{"id":6492,"date":"2012-02-26T13:43:53","date_gmt":"2012-02-26T21:43:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=6492"},"modified":"2012-02-26T13:43:53","modified_gmt":"2012-02-26T21:43:53","slug":"rick-santorum-and-the-anti-intellectual-theocratic-legacy-of-the-gop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=6492","title":{"rendered":"Rick Santorum And The Anti-Intellectual, Theocratic Legacy Of The GOP"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Republican Party has been advocating ignorance for decades. They Reject the 98% of scientists who affirm that climate change is real and the result of human activity. They scoff at evolution in favor of Biblical affirmations that put the age of the Earth at only 6,000 years. They belittle Harvard graduates as elitists and revere candidates they think would make good beer drinking companions.<\/p>\n

Now Rick Santorum, the current frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination, has said aloud what has only been alluded to in the past. At a forum for the Koch brothers’ Americans for Prosperity, Santorum said…<\/p>\n

“President Obama wants everybody in America to go to college. What a snob!”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Really. How elitist of Obama to suggest that all Americans have access to the same opportunities to improve themselves personally and professionally. What a pompous, exclusionary attitude. Santorum continued saying…<\/p>\n

“There are good decent men and women who go out and work hard every day and put their skills to test that aren’t taught by some liberal college professor trying to indoctrinate them. Oh, I understand why he wants you to go to college. He wants to remake you in his image. I want to create jobs so people can remake their children into their image, not his.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Exactly. Heaven forbid that kids should be encouraged to learn things taught by college professors when all they are capable of is manual labor and assembly line work. Santorum is squarely opposed to kids having higher aspirations. He castigates Obama for wanting to remake kids in the image of someone who began poor, from a broken home, and rose to become president of the United States. But Santorum prefers the image of kids who skip school, get a job, and never achieve anything greater than their parents did. Never mind the fact that most parents sacrifice selflessly to give their kids the opportunity to reach their highest potential.<\/p>\n

In Santorum’s world ignorance is the goal. It would have to be in order to persuade people to vote for him. And his followers are fully on board with this. They applauded enthusiastically at his “snob”<\/em> comment. But this is a relatively recent position for Santorum. In is last campaign for senate, his web site<\/a> told a different story:<\/p>\n

“In addition to Rick’s support of ensuring that primary and secondary schools in Pennsylvania are equipped for success, he is equally committed to ensuring the {sic) every Pennsylvanian has access to higher education.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Critics will surely jump on that reference as evidence of Santorum’s hypocrisy. But not so fast. He was only in favor of “every Pennsylvanian”<\/em> having access to higher education, not every American. Screw the Kansans and the Carolinians. Obama has the temerity to favor people from Arizona to Maine earning college degrees. That is unconscionable, but it’s OK for PA.<\/p>\n

This weekend also saw Santorum describing the parts of the Constitution that make him vomit.<\/p>\n

“I don’t believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute. The idea that the church can have no influence or no involvement in the operation of the state is absolutely antithetical to the objectives and vision of our country… to say that people of faith have no role in the public square? You bet that makes me want to throw up.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Of course, I don’t know of anyone who says that people of faith should have no role in the public square. They can and do in great numbers. However, having “involvement in the operation of the state”<\/em> is another thing entirely. It’s called theocracy, and it’s what you get when there is no separation of church and state.<\/p>\n

The combination of viewing education as a character flaw and the Bible as an addendum to the Constitution is what defines the modern Republican\/Tea Party. But it is not what this country is based on and it is not the path to peace and prosperity. And when discourse devolves to the point that the Constitution makes candidates wretch and advocating greater access to a college education makes you a snob, you know that a line of reason has been crossed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Republican Party has been advocating ignorance for decades. They Reject the 98% of scientists who affirm that climate change is real and the result of human activity. They scoff at evolution in favor of Biblical affirmations that put the age of the Earth at only 6,000 years. They belittle Harvard graduates as elitists and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[152,1,698],"tags":[183,1147,301,872],"class_list":["post-6492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-election","category-general","category-religion","tag-barack-obama","tag-religion","tag-republicans","tag-rick-santorum"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4Ijg-1GI","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":6101,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=6101","url_meta":{"origin":6492,"position":0},"title":"Fox News Miscues: Rupert Murdoch And Rick Santorum Send Mixed Messages","author":"Mark NC","date":"1\/2\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"The campaign trail is fraught with hazards. Sometimes you're moving so fast you miss important turns and signals. That must be the explanation for the disconnect that just occurred between Rick Santorum and the News Corp CEO, Rupert Murdoch. Murdoch recently joined Twitter (Interestingly, just a few days after his\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6862,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=6862","url_meta":{"origin":6492,"position":1},"title":"Post Primary Report: What Will Become Of Rick Santorum And Newt Gingrich?","author":"Mark NC","date":"4\/12\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Now that the Republican presidential primary is effectively over (sorry Ron Paul, you were always a joke, even to your own party), what will losers Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich find to while away all the free time on their hands? Well, there will certainly be books to peddle and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4665,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=4665","url_meta":{"origin":6492,"position":2},"title":"Barack Obama Beating GOP Rivals In Their Own States","author":"Mark NC","date":"6\/16\/2011","format":false,"excerpt":"As the 2012 campaign season continues to roll out, here's something you won't hear in much of the mainstream media: The people who know these Republican candidates best prefer President Obama. These senators, governors, and congressmen served for years representing their constituents, yet those constituents were apparently not impressed. Other\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6464,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=6464","url_meta":{"origin":6492,"position":3},"title":"Is President Obama A Christian? Santorum? Gingrich? Romney?","author":"Mark NC","date":"2\/21\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"It's always comforting to know that there is someone you can turn to who can provide answers to the perplexing spiritual problems that we all face on a daily basis. Someone with wisdom and insight and experience in the ways of the Lord. Such a person is Rev. Franklin Graham,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6651,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=6651","url_meta":{"origin":6492,"position":4},"title":"Rick Santorum: It Should Be Illegal To Read Off A Teleprompter","author":"Mark NC","date":"3\/13\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Rick Santorum, March 12, 2012: I always believed that when you run for president of the United States, it should be illegal to read off a teleprompter. Because all you're doing is reading someone else's words to people. When you're running for president people should know, not what someone's writing\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6360,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=6360","url_meta":{"origin":6492,"position":5},"title":"Why Is The Media Pretending That Santorum’s Victories Mean Anything?","author":"Mark NC","date":"2\/8\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Yesterday there were another trio of Republican primary contests. They were held in Minnesota, Missouri, and Colorado. The surprising thing about the results is not that Rick Santorum finished first in all three, it's that anybody cares at all about these results. There exactly zero delegates awarded last night. Santorum's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6492"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6492\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6494,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6492\/revisions\/6494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}