Without further ado, it’s another edition of What Amanda Marcotte Said:
Even though I suspect the base knows that Romney will owe them if he wins, and will give them what they want, it’s just about more than that. They want reassurance that they are the dominant class in America, and that their culture is winning. So they need someone who feels authentically like a full member of the tribe. They need someone whose resentments feel real, who devotion to ignorance feels absolute, and whose misogyny runs bone-deep. Not like that paternalistic misogyny of the banking class Romneys of the world, but the spittle-flinging anger at women that Limbaugh delivers and seems to be crawling right under Santorum’s skin. Religion’s relevance to this is that it’s a quick shorthand for these more important, but difficult to articulate values. But in and of itself, religion isn’t that meaningful. It’s a tool, not the goal.
She also points out that, despite the fact that he is technically Roman Catholic, Rick Santorum speaks and acts like an Evangelical, and is more aligned with them than he is with Rome. Therefore, he reads as one of the tribe. Read the whole piece, please.
