I have been saying this all along. He couldn’t even beat Casey in PA???? WHO is bankrolling Rick? I mean...I like Rick but the whole thing seems a little shady!
He was tossed out on his arse because he deserved to be, that’s the begining middle and end of it. Believe me, this guy will be destroyed in a national election if he his the nominee.. He’s not politically savvy, intellectually astute, or personable enough to win what is going to be a nasty nasty race... he’ll at best get 45% of the vote, and more likely wind up with 40% or less.
Brokered convention all the way!
Several reasons (note, these are observations about local politics and do not reflect my opinion of the man):
- 2006 was a bad year for Republicans, and the mid-terms turned out to be a referendum on GWB.
- Many conservatives were disgusted when Rick S. endorsed Arlen Specter over Pat Toomey in the previous Senate Race. Some have still not forgiven him.
- Some voters were upset that Santorum billed the State of PA for his childrens’ cyberschool education, while they were living in VA. They complained that his listed address in Penn Hills, PA was an empty apartment and that he never lived there. etc.
2006 was a “Wave” election. I don’t know if anyone could have won in PA. Also, Santorum had supported that numbnuts Specter over Toomey in 2004. That cost him votes, bigtime!!
I think I’ll go with Santorum over Romney.
This is a bunch of nonsense.
Santorum lost because he followed Karl Rove’s advice and backed Spector against Toomey. The “genius” Karl Rove was responsible for turning two Republican U.S. Senators from Pennsylvania into two Democratic Senators.
I wrote about this for the Phila. Bulletin back in 2007. I also interviewed Santorum in 2006.
Mike Tremoglie
The fact that he ever won in PA is amazing. Nobody should be surprised that he got trounced in 2006.
Bob Casey, Jr. was the progeny of a very well-loved politician, and 2006 was a disaster for the GOP.
Also, Santorum had a reputation for being very conservative. I think liberal PA became tired of it.
Santorum has been a much more reliable conservative than Newt Gingrich. He’s stuck to his guns over the years despite the abhorrent treatment he has received from the liberal media for his view on gay marriage and abortion. In fact, the sodomites use his name to describe something as disgusting as can be imagined.
He has been a stalwart defender of the unborn, most notably in his debate with Barbara Boxer in 1998. He authored the Partial Birth Abortion Act.
He is not the ideal choice, but he is a lot better than Mitt Romney. And he would be able to win a lot of blue collar voters in states like OH, PA, and MI.
Did Santorum made a mistake by supporting Specture of Toomey, yes...but I believed he should be forgotten. I would like to see Newt have him as a VP since it would be a great ticket (or Newt/West)
2006 was a horrible year for all Republicans. Bush was re-elected with a wave of enthusiasm in 2004, and proceeded to fritter it all away.
Two other factors contributed.
1. Casey’s father was a pretty conservative Democrat, with a pro-life record. Casey ran as a blue dog Democrat, said that he was pro-life like his father, and played the Vietnam veteran card. It turned out that he was a liar.
2. Bush and Rove leaned hard on Santorum and demanded that he should endorse Arlen Specter, who was “electable” and whom they needed to get conservative judges nominated. Santorum regretably agreed, partly because Specter had earlier endorsed HIM, so he was repaying a favor. But Snarlin’ Arlen then proceeded to concentrate on his own race, and never endorsed Santorum again in return.
The conservative base was furious about the Specter endorsement, and many refused to vote for Santorum. That, and the very negative feelings about Bush, was enough to sink him, in a state that doesn’t necessarily vote for conservatives anyway.
The people chiefly to blame for this fiasco were Bush and Rove—although Specter did keep his promise to push conservative SCOTUS candidates over the top, before he returned to his usual rotten ways, lost his base, and turned Democrat—which happily finished him off for good.
Maybe Rick made a mistake. But was it worse than Newt endorsing Dede Scozzafava, when there was nothing but personal ambition to motivate this endorsement? Santorum only failed that once, but it really came at a terrible moment and killed his Senate career. And Bush and Rove just shrugged.
You mean figuratively, not literally.
50 Things You May Not Know About Rick Santorum PDF
What a Big Government Conservative Looks Like - voting record
I think Santorum will do fine. He has self control.
Thanks for your inciteful vanity telling us things nobody had ever heard before, as most of us dolts think Rick is still the Senator from Pennsylvania, and nobody has ever before posted here that he lost his race by 17 points.
Newt Gingrich btw has never ever in his life won a statewide general election in any state in the union, red purple or blue. He didn’t lose his congressional seat of course, because he resigned and didn’t run again.
Rick’s loss was not a surprise, although at the time I thought the margin of his loss was a shock. He was destined to lose because conservatives abandoned him to punish him for endorsing Specter in the 2004 primary over Toomey, and in a year when the democrats were hell-bent on winning and put up a liberal-leaning populist with a social conservative streak, there were no “independent” votes for Santorum to grab to make up for conservative apathy.
People might think, well Pa was conservative, it had republican senators... but one of those was Arlen Specter, and before Santorum their other senator was a Democrat, Harris Wofford, and before that the republican was John Heinz. Toomey won of course in 2010, but that was a wave year for republicans.
On the presidential level, their popular vote has gone Democratic in the last 6 elections, including John Kerry in 2004 and Obama in 2008. Obama won by double digits, in the same range as Casey won over Santorum, against a more moderate republican than Santorum.
But if you don’t want to vote for a candidate who lost an election in a purple state which often votes democrat, go right ahead. It’s a good reason to consider electability, so if your whole presidential vote is based on who you guess might be more electable, have at it. I’d rather vote for a candidate closer to my beliefs, and who I think is more likely to govern conservatively. (I do however want to vote for an ELECTABLE conservative — I just don’t see how you judge that between a guy who resigned in 1998 and hasn’t run for office since, and never for a state office, and a guy who got elected in a purple state twice before being beaten in a democratic wave year when conservatives were sitting out the election).
As hard as it was to take Santorum’s loss, it was nothing compared to watching George Allen lose to Jim Webb here in Virginia.
Not usually mentioned is that Santorum is an animal rights wacko. That affects farmers, hunters and pet owners all of whom are generally conservative but won’t vote for any candidate endorsed by PETA.
Santorum lost by 700,000 votes. The largest margin in U.S. Senatorial history.
Santorum lost by 700,000 votes. The largest margin in U.S. Senatorial history.
You need to look up the definition of the word "literally."