Rick Santorum's Fantasy World

Noted GOP presidential candidate and sad human being Rick Santorum is in the news again today. That's the trouble with living in Iowa during the pre-caucus season--I didn't even get a chance to blog about the last thing he was in the news for before he shot off his mouth again. (Two days ago Santorum signed the National Organization for Marriage's pledge that as president he would try to amend the Constitution to define marriage as "one man, one woman," which isn't really news because I suspect Santorum signs one or two pledges of this sort before breakfast every day, but which I would have used as a dig at Mitt Romney, who also signed the pledge in an effort to prove that there are no depths to which he will not sink to grab the votes of the most hatefully diseased minds in the state.)

So yesterday Santorum told the Des Moines Register editorial board that the courts have "created a right to sexual liberty that diminishes the right to religious liberty." I hope the editorial board laughed in his face, but I don't know anyone on the board so I don't know if that's their style or not. The story doesn't say one way or the other, so let's assume they heard him out.

His explanation: "Same-sex marriages jeopardizes religious liberty because the government may threaten license-holders such as marriage counselors who refuse to treat gay couples." He goes on to say that the courts have thus created a "super-right."

Much the way Santorum has created an argument that is "super-specious."

Sexual liberty, beyond the fact that it has nothing to do with same-sex marriage, is not now nor has it ever been a right granted by the courts. It's yours when you're born. It's a human right. You are free to have sex with anyone who is legally and mentally capable of granting consent. Courts and governments through history have tried to repress this right, but it makes no different if they're repressing it or recognizing it: The right exists.

Santorum doesn't want to acknowledge this because he lives in a fantasy world where his religious beliefs trump everything else. He also told the Register editors that if the pursuit of happiness means the pursuit of pleasure, then "we won't be a country very long."

This is where I wish someone would have asked "Rick--what the hell do you mean by that? I mean, seriously, that doesn't make sense. What will happen to the country? Tell us how it will cease to be a country. Please explain what you're talking about instead of making vague threats."

Personally, I think the country would be in more danger--certainly the Constitution would be--if people like Rick Santorum were given the power to define "the pursuit of happiness."