Is Santorum the Anti-Romney the Mitt Doubters Want?

Rick Santorum was my congressman in the early 90s and then my senator when he won that election in 1994. So I've been following his public career for more than two decades. Santorum was a partner in the same law firm with my personal attorney, who was also a good friend, so I got a bit of the insider's view of him along the way.

I was surprised when Santorum won election to the U.S. Senate from Pennsylvania. The Commonwealth has a long tradition of electing moderate Republicans in statewide elections, and the list of office holders who fit that description, governors and senators, includes many who remain highly regarded in the state's political history. But Santorum was no moderate Republican.

He did, however, have the good fortune to be running for the U.S. Senate in 1994, a year when the Republicans turned the usual advantage of the mid-term election after the other party wins the presidency into an overwhelming victory, taking control of both houses of Congress for the first time in several decades. And he was running against a fellow who, while an incumbent, had won just three years earlier in a special election. That was Harris Wofford. Wofford had been appointed by the governor to fill the senate seat vacated by the tragic death of John Heinz in a helicopter crash. He then won a special election against former PA governor Dick Thornburgh, one of those moderate Republicans. That surprised the heck out of me, but Wofford was claiming to have special expertise in health policy at a time when interest in health care reform among the electorate was high. Wofford, however, turned out to contribute essentially nothing to the Clinton health care reform effort, which went down in flames. (That ill-fated endeavor, labeled "Hillary Care," may get an essay of its own in this blog some day.)

And so Santorum's timing, in 1994, was most fortunate. Then, in 2000, the Democrats put up Ron Klink, a liberal Democrat, four-term congressman, and former television journalist as their Senate candidate. Although in 1994 I thought Santorum was too conservative for Pennsylvania voters, and in 2000 I thought that was still true, his opponent was probably too blue in a purple state.

In 2006 it was Democrats' turn to take advantage of a mid-term election and the increasingly unpopular war in Iraq, and Santorum was soundly thrashed in his bid for a third term. The fact that voters had finally figured out just how far right he was probably played a role, too.

So how far right is he? Certainly enough to satisfy those in the Republican party who don't like Romney's flip-flops on core issues. Santorum can be criticized for not being enough of a fiscal hawk, because he is not ashamed of having supported earmark spending so he could "bring home the bacon" to Pennsylvania. But aside from that, he is a true-blue (or should that be true-red?) conservative across the board. He wants to cut spending and taxes and reduce the size of government. He has ultra-right views on issues that matter to social conservatives, most notably abortion. His perspective on health system reform is free-market, clearly the diametric opposite of the socialist leanings of the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) - in contrast to the program Mitt signed onto in Massachusetts, which has much in common with the ACA.

In contrast with Romney, when one peruses Santorum's record, it's really difficult to find flip-flops, or even much in the way of inconsistencies. Those who believe in open-mindedness and a willingness to allow one's thinking to evolve like to quote Emerson on consistency of thought. But Emerson said, "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds" (emphasis added), and foolish is definitely in the eye of the beholder. If you like Santorum's rock-ribbed brand of conservatism, you find nothing foolish about it.

So is he the anti-Romney the conservative faithful have been seeking? After dwelling in the single digits - low teens at best - in the national Republican polls for many months, why is Santorum finally now apparently being taken seriously as a contender for the nomination?

Look at the heartland. That means all that territory the folks on the coasts think of as "flyover country." It took a while for the vote counts from the Iowa caucuses to be finalized, but Santorum won there. And then look at its next-door neighbor, Missouri, where Gingrich, also seeking the mantle of the anti-Mitt, was not on the ballot. Santorum trounced Romney, something no one thought Gingrich could do in a one-on-one contest with Mitt. The current polls show a Santorum surge: strong leads over Romney in Ohio and Michigan. Every time a new state or national poll comes out I shake my head in wonderment. Is this the conservative the Republican faithful really want?

With emphasis on the word faithful, the answer may well be yes. If you're looking for a candidate with strongly traditional religious values who has lived his life accordingly, Santorum is your man. In a party whose religious conservatives are constantly talking about family values, everything we know of Santorum tells us that's what he is all about, in deed as well as word.

As the campaign has progressed, and he has participated in debate after debate after debate ... sorry, I lost count ... his public presentation has acquired polish at the same time that his brash, in-your-face explication of his views has lost none of its intensity.

I'm still not at all sure this is the conservative the conservatives are seeking for November. But I've seen enough in this race so far that I now will not be surprised if it turns out that way. If they want someone who will provide a stark contrast with Barack Obama in every imaginable way, Santorum is most definitely that guy.