All week, the Judges at FrederickClarkson.com have toiled, sometimese late into the night, to find that certain someone who meets the High Standards of Theocrat of the Week. We were, as always, richly blessed with candidates. But we are pleased to announce our Theocrat of the Week: U.S. Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA).
Santorum surged ahead of the pack by sticking to his guns in blaming liberals for the worldwide scandal of serial child rape and abuse by priests of the Catholic Church, and the decades long cover-up by bishops and other higher ups. “While it is no excuse for this scandal,” he said three years ago, “it is no surprise that Boston, a seat of academic, political and cultural liberalism in America, lies at the center of the storm.”
The Boston Globe — the newspaper that broke the story of the scandal and won a Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting, asked Sen. Santorum about his comments — and he repeated the charge: “‘The basic liberal attitude in that area…. has an impact on people’s behavior,’ Santorum said in an interview yesterday at the Capitol.”
“‘If you have a world view that I’m describing [about Boston]…. that affirms alternative views of sexuality, that can lead to a lot of people taking it the wrong way,’ Santorum said.”
It will take a broad theocratic coalition to smash the wall of separation between church and state and — Catholic priests and leaders are integral to its success. Its smart to shift blame for serial child rape by priests and cover-up by bishops to the liberals and stay on message — even if it risks Santorum’s reelection campaign for the Senate and his possible bid for the GOP presidential nomination. Santorum is a Loyal Theocrat to be willing to sacrifice his career for The Cause.
Indeed, his response outraged Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) who went to the Senate floor and stated:
“Rick Santorum owes an immediate apology to the tragic, long-suffering victims of sexual abuse and their families in Boston, in Massachusetts, in Pennsylvania and around this country. His outrageous and offensive comments — which he had the indecency to repeat yesterday — blamed the people of Boston for the depraved behavior of sick individuals who stole the innocence of children in the most horrible way imaginable… Boston bashing might be in vogue with some Republicans, but Rick Santorum’s statements are beyond the pale.”
Does Santorum really still believe what he said? Boston Globe columnist Brian McGrory wanted to check. “‘It’s an open secret that you have Harvard University and MIT that tend to tilt to the left in terms of academic biases,’ said Robert Traynham, [a]… Santorum aide. ‘I think that’s what the senator was speaking to.'”
“Of course,” McCrory writes. “The whole thing is MIT’s fault. Why didn’t we realize this sooner? Maybe the Globe should give its Pulitzer Prize back because it failed to get to the root cause of the scandal: Cambridge-based rocket science professors.”
But in the face of the backlash and ridicule, Traynham is already backpedaling — and risking Santorum’s coveted Theocrat of the Week award. The Associated Press reports that Traynam says “his boss recognizes that the church abuse scandal was not just in Boston, but all over the country…. [and that Santorum] ‘was speaking to a broader cultural argument about the need for everyone to take these issues very, very seriously.'”
