from Tales from the Trail:
Washington Extra: Sayonara Santorum
Former presidential candidate and Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum is featured on a button by a supporter who also wore the politician's trademark vest in this January 14, 2012 file photo. REUTERS/Jason Reed
It began and ended at a kitchen table in Pennsylvania. Rick Santorum's improbable and surprisingly long run for the White House is over. But the Republican Party will feel the effects of this game-changing gambit cooked up in a kitchen for some time to come.
Santorum offered disgruntled voters true conservative credentials. He brought social issues and religious freedom to the forefront of the national debate. He made Mitt Romney work much harder for the nomination than expected, and lurch to the right in the process. His supporters may not go away quietly or fall behind Romney in lockstep.
Tony Perkins, head of the Family Research Council, already put his demands out there: "If the Republican establishment hopes to generate this same voter intensity in the fall elections, Santorum voters must see it demonstrate a genuine and solid commitment to the core values issues."
Santo said he was suspending his campaign - which could be interpreted as suspending it until 2015. Surely, he'll be back. And meanwhile, he needs help covering his campaign debt. He asked today for "one more contribution of $25, $50, or $73.10."
from Tales from the Trail:
Contraception question booed at Republican debate
A question about contraception caused a flareup in the culture wars during the last Republican presidential debate before next week's Arizona and Michigan primaries and "Super Tuesday."
The question drew boos from the audience and impassioned statements from the four candidates on the stage in Mesa, Arizona, last night.
"Since birth control is the latest hot topic, which candidate believes in birth control, and if not, why?" was the question posed via cnnpolitics.com.
It sparked a lengthy discourse by the candidates on religious freedom, contraception, and family structure. None of the White House hopefuls directly responded to the question.
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who has taken on the media in previous debates, said it was legitimate to question "the power of the government to impose on religion activities which any religion opposes," before questioning CNN moderator John King and zeroing in on Democrat Barack Obama.
Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney provided backup, saying Obama had launched "the worst attack on religious conscience in the history of the United States."
“Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who has taken on the media in previous debates, said it was legitimate to question “the power of the government to impose on religion activities which any religion opposes,””
So then I guess Gingrich shouldn’t have any problems granting Muslims an exemption from the personal mandate section of PPACA, right?
from Tales from the Trail:
Santorum explains “phony theology” comment
Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum says he wasn't questioning Barack Obama's faith on Saturday when he said the Democratic president's agenda was based on "some phony theology."
Santorum explained his comments during an appearance on CBS's "Face the Nation" Sunday, saying he was questioning the president's world view -- not his faith.
"I accept the fact that the president's Christian," Santorum said. "I just said that when you have a world view that elevates the earth above man says that, you know, we can't take those resources because we're going to harm the earth by things that are frankly just not scientifically proven."
A devout Roman Catholic and social conservative, Santorum brought up the theology issue a day earlier in Columbus, Ohio, as he addressed supporters of the conservative Tea Party movement. (Here's the story from Reuters' Sam Jacobs)
On ABC's "This Week," Robert Gibbs, a senior advisor to Obama's re-election campaign said Santorum's "phony theology" comment crosses a line and was dragging the presidential campaign down.
“I can't help but think that those remarks are well over the line," Gibbs said. "It's wrong. It's destructive. It makes it virtually impossible to solve the problems that we all face together as Americans.”
Here's Santorum on "Face the Nation"
All these so-called “social conservatives” screamed bloody murder when it was rumored that Muslims were being granted a religious exemption to the individual mandate on PPACA. (Even though that was nothing more than a chain-email rumor.) Now these same wingnuts insist that if Obama doesn’t grant Catholics a religious exemption that he’s somehow violating the constitution. Which is it Republicons? Do your religious beliefs exempt you from following the law or don’t they? Or is it just YOUR religious beliefs that garner special privilege?
from Tales from the Trail:
Rick Santorum: birth control ruling has nothing to do with women’s rights
Forcing religious organizations to provide contraceptives has nothing to do with women's rights, Republican presidential contender and vocal Catholic Rick Santorum said on Thursday.
The comment aligned Santorum with a lineup of conservative critics bashing Democratic President Barack Obama's rule requiring religious institutions -- but not churches -- to provide health insurance plans that cover birth control.
The rule, announced in January, covers religious-affiliated groups like charities, hospitals and universities. The Catholic Church opposes most methods of birth control and conservatives have painted the rule as an attack on religious freedom from a secular president.
Speaking to CNN's John King, the former Pennsylvania senator said: "That's the Church's money, and forcing them to do something that they think is a grievous moral wrong. How can that be a right of a woman? That has nothing to do with the right of a woman."
Santorum bills himself as the only true conservative in the field of Republicans vying to win their party's nomination to challenge Obama in November. He's backed by evangelical leaders and social conservatives who admire his consistent and at times polemical stances on abortion and gay marriage. He swept nominating contests Minnesota, Missouri and Colorado on Tuesday buoyed by votes from social conservatives.
Better than expected economic news and the administration's move, which was initially viewed as a score for women's health advocates, have shifted the conversation of an election that most believed would be centered on the economy.
Conservative heavyweights including House Speaker John Boehner, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, Texas Governor Rick Perry and presidential candidate Newt Gingrich have all warned of an attack on religious freedom coming from the White House. Obama also risks losing the votes of Catholics of whom he won 54 percent in 2008. On Thursday, the administration back-pedalled from its position, promising room for compromise but the groundwork for the attacks seems to have been laid.
How’s this for an attack on the church? I want to remove their tax-exempt status. If they want to involve themselves in politics rather than focusing on their stated mission to save souls, thar’s just fine with me. Let’s tax them. On any given Sunday, and this holds true for the mega-fundamentalist churches more than any, most of the “sermon” is instruction on the joys of the Republican Party and the tragedy of allowing the Democrates to grant more freedoms to more people who don’t happen to hold with the Conservative Rights oppressive social agenda. Fine but that’s not the reasons given to justify tax-exemption. I am so sick of the churches duplicity and wonder what Christ thinks about their message of exclusion and ill-disguised Hate.
from Tales from the Trail:
Santorum courts Texas conservatives
By Judy Wiley
Roughly 1,000 supporters filled the Fairview Farms Corral Barn in Plano, Texas and spilled out the door of the party hall where they'd come to see the man in the day's political spotlight -- Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum.
Those who stood outside in the cold could only hear bits and pieces of Santorum's talk, but that didn't stop them from cheering after he raised his voice to declare, "Now is the time for America to rise up and say, "Enough!"
They took up a chant of "We pick Rick," after he asked, "Are you going to give me the opportunity?"
Santorum's visit to The Lone Star State opened 14 miles away in McKinney at a forum with local pastors. Between the Bella Donna Chapel and the barn at Fairview Farms, there was a stop at a Plano hotel ballroom where some 300 supporters turned out to "meet-and-greet" Santorum.
The Wednesday night rally at the Corral Barn capped a Texas campaign swing, with an exuberant Santorum buoyed by his three-state sweep in Tuesday's GOP nominating contests.
Joseph Cabrera and his sister Esperanza Cabrera of Dallas were in Plano with her two daughters -- at their first political rally -- but never got inside the 8,200 square foot barn behind Mario's Chiquita Restaurant.
He should do well in texas, after all they elected bush and perry.
from Tales from the Trail:
Santorum staffer questions whether God wants women presidents
A staffer in Rick Santorum's presidential campaign is under fire for an email suggesting a female commander-in-chief could be at odds with the Bible's teachings.
The Des Moines Register last week reported that Santorum's Iowa coalitions director, Jamie Johnson, sent an email over the summer asking, ‘Is it God’s highest desire, that is, his biblically expressed will … to have a woman rule the institutions of the family, the church, and the state?"
Michele Bachmann, a social conservative who campaigned heavily in Iowa, competed with Santorum over the conservative evangelical vote in the Iowa caucuses. She dropped out of the race after a dismal finish in the Iowa race.
This weekend Peter Waldron, Bachmann's faith outreach coordinator, said the email was proof that Santorum had engaged in a "sexist strategy" to sabotage Bachmann. He demanded an apology from Santorum and called for Johnson's firing.
The recent spat brings the issue of sexism in conservative politics to the fore again. When Bachmann ended her campaign, political observers wondered whether conservative perceptions of women and Bachmann's own alignment with the Christian right and disavowal of feminism had been her undoing.
The Des Moines Register said that in the final weeks of her campaign Bachmann's aides began to complain that sexism was a problem in Iowa’s religious conservative community, even as her aides deflected questions from reporters on the topic.
from Tales from the Trail:
Perry stands ground on Turkey
Given an opportunity to revise (back down or retract) his comments he made in Monday's Republican debate linking Turkey to "Islamic terrorists," Texas Governor Rick Perry stood his ground on Tuesday.
The Republican presidential candidate made no apology for nearly touching off an international incident with his take on the long-time U.S. ally. Perry defended his view in a CNN interview, hours after Turkey's response.
Here's the video:
from Bernd Debusmann:
U.S. Congress, Communists and God
Bernd Debusmann is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.
After the high-profile failure of a Congressional "supercommittee'' to trim America's budget deficit, one could be forgiven to conclude that there's nothing the divided House of Representatives can agree on. But that would be wrong.
Among the few topics on which Democrats and Republicans in the Republican-dominated House see eye-to-eye: the official motto of the United States is "In God We Trust''. That has been the case since 1956 but as the supercommittee wrangled with the thorny deficit problem, lawmakers found time to vote on a resolution reaffirming the motto. Why that reaffirmation was deemed necessary speaks volumes about congressional priorities and Washington's peculiar political climate.
According to two polls taken before the supercommittee failed to find a compromise, the American public's faith in Congress stands at historic lows - a 9-percent approval rating according to a CBS/New York Times poll and 13 percent according to Gallup. In October, Gallup forecast that disenchantment with the people's representatives would further deepen in the absence of agreement.
Not to harp on the negative, let's revisit the resolution on America's motto, passed 396 to 9 on November 1, with two legislators voting "present'' and 26 not voting. Randy Forbes, the Republican who sponsored the measure explained it had been necessary because "a number of public officials ... forget what the national motto is.'' He named President Barack Obama as one of the forgetful officials, referring to a speech in which he cited E Pluribus Unum as America's motto. (Latin for "out of many, one'', those words are emblazoned on the official seal of the United States and engraved, along with "In God We Trust", on 25-cent coins. E pluribus unum served as the country's de facto motto until 1956, when Congress passed a law making In God We Trust the official motto).
In the floor debate on the matter, one legislator, Arizona Republican Trent Franks, portrayed failure to reaffirm the motto in apocalyptic terms. "If ... man is God, then an atheist state is as brutal as the thesis it rests upon and there is no reason for us to gather here in this place,'' he told his fellow members. "We should just let anarchy prevail because after all we are just worm food.''
There are no polls showing how many Americans live in fear of atheist anarchy, or of the perils arising from people confusing one motto with the other. But such remarks leave no doubt about the extraordinary tone-deafness of some legislators at a time when unemployment and inequality dominate the national conversation.
This Congress is so bad; they cannot even point to the President for the blame.
from Tales from the Trail:
Perry speaks about his faith and failings
The subject was faith not policy in Republican presidential frontrunner Rick Perry's speech at Liberty University.
In the 20-minute speech described as "perhaps his most reflective and personal," the Texas governor made no mention of the biggest issue thus far in the 2012 presidential race - jobs - or his views on President Barack Obama, The Washington Post reported.
"Instead, the evangelical Christian governor spoke the language of the movement with ease," the newspaper said.
Perry talked about his life in deeply spiritual terms and cast his political aspirations as destiny, the Post reported.
"He who knows the number of drops in the ocean, he counts the sands in the desert, he knows you by name... He doesn't require perfect people to execute his plan," Perry said in the speech to an estimated 13,000 students and faculty at the Virginia university founded by the late Rev. Jerry Falwell.
The Texas governor also talked about his failings, saying he did not pursue his early dream job of becoming a veterinarian because he flunked organic chemistry. Click here to see Perry's speech.
Perry, a favorite of the conservative Tea Party, has made his faith a large part of his public image.
Just a minute here. He’s from Texas, he’s a republican and he is an unapologetic Christian. I don’t see any horns. I don’t see an agenda that locks up liberals. So from Canada here we wonder why America is so self engrossed these days. Unless you believe the conspiracy theories George W did not go looking for a war with extremist Islamic terrorists. They brought it to America. Bill Clinton knows this and should be speaking up.
Seriously America get a grip.
from Tales from the Trail:
Obama hosts Iftar dinner marking Ramadan
Three dozen foreign diplomats, two Muslim American members of Congress and some 9/11 families were among the guests invited to join President Barack Obama for what has become a White House tradition -- an Iftar dinner celebrating Ramadan.
"Tonight is part of a rich tradition here at the White House of celebrating the holy days of many faiths and the diversity that define us as a nation," Obama said in his welcome remarks.
"Like so many faiths, Islam has always been part of our American family, and Muslim Americans have long contributed to the strength and character of our country, in all walks of life. This has been especially true over the past 10 years," Obama said.
The president said Ramadan was a time for reflection for Muslims and noted that this year it fell near the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.
Obama recognized Muslim Americans who died in the attacks, others who responded in the aftermath and members of the military fighting in the wars that followed.
"In one month, we will mark the 10th anniversary of those awful attacks that brought so much pain to our hearts," Obama said. "It will be a time to honor all those that we've lost. And tonight, it's worth remembering that these Americans were of many faiths and backgrounds, including proud and patriotic Muslim Americans," Obama said.
This was Obama's third Iftar dinner at the White House. Former President Bill Clinton started the tradition of hosting an Iftar dinner which was continued under President George W. Bush.
Didn’t even take “actual” taxpayer an hour to pop up with his nativist tripe
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