Politico features the "return" of the man who never really went away, Rick Santorum:
The iconoclast social conservative is already taking the temperature of potential donors. His big money benefactor, Foster Friess, still adores him. He’s headed to Iowa in October to meet with key conservative activists. And he is growing his grass-roots network beyond early primary states.
Friday I noted the GOP's superabundance of 2016 losers. (To save you a click, they include, other than Santorum, Mitt Romney, Rand Paul, Chris Christie, Scott Walker, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush, Paul Ryan, Mike Rogers, John Bolton, Mike Huckabee, Marsha Blackburn, Michele Bachmann, Rob Portman, Bobby Jindal, Rick Perry, Mike Pence, Peter King, Herman Cain, Jon Huntsman, John Kasich, Donald Trump, Carly Fiorina and Ben Carson).
And Saturday I concluded that since some of the smarter ones, such as Sen. Cruz, know beyond any doubt that their reactionary platforms are sure losers, they must be sincere in promoting them. Nothing other than a quixotic evangelism would explain why any pol would labor for years hawking an electorally condemned philosophy.
His candidacy may be doomed, but his cause is righteous, and God will love him for it--that sort of thing.
I think we can safely add Rick to Ted's curious category of fruitless valor. In fact, this morning the NY Times editorial board already did--indirectly, anyway:
For years [Democrats] were cowed by the religious right into changing the subject when abortion or birth control or same-sex marriage came up. But now, increasingly assured that public opinion supports their positions, Democrats have become more aggressive in challenging Republicans about their beliefs....
It is ... a reflection of the growing obsolescence of traditional Republican wedge issues in state after state.
Santorum knows that; he can read, he has pollsters, and every now and then he talks to advisers in touch with the 21st century. And yet he's at it again. The Republican nomination may mean nothing to 2016's virtually predetermined outcome, but it means everything to the ideologically possessed and self-righteously committed. It's kinda sad.