Election 2012: Explaining Rick Santorum’s Odd new ‘Doomsday’ Tone
"I should have listened to Rick Santorum!"
The Associated Press has a story up this morning all about presidential candidate Rick Santorum’s new campaign tone, and the quotes to prove it. If you’re to believe his between-the-lines predictions, President Barack Obama’s policies and inner demons will—at some point soon—result in some twisted combination of Terminator 2, Armageddon and Dr. Giggles, in an alternative universe, where the antagonists/rock didn’t get stopped at the end.
In other words, total destruction! And he’s using some weird references even old Gunao buddy Ron Paul couldn’t come up with. And while the former Pennsylvania Senator’s tone is newish for him (remember how happy his Iowa speech was?), it’s really just the same tired fear rhetoric the right spews, and has been spewing since Obama came into office. It’s harder to notice since the main aggressors like Glenn Beck have been sidelined.
Let’s go to the quotes:
“Go back and read what the sirens did once you arrived on that island. They devour you. They destroy you. They consume you,” Santorum said at a recent speech in Colordao.
Let’s explain this one: For some reason, Rick Santorum is talking about Greek myth/The Odyssey here. A favorite amongst all English majors (even if we skip reading the book in college, we re-read it during our years and years of unemployment)! In that book/mythology, the island of Faiakes was inhabited by Sirens, who were literally Sea Nymphs—head of a man, body of a bird—and American Idols of their time. When sailors sailed by, they were often enticed by the Sirens’ songs, stopped at Faiakes, and stayed there until they died, missing out on their original adventure.
Sort of a weird reference, no? Either way, the AP goes on, and while the rest of his quotes aren’t as Greek mythy, they’re still a bit weird:
“Under Obamacare, you are going to have to provide insurance coverage, free coverage, for things that are absolutely against the teaching of the Catholic Church: free sterilization, free abortions. … This is just the tip of the iceberg of what we can expect.”
Which is similar to what the Catholic Church has been saying about the Affordable Care Act, as well, since Catholic-affiliated organizations may have to supply their employees with coverage that includes contraception, even though 98 percent of Catholics use contraception, and if you want to be all Bible literalist about the thing (assuming that’s why the Church is against contraception), when the scriptures speak against contraception, they promise death for ‘pulling out.’ Which means, unless you’re a couple who’s been having a kid once every two years or so, for your entire adult lives, you’re guilty.
Santorum adds, “Be careful what you do … because once the government creates a right, it can tell you how to exercise that right,” and ends things up by telling audiences that both GOP frontrunners Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich cannot win because they’re not extreme enough.
Santorum is going for the true wingnut vote here. The basic threats of what might happen if… It’s the “healthcare will kill us,” “Iran will nuke us,” “Gay marriage will end us,” “Doomsday is coming, unless…” vote both Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann struck out trying to straddle on the campaign trail, because Santorum is better at it. It’s also a theme radio host Rush Limbaugh has repeated over the last few years, too: If you think Obama’s term is just a low point in history, and we’ll get through it, that’s your opinion—but it’s wrong, he says every weekday afternoon. According to him (and Santorum, apparently), the Obama years have set the U.S. on a path toward moral, economic and militaristic decay. The sky is falling and if you think just a more moderate version of what’s in the White House now can save it, you’re as dead as the sailor who docked on Faiakes.
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