Rick Santorum is creeping me out
Shades of the “Daisy Ad”? The latest from the Catholic fevered apocalyptic imagination of Rick Santorum:
Second thought: Maybe there is a certain Catholic element to his imagination, circa 2008:
His Eminence James Francis Cardinal Stafford criticized President-elect Barack Obama as ‘aggressive, disruptive and apocalyptic,’ and said he campaigned on an ‘extremist anti-life platform,’ Thursday night in Keane Auditorium during his lecture ‘Pope Paul VI and Pope John Paul II: Being True in Body and Soul.’ ‘Because man is a sacred element of secular life,’ Stafford remarked, ‘man should not be held to a supreme power of state, and a person’s life cannot ultimately be controlled by government’…’For the next few years, Gethsemane will not be marginal. We will know that garden,’ Stafford said.
“Know garden.” Could work as a bumper sticker…
0:40
Is there no end to your politics?
What does that even mean?
Forgetaboutit.. Santorum has become yesterday. Gingrich is on his way to be a Harold Stassen with hair.
We really should not get excited about the American bishops explicit entry into partisan politics. And it is dirty partisan politics. The reason we should not be upset is that the American bishops are losing credibility by the day as every poll shows. They have aroused the Catholics who stay to oppose them in unprecedented numbers. The fact they do not see the deluge coming is perhaps the more startling fact. And it would not help them if they were married either. As Marie Antoinette exhibited.
I didnt realize that Rick Santorum was an American Bishop.
I think it’s creepy, too, but how did you feel about Johnson’s anti-Goldwater ad? Bet you thought it was clever, smart, and on target.
Anti-Goldwater ad? Huh? Was that like 50 years ago?
What has scared me most the past couple of years is not the politicians with their apocalyptic message, but the realization that there are a substantial minority of Americans who truly buy into it.
Wow! One man could cause all that! Makes you sort of wonder why you voted for all those Republicans in 2010 and why the Supreme Court with its Republican Catholic majority can’t curb the runaway Muslim.
I liked it! Fear-mongering so good I thought it was a satire. The crows at the beginning are a great touch.
Here’s a site I use in my mass communication course that’s fun. Every single presidential TV ad ever made:
http://www.livingroomcandidate.org/
Jean, that’s a terrific site! BTW, I’m sure you’ve seen that Andrew Sullivan has an “Ad War Update” feature with roundups of the various ads from every camp. Santorum has actually done some funny ones in the past, about Romney I think. (Who is low-hanging fruit.)
Of course now Rick is letting it be known he’d be the Veep for Romney. It’s a good match, except that it isn’t.
I think he needs vampires.
What’s the problem with this ad?
Very creepy, it would be more accurate to suggest that with the break down of Christian values, we all run the risk of becoming pillars of salt.
“What’s the problem with this ad?”
The problem is that it totally glosses over how in 2014, Obama takes a time machine back to 2001 to orchestrate 911. And, what’s more, there’s no reference to the fact that Obama, via his time machine, destroyed the Temple in 70 CE while in the guise of the Emperor Titus.
Also, he eats babies.
Also, he is a skin-job.
In my opinion Christian values are not at issue. The most remarkable and useful of them are quite literally timeless and indisputable. What is at issue is those who, from the position of grand and well-appointed stages supported by considerable material wealth (i.e., power) with the conviction of divine inspiration daily spout lengthy diatribes in support of those values while their deeds are literally no such thing. And I do mean literally.
In my lifetime the revered titans of wealth were driven from their gated communities to a fine office. How would they have noticed the lowly Datsun much less recognized a need for such a silly thing? To suggest it might be useful to a person strapped for cash would have required they not only recognize a lesser world but act upon that recognition. My opinions contain “grand” notions and do not give adequate attention to the details of the complex realities involved. But then, that has been the very path taken by every single messenger of God. What I find confusing is the very individuals who claim with a broad smile merely to be following that very path believe their willing to joyously and openly profess their allegiance to a “faith” is not merely a grand deed but sufficient. I make so such claim. When those who do make such claims protest they are being “victimized” I wonder did no tell them about the crucifiction or do they simply not believe it.
But, Abe, at least in bleak Obamaville, cable still works. (See .40 again.)
(I hope the President’s campaign responds by giving us a glimpse into Santorumland. If Rick implements the goals of his spiritual directors, . . .)
MightBe, regarding Christian values and those peddling free contraception for all, I have no doubt if Christ were here in Person, he would be turning over tables everywhere.
“I think it’s creepy, too, but how did you feel about Johnson’s anti-Goldwater ad? Bet you thought it was clever, smart, and on target.”
The Johnson ad (which you can see for old time’s sake at the link I posted above) was a similar creep-out job with one difference: Goldwater had actually talked about using nukes in Vietnam.
The Santorum ad merely paints a dystopian pastiche with a menacing soundtrac rife with images of death and decay (crows, baby in crib immediately followed with split second image of someone who appears to be holding a butcher knife, lots of red light, crumbling infrastructure, legions of suits marching to the tune called by the crooks on Wall Street, etc.).
My sense is that Santorum is really running against the most radical elements of secular culture–and that’s OK; I think there’s lots to criticize–but I think he mistakenly identifies Obama as the perpetratr of all these ills, most of which were in place long before Obama was ever elected to office, and some before he was even born.
I, too, think that if Jesus were here in Person, He would be turning over tables left and right. Great piles of Ayn Rand’s works would go crashing off the remainder tables, for example, along with the instruments of torture. Those are among the most radical elements of modern secular culture, but Santorum and his party seem to have no problems with either.
Jesus also would have something to say about the notion that the president may kill whomever he wishes so long as he does it with high-tech drones, so if Santorum wants to be partisan in choosing the most radical elements of secular culture, there are elements he could deal with. But his video blames Obama mostly for the works and pomps of unregulated greed, which predates Obama (and is advocated in the Paul Ryan guidebook by the above-cited Ms. Rand).
Tom, the most radical element of modern secular culture is the objectification of the human person, not to mention that if you wish to speak about torture you should not forget about The Holy Innocent.
http://blogs.chicagotribune.com/news_columnists_ezorn/2012/03/fellow-mt-carmel-alum-on-why-santorum-is-avoiding-the-school.html
(A fellow alumnus of Carmel High School on Santorum.)
http://www.juancole.com/2012/02/top-ten-catholic-teachings-santorum-rejects-while-obsessing-about-birth-control.html
(Juan Cole on Santorum.)
N@ncy, I am not forgetting about anyone, and especially am I not letting abortion distract me from all the other ones which this country did not officially torture before the mid-’00s but then began to torture on suspicion that they might possibly be or become a terrorist. I’m not even forgetting the innocent Afghan wedding parties that get blown up by mistake in the name of capturing or killing Osama — oh, we did that but we are still making mistakes.
Actually Tom, I’m more creeped out now about the exchange between Medvedev and President Obama :
President Medvedev: Yeah, I understand, I understand your message about space. Space for you…
President Obama: This is my last election. After my election, I have more flexibility.
President Medvedev: I understand. I will transmit this information to Vladimer.
I would feel much better if something was simply lost in translation, but I find something deeply disturbing about President Obama announcing to Vladimer through Medvedev that he will, for certain, win the coming election, since it was not as if President Obama was at a Political Rally or some such.
Time to sign off, I’m afraid I am too creeped out.
N@ncy, you get creeped out about weird things. tom
Santorum can’t even carry the Catholic vote. As a Bronx Born Catholic that would be read as a personal sign of ‘not being in it’. They are voting Mormon!!!!It’s also a sign that the pew Catholics are not buying what bishops are politically selling. It,s also a sign that the Trads are fading too. Wasn’t VatII all about ‘reading the signs of the times’?
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/27/us/politics/rick-santorum-fails-to-capture-catholic-vote.html?hp
From Wikipedia: “Paranoia is a thought process believed to be heavily influenced by anxiety or fear, often to the point of irrationality and delusion. Paranoid thinking typically includes persecutory beliefs, or beliefs of conspiracy concerning a perceived threat towards oneself. (e.g. “Everyone is out to get me.”) Making false accusations and the general distrust of others also frequently accompany paranoia.”
I know. I know. Even if you’re paranoid, it doesn’t mean they’re not really out to get you. But really, folks. That video is crazy-talk. The question is this. Goes the guy really believe it, or is he BS-ing?
In his book On Bullshit, Harry G. Frankfurt makes a crucial point distinguishing BS-ing from lying. He says that whether you tell the truth or lie, you assume that there are indeed facts that are in some way both determinate and knowable. But if you BS, you are indifferent to the truth. You are “offering a description of a certain state of affairs without genuinely submitting to the constraints which the endeavor to provide an accurate representation of reality imposes.” The BSer also hides the fact that the truth is of no concern by affecting sincerity. “The lack of any significant connection between a person’s opinions and his apprehension of reality will be even more severe, needless to say, for someone who believes it is his responsibility, as a conscientious moral agent, to evaluate events and conditions in all parts of the world.”
I’ve run across this William Saletan book review of Jonathan Haidt’s “The Righteous Mind”. I think it helps explain why many of the folks here find the Santorum ad so obviously objectionable that they don’t feel the need to spell out why, whereas I find it a well-done and succinct statement of important truths.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/25/books/review/the-righteous-mind-by-jonathan-haidt.html?src=me&ref=general
David Gibson – thought you might enjoy this story about Stafford since you quoted him. As bishop of Denver, he used to interface with the Vincentian faculty at this theology school, St. Thomas Seminary.
Given the times, bishops feeling pressure to be orthodox, etc. Stafford had a habit of making phone calls late at night – e.g. 10PM to various priest department heads and to the academic dean. He would have recently been reading something about this theologian or that or some recent pronouncement from Rome, and he would find out that this theologian’s books were being used in a seminary course or even could be on a library reserve shelf for on-going assignments. He would reach the academic dean, for example, and insist thet he immediately go over to the campus and remove that book, reserve shelf assignment, etc. so that no students would have access.
It got to be a steady routine with calls coming 3-4 times a week. Now that is a mark of fear, orthodoxy, and ambition so that no one could use these things to stop his promotion to Rome. OTOH, it was demoralizing and embarrassing, if not confusing, to faculty and to his own seminarians.
Differing narratives: a narrative of liberation vs a narrative of defense:
http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/17/forget-the-money-follow-the-sacredness/
Regardless of one’s narrative, however, we all have an obligation to look at reality – to look at “facts that are in some way both determinate and knowable.” The video is creepy not because of the difference of narrative but because of the distance from reality.
I did spell out it’s problems–it goes to easy on Obama and fails to expose his time-traveling conspiracy.
What are we to conclude from these visual representations of Santorum’s political mindset? Is there really such a thing as a mass hysteria or delusion that can affect large segments of populations much like what some historians conclude about 1930s Germany?
Are there really any degrees of separation between Santorum and Catholic hierarchs left? If reality is a social construction, then what really are the contours of the shared reality of right-wing ideologues like Santorum and the hierarchs?
What would be the effect of victory or defeat in the upcoming election on the sense of reality of these reactionaries and ideologues? Is there a road back for them to the rest of the population? Or, are we as a culture at the proverbial “fork in the road?”
Given the stunning lack of enthusiasm among fellow Catholics for their stealth Opus-Dei presidential candidate, is Santorum or are Catholic hierarchs more irrelevant and alienated from the majority of American Catholics?
Pete Townsend may very well have been prophetic in “Give Blood” on his 1985 album, White City:
Give blood, but it could cost more than your dignity
Give blood, parade your pallor in iniquity
Give blood, they will cry and say they’re in your debt
Give blood, but then they’ll sigh and they will soon forget
We’re heading for the day of reckoning
I’m telling ya, it’s all building up to something
Something that can only be redeemed with fire
So give love and keep blood between brothers.
Give your love and keep blood between brothers …
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WvRjGLRQQVk
I can’t believe it took this particular ad by Sanctitorium to creep you out! Why so long? Have you been listening to his theocratic nonsense?
If he is a visible product of Opus Dei influence, it is indeed an insidious, dangerous cult that should be dissolved.
Abe – sorry, I am not ignoring your contribution :-)
Yeah, I thought I outlined my objections to the ad’s composition vs. content in a relatively balanced way. But I’m afraid if I point this out that Jim Pauwel, whom I deeply respect and could probably find common ground with even though I’m sure I cancel out his presidential vote every four years, will just be proving I’m a narrow-minded liberal.
Political ads hit the gut and galvanize the base, but, as this thread shows, they don’t do much to generate useful political discourse.
Just for laughs, though, my all-time favorite political ad was the one in which now-Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) shot a copy of Obamacare nailed to a tree, just like a rabid dog. For those who want to re-enjoy that moment, here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIJORBRpOPM
Correction: But I’m afraid if I point this out that Jim Pauwel, whom I deeply respect and could probably find common ground with even though I’m sure I cancel out his presidential vote every four years, will think I’ve proved myself a narrow-minded liberal.
(Liberals are not only narrow-minded, but they get lost in their own convoluted rhetoric sometimes. Hee.)
Thanks for that link, Jim. Interesting how the reviewer turns decidedly “liberal” at the very end. I wonder whether the rest of the review was too even-handed or sympathetic to the author of the book for the Times editors to stomach :0)
Hey, Jean, we’re in different states, so from an electoral college point of view, it’s actually unagidon who is cancelling me out. :-) And your analysis was pretty interesting.
This site gets most divisive around election times. I’m making a resolution to not fan the flames this time, but as with most things in life, I’ll probably fail. Y’all are my brothers and sisters in Christ, no matter what.
Romney is the guy for the Republicans, not Santorum.
Generally – not always but generally – Catholics are too conservative for the Democrats (e.g. abortion and gay marriage), and too liberal for the Republicans (e.g. death penalty and immigration reform).
Plus, most of the time Congressmen do not make good presidents. Governors are better because they already have executive experience. Congress runs via committees and has rasied dodging responsibility to a fine art; presidents (whether D or R) simply cannot do that. Like I read somewhere; you can look in all the city parks at the monuments, and you will not see one statue of a committee.
And so it looks like Mittens in November!
@Bill deHaas 03/27/2012 – 1:13 pm
Absolutely fascinating material about Stafford. Downright creepy, in fact.
Is that the level of intelligence and integrity in Roman appointments? Wait until Lori gets there (grin).
Let no one guess why hierarchs are justly losing moral authority.
And still Santorum bows and bows, throwing incense. “Fevered” imagination is an apt word choice.
Carolyn, have a look at the book review Jim referred to:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/25/books/review/the-righteous-mind-by-jonathan-haidt.html?src=me&ref=general
I M so dum. Joe Manchin shot the Cap and Trade Bill; he only vowed to repeal “the bad parts” of Obamacare.
One of Santorum’s claims are long waits to see doctors. Apparently, he doesn’t know that low-income people like me who have to save up for visits also often wait a couple of years before they have the dough to see a doc. Completely off topic (but I’ve got a horse in this race so I’m following it closely):
Pundit consensus seems to be that Obamacare is going down the tubes in the Supreme Court, and, as someone unable to afford health care, I have very mixed feelings about that. I don’t think Obamacare is a good bill, but I do think that the 40 million of us without health care insurance will fall off the map if this goes down.
I think, unless universal national coverage is implemented (which it has failed to since the time of FDR), it will be up to the states to find solutions for these problems. The Michigan legislature shot down Gov. Snyder’s proposal to implement an insurance exchange independent of the federal bill because it smacked of Obamacare.
Eight more years to Medicare!
Universal health care will come, but not for a while. Obamacare may have delayed it, since it’s left such a bad taste in so many people’s mouths. I confess to not having paid much attention to it. It’s not something that affects me directly, since, like most people, I already had fairly good insurance. But we have a good friend in probably much the same situation as Jean. Obamacare will let her purchase insurance, now, which she couldn’t before, but at such a high price that it’s not practical. What kind of solution is that? In addition to not helping the people the program’s sponsors claim to have helped, it’s added more bureaucratic creatures like the panel responsible for the current contraception-mandate mess. Apparently Obama just wanted some health-care accomplishment in his name. That’s no way to run a railroad.
My abiding concern with a health-care system that pays everybody’s bills all the time – we should stop calling it “insurance”, since it’s hardly that – is that when the government’s in charge, we’ll be inundated with lots of impositions like the contraception mandate, not just one every now and then. The Church and other groups trying to hold the line on reductions or eliminations of moral restraint on public policy will be forced into an ever smaller territory, until their voices won’t reach outside the buildings where they hold their services.
Oh, well, can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs, eh?
“Eight more years to Medicare!”
But a lot more than eight for your son.
“Pundit consensus seems to be that Obamacare is going down the tubes in the Supreme Court, and, as someone unable to afford health care, I have very mixed feelings about that. I don’t think Obamacare is a good bill, but I do think that the 40 million of us without health care insurance will fall off the map if this goes down.”
I’d think that pundit consensus, at least as of yesterday’s SC arguments, is that the individual mandate will go down the tubes. That provision could be struck down and the lion’s share of the bill remain intact. Or the entire bill could be confirmed. Or the entire bill could be struck down. Or maybe some other outcome.
If the individual mandate is struck down but the benefits are left intact, I assume that health insurers would rise up as one and scream for a fix or a new bill. And this would happen something like four months before a presidential election.
I agree with you that it’s a flawed bill that tries to solve a genuine problem. Letting the entire bill die without replacing it with something else would be unconscionable. The status quo ante was a three-tier society, in which those who work for big companies or belong to unions or are wealthy had relatively decent benefits, retirees and the poorest of the poor had a government entitlement, and tens of millions of people who aren’t poor enough or old enough or lucky enough had nothing. We can’t accept a return to indifference to the poor.
“Generally – not always but generally – Catholics are too conservative for the Democrats (e.g. abortion and gay marriage) —”
That’s wishful self-delusion about the “generally” part.
Here’s a dispatch from earlier today from a glum Jonathan Cohn on what the justices may be thinking. Headline: “Another Worrisome Morning at the Supreme Court”
http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-cohn/102105/another-worrisome-morning-the-supreme-court
“I confess to not having paid much attention to it. It’s not something that affects me directly, since, like most people, I already had fairly good insurance.”
I’m happy you have good insurance and need not concern yourself with riff raff like us. Highever, this DOES affect you directly b/c those who access health care they can’t pay means that labs, hospitals, and doctors are passing those costs along to those who CAN pay … and that means your premiums go up, and your employer will start freezing wages to pay for those rising costs.
Case in point: The local teachers recently agreed to a change in medical coverage, which requires them to pay higher deductibles so that fewer teachers would be laid off. Since a wage freeze was already in place, that amounts to a pay decrease for them.
Oh, Jim, that’s all we’ve ever had. Obamacare didn’t cause us to start caring for the poor, any more than Medicaid or Medicare or Social Security did. That the government agrees to give the poor some money, after making them grovel for it, has everything to do with politics and nothing to do with caring.
No, David Smith, that’s NOT all we’ve ever heard. Some of us remember FDR who was extremely concerned with the poor as were Jack Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson. And Eisenhower and Nixon (yes, him) were not totally indifferent. And the country as a whole has been better off as people have more security and so are willing to take more risks as good capitalists will given a certain amount of security.
You just have seen too many Republican administrations that have been bought by the rich.
Ann, government is a machine – it can’t care for anything, even itself. Whether or not “we” care for the poor has nothing to do with government programs, which are about as impersonal as anything imaginable. Have you ever had to sit in a welfare office waiting room for four hours? What’s doled out there is not care – it’s money and permission and paperwork.
You seem willing to personalize government with warm images of FDR and JFK and – God help us – Lyndon Johnson. Pardon me, but that’s gilding the spittoon.
I’m optimistic by nature. I don’t think that the entire Affordable Care Act will be struck down by the court, but if it is, then *something* will have to be done to replace it. I’d remind folks here that there was some Republican interest during GW Bush’s administration in addressing the needs that the Affordable Care Act addresses.
One of the tragic flaws of the PPACA is the utterly partisan process by which it was passed – that process sowed the seeds for the political warfare we are seeing now.
If Congress and whoever is president in 2013 need to go back to the drawing board and build a replacement for PPACA, there will be a lot of lessons learned to draw from. Bipartisan support, I hope, will be one of them.
David Smith –
If poor people have to wait for hours to be served it’s brecuse people aren’t iwlling to py the taxes for eough people to serve them.
The governmennt is most assuredly not q mqchine made up of uncaing robots. My father was a bureaucrat, and I assure you that he was a very caring man. He began with the government as an assistant to Sen. Ransdall who invented the National institutes of Health and pushed it through Congress (in spite of the contrary efforts of Calvin Cooledge. Sen. Rnsdall’s concern was the health of all the people, American medicine is no the pride of the country, in large part due to that federal institution.
My brother’s best friend was sn assistant to the then House Whh]ip Hale Boggs, and i assure you that he was extremely committed to the welfare of the poor and the rest of us, as was another of Bogg’s assistants whom I knew. Maybe your trouble is all you have known have been uncaaring Republicans. But even so, I doubt that what you say it true of them either.
Yes, the government could be more efficient, but to claim that the people who work for it are robots is slander.
sure, different government offices are nt doubt more or less well run, but to make such a blanket charge as you just made is grossly unfair.
” – government programs, which are about as impersonal as anything imaginable. ”
As a recent recipient of VA healthcare, I disagree with you 100%. The people employed where I received my services are, in the main, extremely caring and far from impersonal. The system itself is very well organized and offers a wide range of services for many who, without it, would have nothing but emergency room care – which can be EXTREMELY impersonal.
Ann and Jimmy, I agree, if course, that people in government can be caring. Government, nevertheless, is a machine. It could, theoretically, exist without people.
Ann, I doubt that even if government had total control of all our money, welfare offices would be pleasant places.
“Have you ever had to sit in a welfare office waiting room for four hours? What’s doled out there is not care – it’s money and permission and paperwork.”
I’m sure experiences differ, but not all encounters with the welfare state are this bad.
I have waited for care at the local health department, which sometimes has enough dough to provide diagnostic testing for low-income women; you have to check every year, and sometimes they don’t.
I waited about 15 minutes to see the staffer, who approved the paperwork in about 5 minutes. I waited another 10 minutes to see the nurse practioner, and another five minutes for other tests to be scheduled through the hospital — I was out of there in under an hour.
The facility was clean and tidy, the staff pleasant and efficient, my personal finances were reviewed where I did not have to answer questions that the whole waiting room could hear, and I was treated with dignity and respect.