Oy, Gotta Wipe This Santorum Off My Shoes

[filkertom]

bayushisan alerted me to one-time, and apparently one-more-time, presidential hopeful Rick Santorum putting his foot in his mouth again:

In an interview with a New Hampshire radio station Tuesday, Rick Santorum suggested the nation's "abortion culture" is to blame for the Social Security program's financial problems.

Per The Hill's Shane D'Aprile, the former Pennsylvania senator and 2012 presidential hopeful told WEZS Radio that not enough children are being born to support the troubled entitlement system in part because of the rising number of abortions.

"The Social Security system, in my opinion, is a flawed design, period. But having said that, the design would work a lot better if we had stable demographic trends," Santorum said. "We don't have enough workers to support the retirees . . . . A third of the young people in America are not in America today because of abortion."

Santorum was responding to a caller, who suggested abortion was behind the nation's troubled Social Security and Medicare infrastructure. Per The Hill, the former senator said the caller was "absolutely right."

"We have seven children, so we're doing our part to fund the Social Security system," Santorum added.

What struck me about this was not the utter insanity of it -- people pay for their own SocSec benefits but we don't have enough people doing it because abortions are just the most fun thing to do on the weekend so there aren't enough benefits for the people who aren't aborted, or somethin' -- but, surprisingly to me at least, the comments.

See, Yahoo comment pages tend to be a real cesspool. Nasty, profane, racist, ever-damn-thing but readable. But, on this issue, it appears that Santorum is a uniter, not a divider: A whole lot of the comments have nailed the economic truth about Social Security -- it would be just fine if Congress didn't keep borrowing from it, if we weren't financing two-and-a-half wars off the books, if we actually had enough jobs for all the unemployed so they could pay into SocSec.

It was quite encouraging. Over the past few months, there have been things -- the governors' situation in Wisconsin and Ohio and Michigan and Florida, the ravings of Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin, the complete and utter lack of any advancement on the job front by the Republican-controlled House despite them campaigning pretty much exclusively on job creation last year -- that have actually begun to catch the attention of a majority of people. And they do not like what they see.

Maybe... just maybe... America is beginning to wake up.

Comments

[sdelmonte]

Wait. He didn't go after birth control? Or women having careers and waiting to have husbands, if they have any at all? Or gays not having children because they aren't good clean procreative sex? He's slipping.

He is not, however, a hypocrite. He does have seven children. Poor kids, with a dad who is clearly depending on them to support him in his old age.

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

I'm goin' down to Florida, and wipe Santorum off my shoes
Or maybe California, and wipe Santorum off my shoes
I'll ride that Yahoo Comment Special
And lose these Red State Blues...

I agree. I think we started waking up in '06, really got stirred up after Prop H8 in '08, went back for 40 winks, but since November, I think we're really actually truly starting to maybe sorta kinda get the idea that



we gotta do this crap ourselves.


The politicians won't do it for us.

No, we don't like what we see... The trick is, getting your average schmoe to quit sucking on the Faux Snooze teat for long enough to see what's going on under their collective nose... but I don't honestly think it's *that* hard.

The trick is, getting folks' heads around the idea of not giving the Powers that Be the money they need to fund all this stuff. If we give the corporate purse strings a good hard yank, stuff will start happening.

At least I hope. The *fearmongering* going on isn't helping.

But ya gotta hope. To do otherwise... doesn't bear contemplation.

Hope, and get up and do something about it.

[bayushisan.livejournal.com]

There are numerous means by which we could make social security solvent it is just getting people to agree on a method that's the issue.

To Rick Santorum's point I have to say that it sounds like all he really cares about is the kid being born. This is a common flaw within the prolife community, and this is coming from someone who is very prolife. I honetly don't think that overturning Roe v. Wade is a fight that can be won. I'd rather see the money and effort spent on doing so put towards establishing clinics to provide prenatal care and helping children get health care. Heck I'd love to see a movement within the prolife movement to adopt or get involved in foster care so that those kids can have homes. I don't see it happening any time soon though, mores the pity.

[alverant.livejournal.com]

I wish more pro-lifers were like you. Being pro-life should be more than "anti-abortion". No offense, but I'd give their movement more respect if they spent more time helping those who are post-born.

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

Saw a VERY pointed bumper sticker on that topic over the weekend:

"Are you pro-LIFE, or just pro-BIRTH?"

[nagasvoice.livejournal.com]

Thank you, I really appreciate you making that point. Far too many people, prolife, social conservatives, etc., are so indifferent to kids' well-being once they're born. I could understand having a ferocious discussion about taking responsibility, about who has the kids and when, about *how* to make sure the babies born get taken care of, what level of support is needed and who needs to provide it and be held accountable for it, why we're not doing it very well now, on and on. I think all of that could use some discussion.

[bayushisan.livejournal.com]

Thank you as well. I wasn't always so thoughtful, but I'd like to think that I've grown some since highschool and college and my beliefs and point of view have grown as well.

There was a time when I was a mouthy little jerk to be honest. I was unthinkingly conservative and kind of hostile about it. I've been through a lot since then though and my experiences have done much to shape my point of view.

Anymore I think that people should just be treated fairly and that more Christians should spend their time trying to live their beliefs instead of talking about them. Talking is easy, living is much, much harder.

[nagasvoice.livejournal.com]

Indeed, I agree you are absolutely right on that last sentence!

[delazan.livejournal.com]

Maybe... just maybe... America is beginning to wake up.

From your mouth to Gods' ears.
-L.

[peachtales.livejournal.com]

One can hope that people are waking up. Sadly, what I hear from so many people every day is stupid crap, so I am seriously worried how I can go on living in a country that seems to be sliding toward putting me, as a woman, in jail until I produce babies. At least I wouldn't have to worry about my (former) house if I decided to move, since they already took that away from me.
Oh by the way, this is what my really tired stream of consciousness sounds like.

[kilbia.livejournal.com]

I am glad that even the average Yahoo! reader was able to catch the one major flaw in Santorum's logic: Social Security's viability doesn't depend on how many people *live* in this country, but how many of them HAVE JOBS AND CAN PAY INTO IT.

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

One thing that would help a lot would be removing the salary cap on SS contributions. As it stands now, J. Average Citizen pays FICA on every penny he or she earns, while the corporate fat cats stop paying it at the $108,000 mark.