Who Will Slay the Dragon? Santorum and the Mississippi Run-off

Rick Santorum was in Madison, Mississippi last week to support Chris McDaniel’s effort to unseat incumbent Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS). And for good reason.

We Constitutionalists and people who are Taxed Enough Already are distressed over the Federal government’s pedal to the metal spending over the last decades. Such spending feeds the growing and increasingly invasive Beast of federal government, and puts into peril the economic security and prosperity of ordinary citizens; it fetters and ravages our future generations with crippling and devastating debt from which there will be no remedy. Regions of the country that benefit from federal spending channel the resources from outlining areas to the Beast, much akin to the plot of The Hunger Games. This is not what the Founding Fathers envisioned, to say the least.

People in both parties are guilty for our present and coming tribulation, for different reasons. Democrats philosophically are committed to pedal to the metal spending and feeding of the Beast. Republicans are philosophically opposed to the growth of the Beast, but many of its members make no valiant effort to fight the Beast or to take steps to fix the problem. Sometimes, Republican members conspire and coordinate their votes with other legislators in support of projects that unduly increase federal spending. As the third ranking Senate Republican, Thad Cochran is one such legislator.

Thad Cochran deserves a great deal of praise for serving his state well in his 36 years as a US Senator. He obviously loves his country, and he has gotten so many things right over the years. Still, it’s a new day, and Cochran has done nothing to restrict the Beast’s diet. In 36 years, he has not stood up to fight against out of control spending. In no small measure, it is because of Republicans like Cochran that we are now $18 trillion in debt. It is because of complacent and entrenched Republicans like Cochran that people like Chris McDaniel are challenging Republican incumbents.

Santorum picks his endorsees carefully. He likely sees in Cochran an echo of his own battle with the Beast, going back to the 1995 Balanced Budget Amendment. Our present spending and deficit tribulation would not be ours had a particular uncommitted Republican senator voted differently. The amendment was one that Santorum had managed while in the House, and was the first bill he co-sponsored as a Senator. The vote failed by a single vote, and Oregon Republican Mark Hatfield should have been the vote to restore fiscal sanity to our country. Hatfield, however, as the Chairman of the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee, loved to spend money and voted with the Democrats. Santorum’s well-placed indignation led him to call for Hatfield to resign his chairmanship, and Hatfield did not run for re-election the next year.

Ironically, Hatfield and Cochran have more in common than their spending habits. Cochran, too, served as the Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, which might account for his love of spending.

Tuesday’s run-off election between Cochran and McDaniel allows voters to get the fiscal issues right this time. Will Mississippi send a real fighter to Washington, or will it send Cochran back to cruise his way toward retirement and a 2016 gubernatorial appointment?

At the rally in Madison, McDaniel glowingly spoke about Santorum’s fighting spirit and ability to inspire. We see that same fighting spirit in McDaniel, and might even imagine a St. George fighting the dragon, and resisting its concerted effort to fundamentally transform the country into its image. 

A pro-Santorum Response to Steve Deace's Morning Briefing on the Iowa Caucuses

For Deace's original article: http://stevedeace.com/forum/showthread.php?303-Morning-Briefing-Final-Thoughts-for-2011&p=1876#post1876

Steve, You were seriously considering Ron Paul? You really think that Paul is the person who can get things turned around in Washington? In 20 years in Congress, he has passed but a single bill--to sell an old building. He has forged no alliances in Congress. He has persuaded none of his peers of his ideas. His base is a hodgepodge of fringe elements. Leadership is not his strength. For these and many other reasons, Paul will not be elected, but if he were elected, what is the basis for thinking that he can change Washington? Wouldn't you rather support someone with a proven record of forging consensus to get things done?

Your sole expressed reservation about Santorum is a putative tendency to "take the best deal he can get from the Republicrats when I think we need to draw a line on the sand." This is not the Santorum that I know. The Santorum I know stormed the House Bank as a freshman legislator with a very small but effective group of six others to throw the committee chairman in jail and to force others into disgraceful retirement (Newt kited 22 checks himself, but got on board under Ricks influence). The Santorum I know stood alone against accepting a "voice vote" when Congress tried to sneak in a pay raise. The Santorum I know insisted that the RINO who cost the nation a balanced budget amendment be stripped of his chairmanship, and did so in opposition to stalwart members such as Sen. Jesse Helms. The Santorum I know stood for hours debating Barbara Boxer and cornered her into arguing that the baby is not human so long as its big toe is still in the birth canal. The Santorum I know made a deal with Specter that had the biggest pro-choice RINO in the Senate chomping his tongue bloody saying good things about Bush Supreme Court nominees Roberts and Alito who will serve two or three decades, even if Pat Toomey confirms another liberal justice like Sotomayor. The Santorum I know went down fighting for his principles to the bitter end, backing the surge in Iraq and the partial privitization of Social Security, and opposing Islamic extremism as he lost his re-election bid in the 2006 Republican bloodbath. To say that Santorum cops out on the best deal when he should stand and fight does not ring true to me. It sounds like a manufactured excuse for dismissing him.

Your enthusiasm for Gingrich's articulation of how government should work is probably well placed. We should note, however, that Gingrich is better at articulating how government should work than he is at running government. He lost the confidence of his fellow Republicans not because of his strong stances, but because he would articulate a strong stance and then blink, leaving the Party with the stigma of taking an unpopular stance without any benefits that would accrue from winning the fight.

You raise two specific questions pertaining to the Santorum campaign:

First, it is not relevant to the campaign if some Santorum backers rail against Bachmann for whatever reason. For my part, my only reservation about Bachmann is her lack of experience, and that even if she were to win Iowa, she would merely play the role of spoiler for Romney since she has little campaign organization or strategy beyond Iowa.

Second, if some Santorum supporters who are Christians have absolute disdain for Bachmann, it is irrelevant to the campaign. I suspect that such disdain for her by Christians who support Santorum is rather anomalous. I read the Santorum Facebook groups all the time and never see "absolute disdain" and "total and complete loathing" for Bachmann. Quite the contrary. Most comments about Bachmann in the Santorum Facebook groups have the deepest respect for her opinions, even if her sole legislative achievement is a lightbulb bill. There has been nothing but compassion expressed for the Bachmann campaign in today's news about the defection of her campaign manager.

Santorum and Reagan's 3-Legged Stool

There's no doubt that the social conservative of this primary season is Sen. Santorum. However, Reagan conservatism is a three-legged stool, and all three legs are necessary for a stool to make: social issues, fiscal restraint/small government, and national defense. Accordingly, I don't support candidates just because they are passionate about traditional moral values. While Santorum makes the headlines on the social issues, it is his stance on all three legs which makes me an ardent supporter.

If it were only a matter of fiscal restraint, (and if there weren't so much racism in his newsletters), I'd be very much tempted to support Ron Paul. If it were only a matter of jobs creation, I might be tempted to vote for Romney. If it were only a matter of good governance, I might be tempted to vote for Perry. But the stool where the three legs of the stool are equally secure and proven is Rick Santorum.

On social issues and traditional moral values, little more needs to be said other than that Santorum rightly asserts that not only has he been the effective leader, but one who has been in the forefront taking the bullets. But Santorum's stance is not merely informed by his Judeo-Christian worldview. Rather, his pragmatic side is evident in that he alone articulates why healthy families are key to a healthy economy. Citing that 40 some percent of families with only one parent are living in poverty, Santorum perceptively argues that you can't fix the economy without strengthening families.


On fiscal restraint and on reducing the size of government, Santorum's bedrock beliefs can be seen in a number of episodes in his tenure in government, but none so keenly than in two particular titanic struggles. The first was the Welfare Reform Act of 1996. For the first time ever, a federal entitlement was ended. While Gingrich is quick to take credit for this, it was Santorum who co-authored the bill and did the heavy lifting as the floor manager. The second epic struggle was over the 1995 Balanced Budget Amendment which Santorum co-sponsored . This bill was passed by a 2/3rds majority in the House and sent to the Senate . The final vote was a nail-biter, coming down to the vote of a RINO, Mark Hatfield. He will forever be remembered as the Senator who prevented the Balanced Budget Amendment being sent to the States which almost certainly would have ratified it, so that we would not be in the mess we are in today.

When the Senate defeated the bill by a single vote, Santorum vociferously railed against RINO Hatfield, arguing that he should be stripped of his chairmanship and removed from Republican leadership. Although Republicans did not take this punitive step, it was clear that Hatfield would be challenged in the next primary, and he retired the next year.

On national security, Santorum is well known for his strong stance on defense. He still remembers how we swore our most sacred vows that there must never, ever be another 9/11. None of the candidates is more informed on the threat of radical Islam. Frankly, with the exception of Santorum, the Republican candidates are all rather weak on foreign policy. On the other hand, Santorum's strong suit is the Middle East and Latin America. While the economy is the central focus of this election, I fear that the next President is likely to face a significant foreign policy challenge that will once again occupy his attention. That all important 3 a.m. phone call must be answered by someone who has depth in national security.

Yes, I am an Evangelical and social conservative. But social issues do not drive my motivation to support Santorum. I'm in Santorum's camp because his is the best stool for conservatives in this primary season.