Crisis: "The Return of Rick Santorum"

Crisis Magazine has a piece titled "Lightning Rod: The Return of Rick Santorum". It's worth a read. Here's an excerpt:

... This post-election interlude has yielded time to ponder the victories and missteps that defined Santorum’s career in the Senate. Supporters hope it’s the right moment to correct his public image as a right-wing extremist intolerant of Americans who don’t fit a Father Knows Best storyline. The fact is, his faith-driven political activism has consistently transcended party ideology. He became the Senate’s major force on poverty and global AIDS/HIV, for example, though news coverage of such work has been sparse. If you Google “Santorum” you’ll dig up plenty of controversy—his Virginia-based family’s use of Pennsylvania school-district funds for his children’s “cyberschool,” for example. Meanwhile, it’s tough to find a story profiling his monumental work on behalf of Darfur.

An editor from one major daily in Santorum’s home state acknowledges that some negative stories, like the cyberschool issue, generated “way too many inches of column” when compared with coverage of his legislative record. But that editor argues that Santorum also drove the media’s treatment: “He is confident and upfront. He thinks what he says is right, and believes he can persuade others of his point of view.” Like other reporters who have covered the senator, he did not want to be quoted by name.

In the final days before the election, Santorum’s defenders sought to correct his public image. New York Times columnist David Brooks noted that Democrats attacked him as an “ideological misfit,” even though their target led “almost every . . . piece of antipoverty legislation [that] surfaces in Congress.” Why, then, weren’t liberals embracing him? “If Santorum were pro-choice,” argued Brooks, “he’d be a media star and a campus hero.” A Wall Street Journal op-ed by Peggy Noonan observed that Santorum’s voting record suggested the zeal of a “Catholic social reformer” of a bygone era—say, Robert Kennedy. A 2004 National Journal analysis underscored Noonan’s assertion, describing the Pennsylvanian’s voting record as “slightly to the left of the GOP center.”

***
In 2003, the senator’s prophetic line of thought propelled him into much deeper trouble than he is likely to face now. During an interview with an AP reporter, Santorum predicted the dire, if unintended, consequences of the Supreme Court’s decision in Lawrence v. Texas that lifted the state ban on sodomy. Gay activists had applauded Lawrence and heralded it as the first step in the ultimate legalization of same-sex marriage. But Santorum argued that “if you can do whatever you want to do, as long as it’s in the privacy of your own home,” then the state could face legal challenges prosecuting incest and adultery cases.

A firestorm ensued, with gay activists accusing the senator of equating homosexual relationships with incest and adultery. Santorum and his conservative allies fought back, insisting that his statements were taken out of context: He only addressed the legal dangers posed by Lawrence. But the damage from the interview could not be contained. Santorum’s reputation as a right-wing bigot spread through casual references on television sitcoms and ribald jokes on late-night talk shows.

The charges returned during the 2006 election year. Santorum still failed to convince his critics of his good intentions. More recently, though, an ironic footnote to this controversy has surfaced. The Supreme Court may hear an incest case in which the accused cites the Lawrence decision as a shield against state prosecution of his sexual relationship with an adult stepdaughter. Santorum’s precise argument—that the Lawrence decision would open the door to state-sanctioned deviant behavior—may soon get its day in court. The Supreme Court may hear the argument this year, or wait for a less-complicated case.

In late 2005, Santorum was again under fire when his book It Takes a Family: Conservatism and the Common Good was published. Liberal bloggers obtained copies of the book before its official release date, sifted through its pages for controversial passages, and quickly rushed to define its message before Santorum began his book tour. The author’s positions on abortion, contraception, traditional marriage, and child-rearing were criticized as demonstrating a lack of respect for women.

[More]

(emphasis added)

My Comments:
In my view, Santorum has been one of the more unfairly maligned public figures of recent memory. It goes with the territory, I suppose, of being a pro-life Catholic who also happens to be a Republican.

Sen. Bob Casey, Jr. may be a "pro-life" Democrat, but only time will tell if he will be the sort of vocal advocate on behalf of the gospel of life that Rick Santorum was. What is certain is that Casey's election has, at least in the short run, made it more difficult for the pro-life cause, as this letter to the editor in the July 22-28 issue of the National Catholic Register points out:

Casey Epilogue

Donald DeMarco’s inspirational story about Alphonsus Casey and his son Bob Casey Sr. (“Mighty Casey and American Humility,” July 1) left out the rest of the story.

The Democrats used his father’s reputation to get Bob Casey Jr. elected to the Senate, replacing Republican pro-life stalwart Rick Santorum and giving them a razor-thin majority in the Senate, which they used to pass a bill calling for taxpayer funding of embryonic stem-cell breeding and research, and in the future they will use to block any insufficiently pro-abortion Justices.

Don Schenk
Allentown, Pennsylvania

Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
Life After the Senate for Rick Santorum