Flickr/Gage Skidmore
Mike Huckabee used to say "I'm a conservative, but I'm not mad about it," a line that always got a knowing chuckle. But let's say you like Huckabee's uncompromising social conservatism, but you aren't so keen on supporting a candidate for president in 2016 who's personally friendly and affable. Is there someone out there advocating cultural revanchism who also hasn't smiled since Ronald Reagan left office? Whose vision of the future is built on disgruntlement and disgust? Why yes there is:
Rick Santorum met today with advisors to map out a possible new presidential bid aiming to avoid some of the mistakes that doomed his last candidacy.
A socially conservative former senator who was one of Mitt Romney's biggest rivals for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, Santorum is taking more steps toward another run, meeting Wednesday with a group of advisers who would join a possible campaign, planning some of the details and laying out what a bid might look like.
The four-plus hour meeting was described to ABC News by an aide who attended as a discussion of "lessons learned" from the 2012 campaign that they could use to improve their operation if he "makes the leap." The group also got into more detailed planning that never happened before his last run, the aide said.
Among the topics discussed were Santorum's potential timeline for a decision and possible roll-out, finance and fundraising plans, possible staff additions, early-state movements, communications strategy, political discussions, and putting the experiences and lessons from 2012 "into practice." The goal would be to turn some of the "roadblocks" they faced into "speed bumps."
The biggest roadblock is that Santorum is a deeply unpleasant person, which would be a problem even if his views were acceptable to a majority of the electorate, which they aren't. But he apparently wants to change. Benjy Sarlin reported the other day that Santorum's 2016 message "puts less stock in bashing gay marriage and more in bashing immigration," which could reflect an evolution among Santorum's potential voters. That great-uncle of yours who listens to Limbaugh, watches O'Reilly, and is in a perpetual state of near-rage over how the America of his youth is gone? Maybe he's starting to accommodate himself, just a little, to the march of the gays.
Not that he's any less repulsed by them and their desire for domestic tranquility, mind you, but he's come to understand that that particular battle is just about over. Immigration, on the other hand, has more urgency than ever. He sees it all around him-people speaking Spanish everywhere he goes, cowardly Republicans talking about "reaching out" to voters who aren't even real Americans, and if he hears "Para español, oprima dos" one more time he's going to blow his top.
Rick Santorum hears those voters, and wants to be the vessel for their outrage. Nevertheless, the idea that he could go through an entire campaign without talking about sex and sin is absurd. It's his thing. People are going to ask him about it, and he's going to answer. And that will no doubt be entertaining.
I think having Santorum in the race is quite salutary. Even if his chances of winning the nomination are miniscule, he represents a significant portion of the GOP electorate (don't forget, he won the Iowa caucus in 2012). His is a perspective that should be heard and understood, even if most party leaders would rather he disappeared.
