Virtue

or Bigotry

That is the question.
Santorum's appeal seems to be predicated on his goodness and decency. Family man who really loves his wife and he has had only one. The other detracting things the conservatives have issues with like his Senatorial earmarking is easily forgiven because that is how the game is played. Santorum appeals to people who take seriously biblical admonitions against licentiousness, fornication, lust and the wayward ways of the sexual revolution off the rails. People who like a guy who raises lots of kids and speaks admirably about a virtuous wife. Lots of those kinds of people make up the heartland of America. They don't particularly like seeing tongues licking strange things plastered all over the internet in tribute to the Ninth Circuit legalizing same sex marriage. It viscerally offends their sensibilities in a way that trumps for them any constitutional argument which is largely over their heads. And they think San Franciscans have all sold their soul to the devil anyway.
But will this capture the mood of the entire country.
Will the glitterbombers get to say how they really feel?

I have always said it would be a great debate to hear Santorum engage Obama on some of the cultural issues. Planned Parenthood for example is an institution that has become so powerful within the Democratic Party that it can rally an entire caucus of congresspeople to trashtalk another private Non Profit who decided not to fund it. I find that over the top ridiculous and disgusting that the party has let this happen to such an organization. Has the Democratic Party sold its soul to the Abortion Lobby? It is a Lobby- and it is an Industry. Doesn't anyone see anything seriously perverse with this? What's next- Planned Parenthood launching an IPO so you can buy stock in aborted fetuses? Sick, people.

There is a fine fault line between creating the neutral space that lets all religions thrive in peace and prosperity and the crushing of any religion in the name of state neutrality. Constitutionally the analysis is complicated.

But what generates all this anti- so called 'elite' sentiment prevelant in Republican politics is that there is a popular belief that basic virtue is being undermined in the name of fairness and the Establishment Clause. That is probably what Romney means when he says he wants to restore the 'soul' of America.

The 'Reagan Democrats' that Gingrich is after he is hoping have this sense of virtue so strongly within them that they will jump party lines to stop the onslaught of imminent persecution perceived of those with certain principles and virtue. You hear people now talking openly about the discrimniation of Catholics which we thought went by the wayside after NINA signs went down.
It is what the 'culture wars' are about.

The smartest thing that Obama can do now is twofold:
Convene a Summit with religious leaders of all denominations and religions to discuss Religious Freedom, and persecution against minority religions around the world (including persecution of Christians in Muslim countries which is real and rampant) and issue clarifying guidelines on the contraception, abortofascient regulations which effectively preclude any religious run institution from having to pay for or cover that. If you go to work at a Catholic Institution, my guess is you know that you are not going to get to get free contraception and it wouldn't bother you. If it did, you might choose not to work there but in another institution that did if you didn't want to pay for it. Some statistics have one in six hospitals in the US being catholic run or affiliated- because healing is a huge part of Jesus' ministry and the catholic church takes it seriously. If one in six hospitals in the country have to provide contraception coverage, or be fined, this is a financial burden that gets passed on to the flock and diverts funding from things that they do believe in- like feeding and housing people adequately. Would you rather the money go toward putting a roof over someone's head or paying for Plan B for some nurse who thinks she might be pregnant and doesn't want to be. Money does not grow on trees, except maybe in China.

http://berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/events/equality-freedom-religion?utm_source=Berkley+Center+Newsletter+Mailing+List&utm_campaign=84f87a05ba-Berkley_Center_February+_Newsletter_2012&utm_medium=email