A Thinking Reed

Seamless Garment Watch

Written by

Lee M.

in

Another item from today’s Inquirer: Santorum shifting on a key issue:

Sen. Rick Santorum (R., Pa), a longtime supporter of the death penalty, says he is reexamining his stance but not to the point of saying it is wrong in all cases.

“I still support the death penalty, but what I’m suggesting is, number one, we have to be more cautious,” he said Tuesday, saying capital punishment should be limited to the “most horrific and heinous of crimes.”

Santorum, who is running for a third term, said he was “not saying that I fundamentally believe the death penalty is wrong.”

In an interview published in Tuesday’s Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Santorum, a Roman Catholic, said he agreed with the Pope that the use of the death penalty should be limited.

Some thoughts:

  • The Catholic bishops have recently stepped up their advocacy for ending the death penalty. Is Santorum worried about getting the Kerry treatment in ’06?
  • Bob Casey, Jr. is both anti-abortion and anti-death penalty. Does Santorum thinks that this consistent ethic of life approach will play well with voters?
  • What does it really matter if a U.S. Senator is against the death penalty anyway? Federal death penalty cases are rare, and the Supreme Court has ruled that the states can deploy it pretty much at their discretion (with certain exceptions like juveniles).

Comments

One response to “Seamless Garment Watch”

  1. Joshie

    I doubt he’s afraid of getting the “Kerry” treatment from the RCC. The anti-abortion faction in the RCC have made it clear that they see abortion as infinately worse than the death penalty and are willing to ignore stances on the death penalty as long as they tow the line on abortion, and this faction is extremely powerful. I have heard people on EWTN say as much.

    My guess would be it has more to do with Casey than anything else.

    I was a little annoyed by that news piece about the Catholic bishops too for the “executing heretics” remark, although a correction has been issued for it. The Church is forbidden to shed blood by canon law, so any execution of heretics was done by political eneties at the beheast of the church not the church itself. This was the reason for many of the “crusades” in N. Italy and especially Southern France called for by popes in the middle ages. Since the church had no power to execute heretics itself, they had to call on the other “sword” if you will, to do the dirty work.

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