Rick Santorum debates Howard Dean at Cornell University. Cornell alumni include Ann Coulter and Keith Olbermann. Santorum is fond of debate and does not shy from the chance to speak in venues where there is strong disagreement.
There seems to be a great deal of misplaced fuss over Rick Santorum contributing at WorldNetDaily. While I am used to this coming from the Left, it was a surprise to see Matt Lewis write at the Daily Caller that this means by attrition that Rick Santorum is not running for president in 2016.
1.) Santorum apparently decides against 2016 run – At least, that is the only conclusion one can draw from this press release from World Net Daily:
“Rick Santorum – the former U.S. senator who ignited grass-roots conservatives as a Republican candidate for president this year – today joins WND as an exclusive columnist. His commentaries will be featured each Monday.”
Rick Santorum is not likely to pass up an opportunity to write an exclusive op-ed for a high traffic news website, nor would anyone who wants to get their message out to as many people as possible. He also offers exclusive commentary at Red State, Ricochet, and other websites.
Who else writes at World Net Daily? Thomas Sowell. David Limbaugh. Phyllis Schlafly. Dennis Prager. Star Parker. These are mainstream conservatives who support the Republican Party platform. To my knowledge, none of them are concerned about Barack Obama’s birth certificate. Contributing at a website does not mean that you endorse everything on it. If it did mean that, I would take issue with Matt Lewis for writing at The Daily Caller, where Ann Coulter is also a columnist. Coulter has said that Mitt Romney is more conservative than Ronald Reagan. One doesn’t get much more off the rocker than that.
It’s very disappointing to see such an extreme charge against Rick Santorum from someone like Matt Lewis who is usually quite level-headed. I do hope he will re-think the idea of claiming that if you write for a website, you automatically endorse all of that website’s editorials. I’m sure that most people understand that when Thomas Peters writes at the left-wing Washington Post it does not mean he has jumped ship to become a liberal. In like manner, when Rick Santorum writes at World Net Daily, it does not mean that he agrees with the editor or the other contributors on any issue unless he specifically says that he does.
