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Feb. 8, 2013
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Jewish World Review
April 11, 2012/ 19 Nissan, 5772
Santorum's Gettysburg surrender
By
Dana Milbank
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
GETTYSBURG, Pa.
Three weeks ago, Rick Santorum chose this Civil War town to give a defiant speech about his need to stay in the presidential race, linking his struggle against Mitt Romney to “the things that the people in this battlefield just down the road fought for.” Recalling the blood shed at Gettysburg, he exhorted more than 1,000 supporters: “That’s why we must go out and fight this fight.” But if Santorum thought he was George Meade rallying the Union forces, he turned out to be leading Pickett’s charge — the disastrous Confederate offensive here at which Gen. George Pickett lost half of his division and the war turned against the South. Santorum lost the Wisconsin and Maryland primaries, his poll numbers plunged, his money dried up, conservative and Republican Party leaders called on him to quit, and he canceled a string of campaign events. After calling off his first two appearances Tuesday, Santorum rolled into the Gettysburg Hotel — the same spot where he gave his Gettysburg Address three weeks ago — for what the campaign had said in a Facebook posting would be a “Rally for Rick.” This time, however, he was bumped from the ballroom by a convention of district attorneys and had to settle for a small conference room with seats for 20 reporters.
Even in defeat, Santorum sounded defiant, not even mentioning Romney in his 15-minute speech. “We made a decision over the weekend that while this presidential race for us is over for me, and we will suspend our campaign effective today, we are not done fighting,” he announced, standing with some family members in front of a wrinkled American flag (an aide brought an iron, but there hadn’t been enough time to use it). Recalling his “game on!” exclamation after the Iowa caucuses, Santorum added: “I know a lot of folks are going to write, maybe those even at the White House, ‘game over.’ But this game is a long, long, long way from over.” But for all the tough talk, Santorum’s once-fiery presidential bid went out like a candle Tuesday here in his home state. His campaign, always a shoestring operation, lacked the finances and organization to keep pace with Romney for the Republican nomination. The campaign spent its final day in typical disarray. After a long weekend off while Santorum’s young daughter Bella was treated in a hospital, the campaign canceled Tuesday’s events overnight — so late that aides neglected to update the schedule on his Web site. Several of Santorum’s remaining supporters showed up at his morning event at a sportsman’s club in Bedford, Pa., but found not so much as a Santorum sign. The campaign then scheduled its Gettysburg “rally” for 2 p.m. But this, too, turned out to be bad information. The few supporters who showed up were told by hotel workers that the event was only for the media. “They advertise it that he’s going to be here so you can see him!” Santorum supporter Frank Johnston complained at the hotel’s reception desk. That was the least of the complaints Santorum has been hearing. Sen. John McCain said last week that “it’s time for a graceful exit.” Southern Baptist official Richard Land, who rallied a group of religious conservatives to endorse Santorum, said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” that Santorum “ought to seriously consider leaving the race.” Even Newt Gingrich, who had attacked Romney savagely, has shifted to the past tense: “Turns out he had more things to hit with than I did.” Although he faced defeat in Pennsylvania’s April 24 primary, Santorum was disinclined to listen — right up until the time he took the stage Tuesday afternoon at a lectern still bearing his “Join the Fight” slogan. Santorum flashed a goofy grin and raised his eyebrows as he entered. He spoke about his ill daughter, his grandfather in the coal mines, his sweater vests and topics from Iran to the “moral enterprise that is America.” The closest he came to supporting Romney was a vow to “make sure that we defeat President Barack Obama.” (He ignored shouted questions about whether he would endorse Romney.) With his trademark bravado, he boasted of accomplishing “things that no political expert would have ever expected.” And he compared himself to another politician who once visited Gettysburg. “What I tried to bring to the battle was what Abraham Lincoln brought to this battlefield back in 1863 on November 19th,” Santorum said. “He talked about this country being conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.” Yes, Santorum, like Lincoln, spoke at Gettysburg. But it’s a safe bet that the world will little note nor long remember Santorum’s version.
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Previously:
• 04/09/12 The facts vs. Mitt Romney
• 04/06/12 Mitt Romney, talking to the press, keeps the press at a distance
• 04/05/12 From tracking al-Qaeda to tracking the wayward spouse
• 04/04/12 Budget cuts as back-door deregulation
• 03/26/12 My pet Mitt
• 03/22/12 Mitt Romney's latest gaffe may be etched in history
• 03/20/12 Supreme Court conceives of life after death
• 03/15/12 Conservative for Obama: The British PM as campaign prop
• 03/14/12 In Section 60, a silent search for meaning
• 03/13/12 Super Friends, unite
• 03/12/12 It's time to believe: Romney's a winner
• 03/07/12 Settling in to Washington's ways
• 03/06/12 AIPAC beats the drums of war
• 03/05/12 Did Republicans forget the women's vote?
• 02/29/12 Mitt Romney's acceptance speech, in (mostly) his own words
• 02/28/12 Common ground becomes a great divide
• 02/27/12 An expert witness for the GOP gender gap
• 02/21/12 Where Romney shines
• 02/15/12 A Republican death wish?
• 02/14/12Obama's budget games
• 02/13/12 Are GOPers playing right into Obama's hands?
• 02/08/12 Obama pumps the compressor of Joe Hudy's Extreme Marshmallow Cannon
• 02/07/12 Abramoff's atonement
• 02/01/12 Why we in the media just love Newt
• 01/31/12 The end of the road for Newt Gingrich?
• 01/25/12 Gingrich is Obama's best surrogate
• 01/24/12 Tim Pawlenty, Mitt Romney's attack dog
• 01/16/12 Mitt Romney's Al Gore problem
• 01/12/12 Kamikaze Gingrich, on the loose in South Carolina
• 01/11/12 Journalists' campaign trail secrets revealed
• 01/10/12 Mitt Romney's money problem
• 01/09/12 Newtonian exceptionalism
• 01/05/12 Mitt Romney out of control
• 01/04/12 Indecision 2012: In Iowa and the GOP
• 01/03/12 Rick Santorum's curious closing argument
• 12/28/11 A few cracks in my crystal ball
• 12/23/11 A few cracks in my crystal ball
• 12/20/11 Strange brews and views?
• 12/19/11 Cellphone ban would be a distraction
• 12/15/11 Harry Reid, Mitch McConnell and the Malfunction Minuet
• 12/14/11 The presidential auction of 2012
• 12/12/11 Newt's tactics comes back to haunt him
• 12/06/11 Can an anthem save Occupy non-movement?
• 12/05/11 The winner of the GOP campaign: Washington
• 11/30/11 Barney the bully: Congressman Frank's other legacy
• 11/23/11 Jon Kyl's search-and-destroy mission
• 11/21/11 Pay to play, brought to you by Washington
• 11/17/11 Big enough to save the supercommittee?
• 11/16/11 Why Newt Gingrich won't last
• 11/08/11 The 2012 campaign gets seedier
• 11/06/11 A Machiavellian model for Obama
• 11/03/11 The Herman Cain crack-up
• 11/01/11 Cain can --- he will survive
• 10/27/11 Stuntmen of the supercommittee
• 10/26/11 Democrats on the sidelines
• 10/24/11 Rick Perry's birther Parade
• 10/24/11 The birthers eat their own
• 10/19/11 The GOP's middle man
• 10/17/11 The waiting for nothing Congress
• 10/12/11 Sparsely occupied D.C.: Why the movement hasn't caught on
• 10/10/11 Can Obama strike an alliance with Occupy Wall Street?
• 10/06/11 Chris Christie, such a presidential tease
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• 09/28/11 Cain could deliver
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• 09/22/11 Why Ron Paul is winning the GOP primary
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• 09/19/11 Dems for Romney?
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• 09/07/11 Mitt Romney finds his (corporate) voice
• 09/01/11 The infallible Dick Cheney
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• 08/29/11 Wanted: More bite from Obama the Great Nibbler
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• 08/08/11 The FAA shutdown and the new rules of Washington
• 08/04/11 Lt. Col. Allen West fires a round at the Tea Party
• 08/03/11 Government on autopilot
• 08/02/11 Dems mourn debt deal like death
• 07/27/11 Life imitates sport
• 07/26/11 Obama and Boehner take on Washington
• 07/21/11 Why Americans are angry at Congress
• 07/20/11 The new party of Reagan
• 07/18/11 Rob Portman, the boring Midwesterner who could bring sanity to the debt debate
• 07/13/11 John Boehner's bind
• 07/04/11 Stephen Colbert, Karl Rove and the mockery of campaign finance
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• 05/16/11: The medical mystery of Mitt Romney
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• 05/09/11: The GOP debate: America -- and the party -- needs the grown-ups
• 05/05/11: Mitch Daniels, an alternative to scary
• 05/03/11: Obama's victory lap
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• 04/28/11: Obama's birther day: Why did he lower himself by appearing in the briefing room?
• 04/27/11: Obama, lost in thought
• 04/24/11: Andrew Breitbart and the rifts on the right
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• 04/06/11: Paul Ryan's irresponsible budget
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• 04/04/11: Robert Gibbs, Facebook and the White House corporate placement service
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• 02/09/11: Arianna Huffington's ideological transformation
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