I finally gave Santorum 10 minutes today. I've been a Santorum virgin, meaning I've never seen video of this particular US presidential candidate. (After all, I live overseas and I don't usually "check out" senators, especially not senators from other states, not before they hit the bigtime.) So for 10 minutes, I watched the worst, most gaffe-laden, repugnant "gotcha" stuff I could find from the liberal media via Youtube.
I have this to say: while Palin is a disaster and a walking bag of malapropisms who is terminally provincial, I don't think the media has anything on Santorum. I think he's bright, fairly articulate and very committed to his version of the truth.
McCain scared me (the anger/temper thing); Santorum didn't. I didn't see deep-seated pathologies and hang-ups just begging to come to the surface; I think those are in people's minds. Such as in the mind of advice columnist Dan Savage. (I watched a video of Savage, too, for comparison, where he explains why he coined a new word named after Santorum -- Savage seemed troubled and used a lot more curse words than Santorum.)
Of course, when I watched Santorum, I see a bit of inflexible white dork who wears his belt too high, but that's par for the course for Republicans. Apart from the fact that he's Republican (weak, splintered party, damaged brand) and that he seems too principled (it will be more painful to watch his inevitable slide to the center if he is elected), he seems like a very strong candidate.
I wish him well, in the sense of good sportsmanship.
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I don't trust anybody who believes so deeply in his set of values. Give me Gingrich or Clinton. Someone who knows that I know that he's lying to me and goes on lying, with a smile on his face, and by the time he's done lying, I'm smiling too.
Maybe he is just faking it better.
I don't trust anybody who believes so deeply in anything, except science, which ultimately is the knowledge that we don't know very much at this point of human development. More religious nuts in government is precisely what we do not need at this moment of American decline.
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