Subscribe
NewsOne Featured Video
CLOSE

Now that he’s suspended his presidential campaign, Rick Santorum is being flooded with the niceties that typically greet a losing candidate whenever he or she takes the hint to bow out. It’s only been 24 hours and I’ve seen so much praise related to how “compassionate” and consistent he was throughout the campaign. Or what a staunch advocate for the little guy the former Pennsylvania senator was purported to be. And, ah, yes, the passion he embodied when speaking about his vision for the country.

SEE ALSO: The Other 2012 Fight: Who Gets the House?

That’s cute for him and all, but I’d much rather focus on what a jackass he was. Mitt Romney may be a walking PSA for the dangers of seeming emotionless, but Santorum is the poster child for being way too into your feelings.

Rick Santorum is a bigot with a bastardized view of his own faith that he used to belittle anyone that wasn’t straight, Christian, and equally adoring of patriarchy as they are vaginal sex. If you didn’t fall within those parameters, Santorum paid you lip service about respecting you in carefully choreographed interviews, though he proved to have anything but when speaking freely.

Remember when he told a crowd in Sioux, Iowa: ”I don’t want to make black people’s lives better by giving them somebody else’s money. I want to give them the opportunity to go out and earn the money and provide for themselves and their families?”

Oh, excuse me, “blah people.”

Of course, his career has made certain that never back peddled when it came to his thoughts about women, and his arch-nemesis, sex.

There’s the now notorious remark: “One of the things I will talk about, that no president has talked about before, is I think the dangers of contraception in this country. It’s not okay. It’s a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be.”

That time he declared: “I do have concerns about women in front line combat. I think that could be a very compromising situation where – where people naturally, you know, may do things that may not be in the interests of the mission because of other types of emotions that are involved.”

Or that infamous book quote of his that claimed: “The radical feminists succeeded in undermining the traditional family and convincing women that professional accomplishments are the key to happiness.”

There was also that racially and gender biased quip about single moms breeding criminals that he made in the 1990s.

As for gay people, not only do they not deserve any legal rights with respect to their long-term relationships, well, people like me…we might as well be boning Beethoven. It’s the same thing in Rick’s eyes.

For not-so-Slick Rick, all of this nonsense was his way of proving he’s committed to restoring America’s “moral currency.” To anyone else with sanity, it was just a reminder of how insane it is to continue allowing people much more equipped to be priests in the hills of Appalachia to actually believe they should be the leader of the free world.

Rick Santorum might be a nice guy one-on-one, but he was hateful towards the greater communities that were largely unlike him. So while other people can laud Rick for being the way he is, I’m just happy I no longer have to hear about it.  Eh, at least not for four more years anyway.

SEE ALSO: Why Is Romney Avoiding Religion and Race?

Michael Arceneaux is a Houston-bred, Howard-educated writer currently based in Los Angeles. You can read more of his work on his site, The Cynical Ones. Follow him on Twitter: @youngsinick