Polly-ticks

I know the two things which can kill a conversation, or a friendship, faster than any other are talking about religion and politics. But I just had to get this one off my chest. To set the record straight before I begin, I am not from Pennsylvania. I have visited the state, but never lived there.

Okay, now that that's out of the way... Rick Santorum was *not* re-elected in Pennsylvania. Pardon me while I shout "Yeah!" to the heavens and do a mighty double-fist pump. This might actually make me believe that there *is* a God, though I will never believe that this God bears any relation to the one Rick Santorum worships.

Santorum is about as disgusting a human being as I think it is possible to be without being a murderer, thief or assassin (or terrorist, for that matter). His record reads like a bad dream: butting his nose into the family drama of Terry Schiavo (and make no mistake, I blame Bush for doing the same thing. The politicians should *not* have gotten involved at all!), his attempt to smear homosexuality as being the same as incest, bigamy or adultery (Let's face it, homosexuals aren't cheating on anyone, and they are both adults, hardly the case in the other three examples he used), his support for "Creation Science"/ID, and worst of all, his scorn and willingness to demonize people who were stuck after Hurricane Katrina because, in his own words, "I mean people who don't heed those warnings and then put people at risk as a result of not heeding those warnings [...] There may be a need to look at tougher penalties on those who decide to ride it out and understand that there are consequences to not leaving." Gee, Rick, how many of those people didn't have the means to leave on their own? A vast majority of them! But yet you want to play God and decide these people should be punished!

And yes, he did later acknowledge that most of these people had no way to leave. But, gee, Ricky, why not think before you flap your jaw? He was also cited as one of the 20 most corrupt members of Congress by the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (their second report, in 2006). He educated his children at the expense of the Pennsylvania public, while spending a majority of the year living in Virginia, which violated the residency requirements for the school. He insisted that he didn't owe the state the $67,000 it had paid for the tuition for his children to attend this school (80% of the cost) while making a new plan to educate them elsewhere. He also wanted to be paid the homestead tax credit for his Pennsylvania home while he had renters living there, but decided not to file for the $70 because of the political race he was in. Gee, he just wanted to suck every buck possible from the state he was Senator of, didn't he?

For these, and many other stupid, short-sighted idiotic acts and statements, I am very glad he will be gone. In my own estimation, Santorum belongs in his own party, the Re-Smug-licans.