions or personal beliefs. Polls showed that even his position on contraception, which was wildly mis-reported, gained him respect from both men and women.
In brief, he spoke our language.
Perry was my number one, after that I switched to Newt. But many in my circle of friends loved Santorum, and it’s because what he says resonates with them. He resonated with me, too, but I preferred Newt, just barely.
I wasn’t “so enamored of him”— ever. Given my ABO stance, however, I’d have voted for him.
Santorum wasn’t even close to ready for prime time.
After what he said about Zimmerman he has no business at any level of government.
He duped his supporters but they allowed it because they never checked his record - seems they didn’t care.
Santorum was, is, and always will be a joke.
It was all about stopping Romney.
Perry was my first choice too, I still cant believe how bad he imploded, it’s unbelievable.
>>the simple truth is that to the extent that manufacturing jobs were ever glorious (a big reach on its own
I’m sure the folks at Forbes cannot understand this, but factory jobs are not glorious and no ever said they were. However, they were a way for a high school graduate with a work ethic to make a good living for his family, possibly sending the children to college so they could migrate to the big city and look down their noses at factory workers.
I am so sick of elitist snobbery on both sides of the RepubliCrat parties who worked so hard this election destroying every conservative candidate (and some almost-rans and shoulda-rans) reducing us to the Newt-Santorum-Romney choice.
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