Democrats have an unexpected new foil in their effort to label the GOP as hostile to women: Rick Santorum.
After hammering away for a year at the message that Republicans are indifferent to women?s health and economic well-being, President Barack Obama?s party has been handed a nearly perfect political punching bag in the former Pennsylvania senator, whose down-the-line cultural conservatism is a major selling point in the 2012 primaries.
Continue ReadingGender issues have taken center stage in recent days as Santorum has made incendiary comments suggesting women not be allowed to serve in combat roles in the military (he later said he was concerned men would want to protect them). Santorum has also stood by his opposition to contraception, reiterating his position that it shouldn?t be covered by the national health-care law because it is ?inexpensive.? While the ex-senator doesn?t favor outlawing birth control, he is personally opposed to it.
In another major hit this week, Santorum?s most prominent financial backer, Wyoming financier Foster Friess, joked on television that back in the day, women ? he called them ?gals? ? would practice contraception by holding aspirin ?between their knees.?
The timing of these flare-ups is politically dangerous for Santorum, as Republicans on Capitol Hill this week held an all-male hearing on birth control and the controversy is just starting to fade over the Obama administration?s health-care ruling on contraception and religious groups.
These issues may work in the ex-senator?s favor in the Republican presidential primary. But to longtime Democratic women operatives, Santorum?s rise in the presidential race represents the return of an old rival ? a 1990s-era culture warrior whose political comeback is as shocking as it is inadvertently useful for the Democratic cause.
?He constantly says things that are offensive to women,? said Kim Gandy, former president of the National Organization for Women. ?Regardless of whether Republican women like some of his policies, I think they?re going to be so turned off by his judgmental stand on the independence and essential rights of women that they won?t be able to vote for him.?
?The idea that a man who opposes something as widespread as the use of birth control would even be taken seriously as a candidate, would be shocking to me,? Gandy said. ?He makes Romney look like a liberal by comparison ? but only by comparison. At least Mitt Romney hasn?t said women shouldn?t use birth control.?
Already one of his party?s most ardent abortion rights foes, Santorum, in his 2005 book ?It Takes a Family,? advocated an old-school role for women in the home and accused ?radical feminists? of undermining families by telling women ?professional accomplishments are the key to happiness.? Santorum says his wife authored that section.
Thus far in the presidential race, Santorum hasn?t anchored his campaign message in gender-related issues ? or really, in social issues more generally. He has emphasized his cultural traditionalism as a way of drawing contrasts with Romney, but the main thrust of the Republican?s sales pitch is his adherence to small-government conservatism and his pledge to revive the manufacturing sector of the economy.
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