Rick Santorum: Not the Anti-Romney

It's Wednesday after the 2012 Iowa caucuses and this morning I caught an hour of Rush Limbaugh insisting that Rick Santorum is not a "big government conservative". Rush was attempting to allay fears that former Senator Santorum is yet another politician positioning himself as a conservative while actually being just another ally of bloated government, proposing new government programs, regulations, etc. in areas where the federal government has little or no Constitutional mandate. That's the charge against Mitt Romney and those paying attention to the post-caucus punditry know that Santorum did quite well and is now poised to be this week's "anti-Romney".

And, we need an anti-Romney. Romney is the neon "I Don't Get It" sign whose annoying, buzzing message is that the GOP establishment learned nothing about how to win elections or its constituents from 2010 and the TEA Party. Romney is this year's McCain, who many of us real, small government conservatives hoped was the last gasp of Republican presidential candidates nominated under the assumption that big government was okay with conservative voters, as long as "our" guy sat in the big chair. But, the epic fail that is big government - unconstrained by the Constitution, common sense, or any sense of fiscal responsibility - is not okay. In 2006 and 2008, voters told the GOP, "You aren't giving us much reason to show up at the polls." Putting another big government Republican statist on the 2012 ticket will result in another painful lesson for the GOP, which doesn't seem to realize that many Republican voters have no enthusiasm for politicians who are clearly just paying lip service to reducing government. Romney is an electoral disaster in a nice suit. If the 2012 Presidential race comes down to voting for one candidate who defends Obamacare or another candidate who defends Romneycare, well... Let's just hope the GOP can hold the House.

But, Rick Santorum? Rick Santorum is not a small government guy. Rick Santorum has a record and it's the record of a big government statist. And, no, I am not talking about his social conservatism. It's true that he's a traditionalist on social issues, for what that's worth. (So much for any hope of peeling away younger voters disillusioned with Obama.) But, the problem with Santorum is that he's also a straight up fiscal "I Don't Get It" statist. As in: Affirmative votes for Medicare Part D, for the "Bridge to Nowhere", for Ted Kennedy's No Child Left Behind, actually co-sponsoring the government-subsidized mortgage downpayment legislation, and so on. So, yes, Rick Santorum is undeniably another big government guy.

Johnson is out. Bachmann is out. Cain is out. Perry is dithering. Gingrich, articulation aside, is an another variation on Romney. Is there no GOP candidate with a record of opposing the expansion of the federal government? Is there no one to whom serious fiscal conservatives and TEA Partiers can look and say, "I am sure my vote for him is a vote for the limited government authorized by the Constitution?" Whatever the answer to that question, it is not Rick Santorum.

The Innate Immorality Of The Lib Left

If your father went into his grandson's room, found his wallet and took all the money in it, what would you call it? I know what I'd call it. It's exactly what I'd call a twelve trillion dollar IOU run up by the Baby Boomers who will be long retired — and sucking even more money out of the system — when the true measure of such a monstrous lack of morality gets realized.  It's called stealing, and I can't think of a single moral code on the planet which condones it.  Let me explain something to the hand-wringers who decry the "lack of compassion" in Americans who believe they're entitled to the lion's share of their own labor. There is no such thing as compassion in government-mandated wealth redistribution. When I hear so-called religious leaders talking about the sanctity of such, even going so far as to say, "that's what Jesus would do," it makes me gag. Perhaps the only thing worse are secular leftists invoking Christ's name to promote some freedom-killing concept, despite the fact that most of them despise religion.  Memo to the terminally misguided: the entirety of Judeo-Christian principles is based on the concept of free will, not coercion. Genuine compassion consists of voluntary giving, aka charity. And by the way, conservatives give far more to charity than liberals. Liberals idea of compassion is giving your money to their pet causes, after siphoning it through government, and skimming a little of the top as payment for their oh-so compassionate ways.  Furthermore, Christ wasn't a leftist, which is exactly why leftists attempt to denigrate, control or eliminate religion whenever they acquire enough power. Leftists know that religious-based morality is beyond government control and in direct competition with the totalitarian demands of complete fealty to the state.  Make no mistake: the neo-Marxists in Washington, D.C. — and that's exactly what they are — want as many Americans as possible to be totally dependent on government.  Such dependency is completely immoral. The condition of our inner cities is a testament to that reality. We've always had poor people. What we didn't have prior to the Great Society was the virtual destruction of the nuclear family and the virus of unconscionable behavior that destruction abetted — despite the fact America was far more racist in the past than it is now. We didn't have legions of unapologetic nihilists with no concept of dignity, self-reliance, or hope for the future. We didn't have hucksters promoting eternal victimhood — for which there is no remedy other than government.  It's absolutely amazing that the American left has never been taken to task for this ongoing, orchestrated tragedy. And spare me the "best intentions" excuse. Results count, and the expansion of the welfare state has been an unmitigated disaster.
What's more immoral than having a vested interest in maintaining a certain level of human misery?

What's more immoral than liberals taking pride in how many people they've put on government programs? Isn't genuine morality defined by how many people one can get off government programs?
It sure as hell ought to be for many reasons, even if one of them is purely pragmatic: we're literally going bankrupt promoting the faux-morality of liberalism.  Which is why morality itself must be re-defined by liberals. Government confiscation and redistribution, no matter how onerous, is hailed as "social justice." Anyone who lacks anything, whether or not such lack is due to irresponsible behavior, is deemed "worthy" and automatically entitled to compensation. Anyone who has "more than his fair share" is inherently evil. Even the religiously-inspired idea of "be your brother's keeper" becomes "be your brother's keeper — or else."  In the coming weeks, Democrats and their media shills will be in full pitch mode, telling the American public what a great idea health care reform is. What they won't tell you is nobody said it wasn't. But this bill wasn't about health care reform. If it were, Democrats wouldn't have had to bribe members of their own party to pass it. They wouldn't have to force people to buy insurance, or fudge the CBO numbers to make it seem like this bill was deficit neutral. They wouldn't have left out tort reform, or exempted themselves from it. They wouldn't have front-loaded the goodies and back-loaded the economically destructive poison. The wouldn't have seen unrelenting resistance by a majority of Americans, or a total lack of support by Republicans.  They wouldn't have to keep selling it after they've already passed it.  A Fox News poll shows that 79% of Americans believe the economy could collapse. It also showed a substantial majority doesn't think that "elected officials Washington, D.C. have ideas for fixing it." Absolutely, totally wrong, my fellow Americans. Of course the politicians know how to fix it. But all of the fixes require a reduction of government power and the expansion of individual freedom. The Obama administration, and a Democratically-controlled Congress will never countenance that. Never. Better to rule in hell, as it were.
And that's utterly immoral.