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Campaign Crawlers
Waiting for Answers in Iowa
Will Santorum’s surge vindicate the power of prayer?
ALTOONA, Iowa — A teenager stood beside the salad bar at Pizza Ranch here Monday night, surrounded by a huge crowd packed into the restaurant for Rick Santorum’s final Iowa town hall meeting before Tuesday’s caucuses. Carl Cameron of Fox News was there, as was conservative talk-radio host Laura Ingraham and so many reporters and photographers that some Republican voters who had come to see the surging Republican presidential candidate were forced to park in the lot of a nearby Hy-Vee grocery store. This vivid evidence that the former Pennsylvania senator has suddenly become the man of the hour in the Hawkeye State clearly made an impression on the brown-haired girl standing beside the salad bar.
“Our prayers are paying off,” said 13-year-old Sarah Maria Santorum, whose father soon emerged from the throng, stood on a chair and addressed the crowd.
“This is our last town hall meeting — this is number 380,” the candidate told his supporters, many of whom have met him multiple times during the past year as he campaigned relentlessly across Iowa. “We’re here with the entire family,” said Santorum, praising his wife Karen for her support through the long campaign. “We felt that this was what we were called to do, to go out and speak and lay out a vision for this country, a vision that wasn’t just about taxes and spending, wasn’t just about growth. Yes, it’s about all those things and, as you know if you’ve been to my town hall meetings, I talk a lot about those things. But it’s also about what is at the core of our country, the values of this country. It’s about faith and family.”
For most of the past year, Santorum seemed to have little more than his faith and family to sustain his underdog campaign for the White House. His wife and children have been among his hardest-working volunteers, stuffing envelopes and making phone calls. If he had heeded the pollsters and pundits, he would have quit months ago. His poll numbers were stuck in the single digits and his fundraising was a fraction of the amounts collected by many of his GOP rivals. He got little recognition from the media and many of his campaign stops in the Hawkeye State weren’t even covered by the local press. “The national media has done a very good job of ignoring Rick Santorum,” he told a few dozen of his supporters at an Iowa event I covered in August, a week before the Ames Straw Poll. He suggested then that the lack of media coverage was a result of bias by liberal journalists who were trying to “suffocate” his campaign.
Whether or not they were trying to suffocate him then, the media are nearly smothering him in coverage now. Reporters from all over the world have descended on the Santorum campaign like a plague of locusts in the past week as polls showed him unexpectedly surging upward in the closing days before Tuesday’s first-in-the-nation caucuses. At an overcrowded event Monday afternoon in Boone, where two people passed out and required medical attention, Santorum’s press secretary Matt Benyon remarked about the massive media herd, “They’re rude. They’ll run people over. They nearly even ran over me.”
If more media coverage was one item on the Santorum campaign’s prayer list, their prayers have paid off beyond their wildest imaginings. And if getting more money was on the list, they’re getting lots of that, too. While campaign sources weren’t talking dollar amounts, Santorum himself has said they have received more online contributions in the past week than they had received in the past several months. There have been many more unexpected blessings for Santorum, who was flying coach class on his way back from Iowa when I interviewed him barely three weeks ago. The famous Duggar family, whose brood of 20 children have made them reality-TV stars, drove up from Arkansas to join Santorum on the campaign trail in Iowa this week, arriving in a bus decorated with “Santorum for President” signs. “We heard Rick needs some help, so here we are,” said the family’s 21-year-old son John David Duggar, explaining that Santorum “shares our values the best of all the candidates out there right now.”
Those values were under siege yesterday on Fox News, when liberal commentator Alan Colmes criticized the Santorum family as “crazy” for how they coped with the death of their newborn son in 1996. But that criticism backfired and Colmes quickly apologized, so that the net effect was to encourage sympathy for Santorum and his family. When even the attacks of political enemies end up helping a campaign, the faithful may be forgiven for thinking perhaps their prayers really are being answered this week in Iowa. Hopes for a miraculous victory, however, must give way to more pragmatic matters as Santorum’s political team tries to generate the final push for votes in Tuesday’s caucuses. “I think turnout is going to blow the doors off four years ago,” said former Iowa GOP executive director Chuck Laudner, one of the Santorum campaign’s top supporters. Speaking of the latest poll numbers, Laudner said, “Our trajectory is up. The only question is, how high can it go?”
Most observers expect Santorum to finish in the top three, but the polls are sufficiently volatile that few are willing to risk a firm prediction. However high Santorum surges Tuesday night, his campaign is prepared to carry their newfound momentum forward from Iowa. While Santorum has campaigned tirelessly in the Hawkeye State, he has not ignored New Hampshire — home state of his campaign manager, veteran Republican operative Mike Biundo — and also has built a strong grassroots organization in South Carolina. Several members of Santorum’s South Carolina team have come to Iowa to aid in the final push here, and one of them told me during an event Monday, “I’m laughing at all the media that keeps saying Rick doesn’t have any organization in South Carolina. He’s campaigned in South Carolina more than any other candidate has.… All we needed was a spark, and it looks like we got one.”
That spark seems to have started a wildfire for Santorum here in Iowa, where a strong showing might be the first step toward one of the most remarkable comebacks in America political history. Santorum’s surge could begin to redeem the pain his family suffered when he was defeated for re-election in Pennsylvania in 2006. (Jeffrey Lord recalls that campaign in his American Spectator column about Santorum today.) It was one of the worst wipeouts in the history of the Republican Party, which lost control of Congress in a landslide election driven largely by the unpopularity of the war in Iraq. Election Night 2006 was a painful one for many Republican, but for few was it more painful than for Santorum and his family. As the senator gave his concession speech that night, TV news cameras zoomed in on eight-year-old Sarah, who clung to a doll and wept uncontrollably. Sarah’s tears were mocked by liberal commentators, but inspired a songwriter to compose a tune that was recorded by country music star Martina McBride, the chorus of which says, “Blessed be the child who turns a loving eye and stops to pray for these times in which we live.”
Sarah Santorum and the rest of her family have been praying for many years, and tonight in Iowa they will wait for an answer to their prayers.
About the Author
Robert Stacy McCain is co-author (with Lynn Vincent) of Donkey Cons: Sex, Crime, and Corruption in the Democratic Party (Nelson Current). He blogs at The Other McCain.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (47) | Leave a comment
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Clint| 1.3.12 @ 6:48AM
We Pennsylvanian Conservatives Helped Hand Little Ricky His Ass In 2006.
Santorum Got Paid Back, with 41% of the vote to Casey's 59%,the largest margin of defeat ever for an incumbent Republican Senator in Pennsylvania.
That's What Ricky Got For Proppin' Up The RINO-CINO Poster Boy, Arlen Specter In Our 2004 Senate Primary Against Our Guy,Pat Toomey.
Now, Pat Toomey Is Our Tea Party Senator And Specter & Santorum Are Out.
If He Runs Again In Pennsylvania He'll Get Tossed Again.
Moe Blotz| 1.3.12 @ 8:37AM
So we conservatives in the rest of the country should thank you and your ilk for the DemocRAT takeover of the House, Senate, and Executive branches? Do you really want to keep the President we have now?
Silver Bullet| 1.3.12 @ 8:53AM
Clint: I've read enough of your rants that I've come to a conclusion: you need professional help, buddy.
rhoetus| 1.3.12 @ 11:03PM
Do any conservatives live east of the Mississippi and/or on either coast?
Jack in Wi.| 1.3.12 @ 7:02AM
Give me a break. Even here Santorum only has a few supporters. Rick could not even carry Pennsylvania in a general election. This nasty, chickenhawk , warmonger is no friend of the the pro life movement. His hate monagering and calls for war, gives all of us a bad name. He has always been in the pockets of the Israeli and Military Industrial lobbies. He would get near zero votes from Independents, disaffected Democrats, and the young. 80% of the people in this country are sick of these wars and the people who push them. No pro-war Republican can win. Bush 1, Clinton, bush 2, Obama and the Republicans like Romney, Santorum, and Gingrich are all the same. War and more war is their only solution to anything. Rick you can not be pushing for endless war and still call yourself pro-life and a Catholic.
Obama has killed Bin Laden and is bringing the troops home. He will seem like the peace candidate even though we all know it will not be true. For more of the same, war and bankruptcy, and loss of civil liberties, vote for Romney, Santorum or any of the rest. For Sanity Peace, Prosperity, and Liberty vote for Ron Paul.
Silver Bullet| 1.3.12 @ 8:55AM
@Jack in Wi.: Same goes for you: Get some help. People like you give Ron Paul a bad name.
Occam's Tool| 1.3.12 @ 12:45PM
Yup, the marketing skills of Joe Stalin, which is unfair to Joe, as he was able to market to dimwits quite effectively. More like the Marketing Skills of Ariel Sharon, without the decency of cause.
Tina B| 1.3.12 @ 7:37AM
I see the Paulbots are up bright and early and in full regalia. No more war, No more Israel, No more bad guys, only happy, happy, joy, joy for all the Paulbots and their country.
Oopsie, someone dropped a bomb on their country, oh no. . . no more country, no more Paulbots. Must be there were some bad guys left to bomb all the good Paulbots. How did that happen in Paulbot world?
Oh no. . .Mr. Paul. . .
chuck| 1.3.12 @ 8:36AM
Considering the first two comments, and the hatred shown to Santorum by the Paulestinians, I may have to give Santorum a second look. If Robo-Clint, and the idiot from Wi hate him, he must be alright.
Silver Bullet| 1.3.12 @ 8:56AM
Agreed. Jack in Wi and Clint are two of the best arguments FOR Santorum and AGAINST Ron Paul.
Timothy L. Pennell| 1.3.12 @ 8:34AM
Well. I see that Santorum has gotten someones' attention? Now, why would 2 of Ron Paul's Newsletter subscribers, be the 1st 2 people to rush to this site? Are we Scared?
Evidently. Clint is so upset that he FORGOT to end his incoherent blathering, with his idiotic, "make the Voices stop" screed, where he claims that the Tea Party is where he is (Some Prison Mental Facility, no doubt) and then names a State.
Jack*ss (in another State Facility, in Wisconsin, where he can be closely monitored) is also making his Fear part of the Public Record.
Seal team 6 Killed Bin Laden. Obama had to be dragged in, off the Golf Course, to sit and watch it on the T.V. And, yeah, he brought the Troops home, AGAINST the Advice of the Military Commanders, and we all know how that's working out.
For an old Fool who's spent half hie life chasing Windmills, Legalized Heroin/Methamphetamines and PCP? Vote for Ron Paul.
So, if you hate Jews, wanna know how to Kill Blacks and hide the body, or just own one of those Run of the Mill: MILITIAS, up in Wisconsin? Ron Paul is your guy.
Why is he in TEXAS, when the Iowa Caucus is Today?
He forgets, sometimes. That's what OLD FOOLS do.
Moe Blotz| 1.3.12 @ 8:42AM
Congressman Paul is riding his bicycle round Houston 20 miles whilst the temperature is more amenable to his physical well being.
Occam's Tool| 1.3.12 @ 12:52PM
I look forward to winning! Today we encompass the destruction of Paul, Genghis Khan style:
“The greatest happiness is to scatter your enemy, to drive him before you, to see his cities reduced to ashes, to see those who love him shrouded in tears..."
Tonight the Merkavas roll!
Occam's Tool| 1.3.12 @ 12:52PM
And, I'd love to see Santorum win.
Al Adab| 1.3.12 @ 1:00PM
OT:
"...to trample your enemies benaeath your ponies hooves and to clasp to your bosom his wives and daughters" Stark fellow old Genghis.
Occam's Tool| 1.3.12 @ 10:58PM
Hey, as of 9:56 PM its Santorum, Romney, Paul, and the percentages are starting to stretch a little. By the way, Jack, Clint: there are only 6000 Joooos in Iowa.
And now Rick Santorum's campaign, using Merkavas, will teach Jack and Clint what "Trench Ironing" means. How about a nice cup of STFU, boys!
Occam's Tool| 1.3.12 @ 10:59PM
Sorry, "it's Santoru..." Writing about Jack made me illiterate for a moment.
Tina B| 1.3.12 @ 8:57AM
Hi Chuck, Tim and Moe,
I was wonderin why it was only me 'n two Paulbots and an article about Santorum. Like Chuck, I feel a growing interest in Rick Santorum and his courage and ethics. I will start my due diligence and get ready to answer the liberals in my world. Yes, I am in the world but not of the world. Like many of you.
chuck| 1.3.12 @ 9:24AM
Tina, it's a slow day at work today, so I slept in a little longer. Robo-Clint and the idiot from Wi were up early today, just like kids on Christmas Day, all excited about their "Messiah" on the day of the Iowa caucuses. Clint has already peed his Storm-trooper uniform from giddiness, and his Momma has had to wash it again for him. He is presently spit-polishing his jack-boots, getting ready for a big day of "face stomping". The idiot in Wi has also soiled himself, but that is more due to his age and senility. He wishes they would let him out of the "home", so he could join Robo-Clint for the "face-stomping" festivities.
Vern Crisler| 1.3.12 @ 9:25AM
Just wait until Santorum starts getting the media scrutiny the other candidates (except Mitt) have gotten. Can you say Sarah Palin? In addition, his numbers will come down when the negative advertising starts focusing on him instead of Newt or Paul.
Bob Grant| 1.3.12 @ 12:40PM
Explain your comparison to him and Palin? I see no comparison whatsoever.
Vern Crisler| 1.3.12 @ 1:06PM
Both conservative, politically and religiously. And just as liberals make fun of Santorum's family (as Colmes did), so they made fun of Palin's family (and made horrible claims about it). The level of vitriol directed against her was similar to that directed against Goldwater. If Santorum becomes the nominee, he will receive the same treatment, and his poll number will go down.
bill| 1.3.12 @ 9:57AM
Santorum is another Huckabee, who will make a cameo appearance in IA, and then evaporate. Santorum voted for NCLB and the Medicare PartD, and supported Spector, who like Santorum lost his re-election bid.
Santorum will make a competitive VP candidate, because GOP need to carry PA in 2012.
Otherwise, He will never win the GOP nod.
kf| 1.3.12 @ 9:58AM
The subtitle of this article is offensive. What about those of us who are praying for another candidate? Praying is only vindicated if Santorum wins? How arrogant of you.
Moe Blotz| 1.3.12 @ 10:14AM
If the candidate you are praying for wins, then that will also vindicate the power of prayer. In Rick Santorum's case, he is praying for strength and guidance, not just victory. Praying for an outcome is usually fruitless, you have to work for it.
Al Adab| 1.3.12 @ 10:25AM
It is not any particular candidate who should be the subject of our prayers, but rather the strength and future of our nation itself. Our idolotry has reached such proportions that perhaps we have been weighed in the balance and found wanting. Yet, hope remains: "If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves and pray... I will restore their land." That should be our prayer.
Moe Blotz| 1.4.12 @ 4:35AM
One can also pray for a candidate to rise above the rest and keep our nation strong, what?
Occam's Tool| 1.3.12 @ 12:54PM
As long as you ain't prayin' for Paul, that's all I care about. If you are, here's more Genghis:
“I am the punishment of God...If you had not committed great sins, God would not have sent a punishment like me upon you.”
Time for Paul to listen up.
bill| 1.3.12 @ 11:30AM
VOTE RICK PERRY:
Rick Perry will:
Repeal ObamaCare
Ban abortion
Ban gay marriage
Ban hiring and sheltering illegals
Deport all illegals
Legalize guns in all 50 states
Pass the BBA
Eliminate the property tax and the death tax
Abolish all regulations
Abolish Dept. of education, commerce, energy, EPA, HUD
Secure the border
Increase the defence budget
Explore the energy sector
Dismantle Iran from acquiring the nuclear power
Help Israel achieve economic freedom and security by increasing aid
Al Adab| 1.3.12 @ 12:12PM
It would be nice if the President ruled by executive order and performed as you suggest. However, after seeing this one rule by executive order we had better not go there.
That being the case what of this agenda is actually likely ever to transpire?
TrueBlue | 1.3.12 @ 4:00PM
In order to get rid of those various agencies, first he would need to remove Executive Order 10988, authorizing federal employees to unionize for the purpose of bargaining rights. That at least the President can do so long as they have a pair, the rest is a bit harder.
Seek| 1.3.12 @ 7:20PM
Like he's managed to do anything close to this in Texas affairs during his tenure as governor. Dream on, dreamer.
bill| 1.3.12 @ 2:49PM
We already have the House of Reps., we need to capture the Oval Office and the senate, and that will help pass those legislations, no need for executive orders.
MSM underestimated Reagan in 1980, but he won the GOP nod and defeated Carter handily. Perry will rebound and staged a come from behind victory against Obama if he gets the GOP nominee.
We pray for Rick Perry.
bill| 1.3.12 @ 2:57PM
My GOP Dream Team:
President: Rick Perry
VP: Tom Ridge
AG: Rudy Giuliani
Treasury: Michelle Bachmann
DHS: Joe Arpaio
Secretary of state: Rick Santorum
Seems like we have a team like Saints or Packers, unbeatable and amazing talent.
Al Adab| 1.3.12 @ 4:11PM
Treasury, Steve Forbes
Deconsolidate DHS and return duties to military where appropriate.
End the Czarist tyranny.
We do have a solid talent pool. Just a matter of right fit.
Margie| 1.3.12 @ 4:45PM
Teve Torbes! Teve Torbes!
Remember that?
In all seriousness though, I've always like the man.
Treasury would be excellent, I agree.
Al Adab| 1.3.12 @ 4:52PM
Thanks Margie, he does understand money.
Happy New Year to you and yours. May it bring us a rebirth of liberty and prosperity for all.
Margie| 1.3.12 @ 5:11PM
Happy New Year to you and yours too, Al.
Occam's Tool| 1.3.12 @ 11:01PM
And yours, Dear Margie. I like ya.
Wow, Santorum, Mitt, and Paul in 3rd. Just as predicted. It's gonna be so fun to cheese grate Clint.
"Treason does not prosper..."
martin j smith| 1.3.12 @ 4:21PM
Will Iowa be for Iowans or will there be imports to vote who are actually Socialists or others--i.e. thus inflating the Ron Paul numbers. Whatever it represents 5 mil of 300 mil in the US that is about 1.3% of the US population. Lets get into proportion guys and stop the BS it turns me off.
POST American| 1.3.12 @ 10:04PM
-------------------BOTTOM LINE-----------------------
"We are watching over here in Germany.
It is looking just like what happened to
Germany. Hitler was elected. He passed
laws to MAKE himself dictator. This
is the same thing. We can't believe what's
happening."
---CALLER from Germany
Infowars
(yesterday)
AS posse commintatus is overthrown
--AS it's been widely announced foreign
troops will be used on American soil
--'in case of emergency'
---AS TSA is now to be deployed on highways
and cities nationwide
------AS FEMA camps are on stand by activation
--------AS full-spectrum police surveillance,
monitoring, data collection and tracking are
now ABSOLUTE REALITY
-----------AS the stealth franchise slum amalgation
with Globalist collapsed Mexico gallops on
---------------AS the U.S. Bill of Rights has been
all but discarded with the passage of NDAA
1031 on the 222nd Anniversary of the Bill
of Rights
-------------------AS OBAMA, the stealth proponent
and overseer of the provisions signs it into law
as one of his final acts of 2011
---WE had ALLLLL better hope RON PAUL
wins the nomination ---and the Presidency.
For years we've been warning you about the
decades underway Globalist RED China
world TREASON and EUGENICS OP.
For years we've been predicting RED
Chinese 'assistance' as soon as 2015
as America is systematically DIS---Abeled.
We're now, if anything. prepared to
consider that intervention as coming
even sooner.
-----------------YOU WERE WARNED-----------------
And remember, there's a special place,
even in secular hell, for the Sin AGAINST
Knowledge.
--------------------------AMEN----------------------------
somnolence| 1.3.12 @ 10:14PM
To the fervent Perry posters: Stick a fork in him as he is done. He has spent millions on a road to nowhere as tonight is proving.
somnolence| 1.3.12 @ 10:16PM
BTW Gingrich is so desperate it is really quite sad. Paul will be a legitimate, dangerous threat all the way to the Convention, and perhaps beyond. The objective is to be rid of Barry Sotero.
somnolence| 1.3.12 @ 10:30PM
As to the assured adage about Rick Perry posted above: I, too, hate abortion. But no living mortal now residing on planet Earth will ever end it. Never.
somnolence| 1.3.12 @ 10:31PM
Perry's performance has been lackluster in this campaign in light of the millions he has spent. He should leave gracefully instead of being the burnt toast he has now become.
Naturalborn Texicanette| 1.3.12 @ 11:19PM
Perry has pretty much been ignored by the liberal media, especially after they focused on his stumbles, over, and over, and over again, ad nauseum, in an obvious attempt to kill his campaign.
And now, they ignore him. All they are interested in is the "got cha's." Not in his platform. Frankly, I think the liberal media has a huge bias against Texicans.
Perry has more experience and is better at governing than any of the other candidates. He KNOWS how to run a state with efficiency, fiscal responsibility, and success........something only Romney can claim to have had, though I wouldn't say he's faced the difficult and often dangerous challenges Perry has had to deal with.
Typically, a Texan doesn't give up easily. He'll know IF that time comes, when to hang up his spurs. Texans don't give up easily, and I don't expect at this early point in the campaign, that he will.
POST American| 1.4.12 @ 5:57AM
---------------------FINAL WORD-----------------------
-----There is NO 'liberal' or 'conservative'
media ---and certainly NO PRESS.
Alex Jones stands a a lone sentinel.
'Cutting Through the Matrix' --IS--
about the ONLY informed and unflinching
commentary regularly broadcast.
-------THAT'S IT.