Much of the media rehashing of the Rick Santorum controversy
hasn't added much that's new. But Hendrik Hertzberg's piece in The
New Yorker, Man
Bites Dog, is very fine indeed. One astute observation among
many:
Santorum believes that while individuals have no "right to consensual sex within the home" the state does have "rights to limit individuals' wants and passions," which is to say their feelings. --
It's probably unfair to parse Santorum's pronouncements as if they were products of ratiocination. No wonder, though, that liberal Democrats, moderate Republicans, and other non-hard-right types are increasingly nostalgic for the likes of Ronald Reagan (who delivered a forceful but unfortunately not fatal blow to Republican homophobia when he opposed a referendum that would have barred homosexuals from teaching in California's public schools) and Barry Goldwater (whose suspicion of Big Government did not include an opt-out provision for bedrooms).
Ultimately, Santorum will be seen as a throwback to
authoritarian and statist conservatism, and the truly progressive,
liberty-advancing strain of the movement will win out. The reason:
at their best, traditional democratic liberalism (as opposed to
welfare-state liberalism), small-government conservatism, and
libertarianism inspire with the poetry of greater personal freedom
coupled with respect for the rights of others. Santorum and his
friends' appeal is premised on little more than fear. They're
dinosaurs, and I suspect that even they know it.
--Stephen H. Miller