The Romney campaign is howling with delight over a Rick Santorum gaffe in Illinois this afternoon, as the Pennsylvania senator ? already viewed as a candidate who may be more of a culture warrior than a job creator ? said the following, via Juana Summers:
We need a candidate who's going to be a fighter for freedom. Who's going to get up and make that the central theme in this race because it is the central theme in this race. I don't care what the unemployment rate's going to be. Doesn't matter to me. My campaign doesn't hinge on unemployment rates and growth rates. It's something more foundational that's going on. We have one nominee who says he wants to run the economy. What kind of conservative says that the president runs the economy? What conservative says I'm the guy, because of my economic experience, that can create jobs? I don't know. We conservatives generally think that government doesn't create jobs. That what government does is create an atmosphere for jobs to be created in the private sector.
Santorum tried to clean up the comment a bit on the rope line, saying this:
Of course I care about the unemployment rate, I want the unemployment rate to go down, but I'm saying my candidacy doesn't hinge on whether the unemployment rate goes up and down, our candidacy's about something that transcends that. It's about freedom. It's not about, you know, Gov. Romney's idea that he's going to fix the economy, which is something that of course we as Republicans don't believe that presidents fix the economy. We believe that we try to do things to create an atmosphere for the economy to fix itself.
The moment is similar to Romney's "I like being able to fire people" gaffe from January: What the candidate was trying to say was fairly benign but the literal words that came out of his mouth reinforce an unflattering perception that's already very much in circulation.
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Dumbasss. Even if he didn't mean to say it this way, it's going to be a nice soundbite for his opponents for the near future...
Re: Santorum says he doesn't care about unemployment.
"We need a candidate who's going to be a fighter for freedom."
Did he really say that? What kind of freedom is he talking about? The freedom to believe in whatever god I want? The freedom to be in control of my body, my sexual practices, and my reproductive rights? The freedom to marry whomever I want?
As for the rest, color me shocked. The only thing he cares about are the gayz. And birth control.
Strange little man.
You're free to believe in Jesus and engage in heterosexual missionary position sex, then free to birth a dozen babies before your uterus frees itself from your body by dropping out of your vagina. Silly.
I think he only cares about SAHMs who are into home-schooling, fetuses, conservative white catholics - oh - and blue collar workers in Ohio and Pa. That's about it.