I suppose that since I run in Progressive and Liberal circles for the most part, I am fairly clueless as to how conservatives in Pennsylvania view Rick Santorum. I think others are like me, and generally expect that the vast majority of the state thinks he was a far right fringe character. But goes what? A number of influential PA GOP have come out in support of Frothy Mix’s presidential aspirations: (emphasis added is mine)

Calling him the right man for the right time, 15 members of the 30-member Republican caucus in the state Senate have come out in support of Santorum’s long-shot bid for the White House in 2012, including state Sen. Pat Browne, R-Lehigh, Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati, R-Jefferson and Senate Appropriations Chairman Jake Corman, R-Centre, whose ties to the GOP presidential hopeful run deep.
“We need people with the courage to solve our problems,” Corman, a former Santorum staffer, said at Capitol news conference on Tuesday, adding that Santorum has the “track record of dealing with the tough issues.”

We have a GOP run State Senate partly because many PA Democrats wouldn’t get behind Dan Onorato and Dem turnout was low. I’ve heard die-hard Dems call Onorato Republican-lite. But hat is all water under the bridge. The real question is what will PA Dems from this point moving forward to get this State as well as the country moving along a more progressive direction.

Republican leaders stuck mostly to extolling Santorum’s bona fides on the economy, arguing that he “had the guts” to make tough decisions. They stayed away from Santorum’s more radioactive stands on social issues such as same-sex marriage and abortion, saying it would be “up to the voters” to evaluate them.

But let’s be real. We have been seeing in state after state across the country as well as in Washington DC, the GOP pushing a far right social agenda. All the talk of guts and decision making is a smokescreen to hide the real agenda which is a social agenda to the core. If you didn’t come out and strongly support Democrats in the last election, ask yourself, if things are better for you today, or headed in the wrong direction. Then think carefully about what will happen if we elect a far right radical like Santorum to the presidency.