When confronted recently about things he wrote in his book about radical feminists, Sen. Santorum blamed them on his wife, even though nowhere in the book does she get credit as a co-author.
Now he's protesting, as reported here, that his words suggesting we will end up voting for the real deal, Obama, instead of a paler version, in Romney, have been misunderstood as self-referential:
Santorum's original comment came Thursday in a San Antonio speech, in which the candidate said Obama and Romney had so few differences that "we may as well stay with what we have instead of taking a risk" with Romney.
Santorum argued that when he used the word "we" in his comment, he was referring to the general public. But he said people mistook his remark to mean that he personally would vote for Obama over Romney.
"No, I was saying the people may not vote for someone they don't see as different," Santorum said.
What Republicans should and do find objectionable about this, contrary to Santorum's explanation, is that a high profile Republican such as Santorum seems to be campaigning for the Democrat opposition.
Indeed, he's given evidence that he's more interested in crossover votes from the Democrat Party, e.g. in the Michigan primary, than he is in Republican votes. Moreover his bashing of Protestants unfortunately legitimizes bashing Mormonism, which will come back to haunt, and hurt, Romney in the general election when PACs unleash a torrent of criticism on Romney's strange beliefs.
It's disloyal and dispiriting for Santorum to speak this way in public. Independent voters will lose, not gain, respect for Santorum as a result, not that it matters much. His is a negative campaign anyway, lock, stock and barrel. We all know the many things Santorum is against. The trouble is, we don't know what he's for.
Santorum should withdraw from the presidential contest.
