Press To Be Barred From Santorum Speech

(Cartoon above is by Bill Schorr at caglecartoons.com.)

Rick Santorum is very popular among Texas Republicans (who are as right-wing as it gets). In fact, Santorum was easily leading Willard Mitt Romney (aka Wall Street Willie) in all Texas polls before he suspended his presidential campaign -- and will probably still get a significant portion of the vote when Texas Republicans hold their primary on May 29th (even though Romney is assured of being the nominee).

But the state Republican Party knows which side of their bread the butter is on. While Romney will not be making an appearance at the state convention, Rick Santorum will be. In fact, he is the featured speaker at the convention's Friday night banquet. Naturally, the press (especially the Texas press) wanted to cover Santorum's speech. Unfortunately, that's not going to happen.

The state party has decreed that the press will not be allowed to cover the banquet speech. Party leaders said the banquet is a "private" fundraiser. Party communications director Chris Elam went further and said, "There has never been media availability at the state party's premiere banquet." But Elam is lying. Mitt Romney was the featured speaker in 2008, speaking on behalf of John McCain, and the press was allowed to cover that speech.

The truth is that while party leaders in Texas are ultra-right-wingers, they are not complete idiots. They know that Santorum will tell the party faithful what they want to hear and raise a lot of money, but they also know he is likely to say one or more things that will not sound good to the general public and could easily hurt them in the coming general election with Independents.

State Republican Party leaders want to have their cake and eat it too. They want Santorum to fire up the conventioneers (who are mainly teabaggers and fundamentalists) with his nuttiness, but they don't want the general public to hear any of the speech (because Santorum only appeals to right-wing religious extremists).

This is the time of an election year when the Republicans start trying to hide their extremism and pose as a more moderate party. I don't think they realize yet that in this internet age, that's no longer possible. The extremism exposed in their primary will be replayed many times before election day. They're stuck with it.