Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum has just announced that he will terminate his campaign for the Republican nomination. Liberals will rejoice. Social conservatives will mournfully search their souls for the second presidential election in a row. And I will refrain from braying “I told you, so!” and offer up these takeaways and observations:
Republican presidential candidate, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum turns to his wife Karen, left, after announcing he is suspending his candidacy effective today in Gettysburg, Pa., Tuesday, April 10, 2012. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)
(Gene J. Puskar - AP)
Negative faith and values campaigning does not work in presidential campaigns (I told you so!): Whether he was calling Barack Obama’s theology “phony,” or insisting that nation which permitted a raped woman to have an abortion victimized her twice, or doubling down on an earlier claim that JFK’s commitment to separation of church and state made him want to vomit, Rick Santorum made sure to introduce religious themes into his political rhetoric in as divisive a manner as possible. The American electorate, as presently constituted, is simply too moderate and ecumenically-inclined to warm to this type of Faith and Values politicking.
At the very first debate of the season, the unforgettable “Faith and Freedom Coalition” gathering, Santorum lamented how his name was always associated with the word “ultra.” “Ultra” oratory and policy prescriptions do appeal to a very particular and very vocal chunk of the GOP base. The problem is that pandering to this group has the net effect of driving scads of other voters away, including Republican voters. To give but one example. . . . .
Catholics have limited patience for anathemitizers: Running his campaign as an anathemetizer-in-chief permitted Santorum to score big among white conservative Evangelicals. The problem for Santorum is that his “Game On!”exuberance turned off his fellow co-religionists. In primary after primary he lost among (likely Republican) Catholic voters. A truism that indicates that lay Catholics are among the most laudably independent-minded voters out there, often eschewing the counsels of their bishops as well as those politicians who claim to speak in their name.
Another disastrous presidential election for social conservatives: In 2008 social conservatives initially ignored the candidacy of one Mike Huckabee (even though he jumped into the ring way early in 2007). They finally coalesced around Huck only a few weeks before the January 2008 Iowa caucus. Result: They got stuck with John McCain who they never liked (and who never liked them.) They then sat on the sidelines despondently until Sarah Palin finally energized them late in the homestretch.
In 2012, as if to make sure 2008 never happened again, the field was flooded with candidates whose views were congenial to social conservative worldview. These anti-abortion, anti-gay marriage, anti-federal government champions ranged from Newt Gingrich, to Michele Bachmann, to Herman Cain, to Rick Perry to their eventual favorite Rick Santorum.
The result? A candidate that many social conservatives don’t trust, Mitt Romney, divided and conquered his way to what looks like the party’s nomination. Friendly advice to social conservatives: by July 4th 2014, select your one preferred candidate for 2016. Only then will you be able to achieve on the presidential level, what you have so remarkably accomplished in the judiciary, congress, the statehouse, and American culture at large.
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