Morning Joe 2/8/2012 -- Santorum love

One of the criticisms I make is to what I refer to as more of a libertarianish right. You know, the left has gone so far left and the right in some respects has gone so far right that they touch each other. They come around in the circle. This whole idea of personal autonomy, well I don’t think most conservatives hold that point of view. Some do. They have this idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do, government should keep our taxes down and keep our regulations low, that we shouldn’t get involved in the bedroom, we shouldn’t get involved in cultural issues. You know, people should do whatever they want. Well, that is not how traditional conservatives view the world and I think most conservatives understand that individuals can’t go it alone. That there is no such society that I am aware of, where we’ve had radical individualism and that it succeeds as a culture.

The Morning Joe crew got what they wanted, more excitement in the Republican primary. These caucus type deals with no delegates bring out the most politically active, and, on the Right, that's the religious crowd, so Santorum was given a little love, although it doesn't mean anything.

Republican voters who will come out on election day to vote for the next President are not Santorum supporters. I could be wrong, but I think this is a fluke which means very little. If I'm wrong and Republicans begin supporting Santorum, the Republican Party is too far gone for recovery.

Jeffrey Sachs, Mark Halperin, Cokie Roberts and Carl Berstein were a few of the guests, and the other big topic was the Catholic rebellion regarding Obamacare interventions. Everyone in media is referring to this as an issue of religious freedom, and Scarborough talked about separation of Church and State. I don't see this is a religious freedom issue. When we separate freedom into religious, sexual, gender and other such categories, we're missing the bigger picture. This is an issue of our statist system interfering in the free decisions of free people. It's about time the American people woke up and realized that when one group is denied freedom it affects us all. The Morning Joe crew did touch on the bigger issue and said that not just Catholics are concerned, but they still framed it as a religious freedom issue.

Freedom is freedom, and Americans are beginning to realize that statism violates our individual rights, reduces our freedoms. As long as our free choices don't violate the individual rights of others, then government has no business taking these choices away -- rather than a separation of Church and State issue, I see this is as a separation of State and Economy issue. What hospitals and employers decide in regards to their business operations is not the concern of government. The only problem I have is that so many organizations are receiving funds from government, but our government has set it up this way -- they want private concerns dependent on government -- this way, they can control the private concerns.

Catholics, and everyone one else in the private sector should learn something from this -- the more you become dependent on government, the more government will demand the right to control your actions.

Speaking of Santorum and freedom -- here is Santorum's take on the issue, taken from an NPR interview in 2006:

One of the criticisms I make is to what I refer to as more of a libertarianish right. You know, the left has gone so far left and the right in some respects has gone so far right that they touch each other. They come around in the circle. This whole idea of personal autonomy, well I don’t think most conservatives hold that point of view. Some do. They have this idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do, government should keep our taxes down and keep our regulations low, that we shouldn’t get involved in the bedroom, we shouldn’t get involved in cultural issues. You know, people should do whatever they want. Well, that is not how traditional conservatives view the world and I think most conservatives understand that individuals can’t go it alone. That there is no such society that I am aware of, where we’ve had radical individualism and that it succeeds as a culture.

To Santorum, just say no. When people who say they are for rights and freedom, but then start conditioning this by classifying what they don't like and want control as "radical" individualism -- watch out.