Unlikely rise of Santorum

Added by on February 3, 2012

Politicians usually understand their career is over when voted out of office by large margins. This is why a lot of people were surprised to see Rick Santorum laying the groundwork for his presidential race.

Santorum was defeated, in 2006, by a margin of 17% — a very large margin for a sitting senator. Today Santorum leads the race in several recent polls in a field of four Republican candidates, plus – according to polls – Santorum leads the race.
Many believe Mitt Romney is the most likely to win the GOP nomination, in part, because he’s backed by more money.

Santorum is being taken seriously even though it’s unlikely he will win the GOP nomination. Compared to the state of Santorum’s campaign just weeks ago, Santorum has a possible route to a GOP nomination.

During the past year Republicans have been searching for a strong contender to Romney that many don’t feel is an authentic conservative. During the past year many possible candidates have withdrawn from contention as a result of scrutiny – a long-standing feature of presidential campaigns.

Essentially Santorum is the last man standing because he was the last in the long lineup of possible contenders to Romney and few took Santorum’s campaign seriously against people like Rick Perry.

Yet this month’s surge in Santorum’s standing was caused as a result of victories in Minnesota and Colorado, in addition to winning a non-binding primary in Missouri. Critics say the victories, which they add are essentially meaningless, were a result of relatively small voter turnout in which Gingrich – who was already discredited – was not on the ballot.

Yet the fact remains, Santorum won – thrusting him into a position of plausible candidate. Yet Republicans are probably questioning, secretly, their position in the context of Obama’s popularity.

Republicans are casting Obama as a socialist, casting him as a President that’s eroding religious liberties and seeming to abandoning support for Israel. Republicans are likely to continue using the platform into their broader campaign later this year.

The facts are against the Republicans – there isn’t any evidence the popular vote agrees with the Republican’s view, yet many Republicans continue to hang on to their beliefs. Many say the Republicans nominated Santorum in the flawed belief that the broader voting public agrees with them.

This pattern of denial is not new – in 1964 the Republicans ran their campaigns based on the assumption that voters agreed with their poor view of Lyndon Jonson. Democrats are not immune from being in denial of the facts – in 1972 they were convinced the rest of the country was prepared to embrace the left; in 1984 they cast Ronald Reagan as wanting to initiate a nuclear war with the Soviet Union. In all of these cases the respective parties suffered significant defeats.

The GOP voters often seen on television may seem to be motivated, yet they represent a very small segment of the population. While the Republican base assumes it may speak for American voters, the result of putting Santorum at the top of the GOP ticket will be the true test.