Rick Santorum is running for president, and every conservative and Republican should listen to him.
I can see readers’ eyes rolling now. Many conservatives, libertarians, and moderate Republicans dislike Santorum. They may think he’s a horrible messenger. They may find him terribly wrong on some issues. They may think he has no chance of winning the nomination, or that he would be a disaster in the general election.
These conclusions flow from some combination of reality, petty identity politics, disappointing experiences from the rudderless Bush era of the GOP, and clear-eyed political analysis. But Santorum haters and Santorum dismissers should be able to set aside their personal feelings about the man, and to listen for a moment to his message.
His most important message for the GOP, for libertarians, and for conservatives: We need to care about the working class, about people who are struggling, and about the poor. Republicans need to listen to these people — even if they occupy the 47 percent Mitt Romney so easily discarded — and talk to them, too.
The Santorum-Romney contrast became clear the night they tied for first place in the Iowa caucuses. Both men spoke about the problems with federal welfare programs. Romney castigated welfare recipients as the takers in an “entitlement society,” which is at odds with a “merit society.” This view plagues the American Right — that those who aren’t successful are necessarily that way through some personal perfidy.
Santorum, that same night in Iowa, also took aim at the welfare state. But instead of casting the poor as the bad guys, he made it clear that the poor are the victims of government programs that “increas[e] dependency.”
Rather than blame and write off the working class and the poor, Santorum’s message is to court them, to show them you are on their side, and that you are fighting for them.
Following Iowa in 2012, Santorum ran a respectable second place in the primaries. Partly, he was the default anti-Romney vote for anti-establishment conservatives. But also he connected with blue-collar voters who weren’t your typical William F. Buckley disciples, and who felt excluded by the Romney wing, and the K Street wing of the GOP.
Santorum says his strong second-place showing, as well as his multiple wins in Democratic-leaning Pennsylvania, were “not just because I stood for something. It’s because I stood for someone — the American worker.”
The importance of these voters to the GOP became clear when the votes were counted in Romney’s November 2012 loss to Obama. About 5 million to 7 million fewer white voters showed up than expected, according to political analyst Sean Trende, and “These voters were largely downscale, Northern, rural whites.” In other words, Santorum Republicans stayed home.
How to turn them out? Part of it is tapping into the perception that the game is rigged in the American economy today, with big business and big government doing the rigging.
Santorum sounded those notes in his campaign announcement May 27: “Working families don’t need another President tied to big government or big money,” he said.
When discussing the economic devastation of the rust belt, Santorum blamed the “excesses and indifference of big labor, big government, and yes, big business.”
Of “Hillary Clinton and big business,” Santorum said “their priorities are profits and power. My priority is you — the American worker.”
Santorum, on the policy front, often takes the Pat Buchanan, Ross Perot route, calling for less immigration and protection of U.S. manufacturers. The danger with big-government populism is (a) it usually corrupts over time into big-government corporatism, and (b) Democrats can always go bigger on the big-government front.
A free-market populist agenda could include a war on corporate welfare, tax simplification, a payroll tax cut, clearing away regulatory burdens to sole practitioners and small businesses, and reforming safety net programs so that they ensnare fewer and empower more.
But when Santorum talks about helping the working class and looking out for those who are struggling, he makes a point that’s crucial: “I almost feel uncomfortable talking about, ‘Well, we need to do that to win.’ ” Santorum told me at the recent Southern Republican Leadership Conference. “We need to do that because it’s the right thing for America.”
Caring for those who are struggling, stripping the insiders of their political privilege, and ending the government programs that hurt people — these are things we have a moral obligation to do. If it does nothing else, Santorum’s campaign will hopefully convince Republicans to take up this effort.
Timothy P. Carney, The Washington Examiner’s senior political columnist, can be contacted at tcarney@washingtonexaminer.com. His column appears Sunday and Wednesday on washingtonexaminer.com.
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