Poor Little Rick Man

Check out this hilarious clip of Little Ricky Santorum, the one and only Braffy winner, getting into an argument with a constituent and then going off on an angry anti-media rant. That guy's a class act.



Why do these guys get into politics in the first place? They can't handle a personal confrontation for shit! This woman busts him on a relatively straight-forward issue that has been reported publicly for months. Rick pretends to live in Pennsylvania for political purposes, but actually resides with his family in Virginia. So this Pennsylvania schoolteacher asks him why his state taxes go to paying for his children's schooling in Virginia and not his "home state"?

Rick's prepared with a lame stock answer/dodge - he pays taxes and is therefore deserving of public services - but it's pretty limp and the teacher's not going for it. (It also, unfortunately for Rick, sets the stage for a clear follow-up question: why isn't every tax payer than entitled to the benefits that your children enjoy?)

But less than his glaring incompetence being put on display, what I like about this clip is how pissed off Ricky seems. These incumbent senators, like Ricky and the moribund Joe Lieberman in Connecticut, just can't stand to be challenged at all. I may have said this before, but they all remind me of Ted Knight in Caddyshack. So insulated from everything for so long in their mansions and country clubs that they're totally incapable of seeing things from another perspective or handling criticism. "You want to challenge me in a primary election? You? Not in Bushwood, sir!"

(Yes, the country club in Caddyshack is named "Bushwood." How prescient...)

Now that I thikn about it, that might not be a bad strategy for the Dems in 2008. Put up Al Franken and Michael Moore for President and VP and make it "the Slobs vs. the Snobs!" Americans may be easily fooled by Rovian chicanery, but they'll predictably root for a good underdog. I say we get Ivan Reitman, Dan Ackroyd and Harold Ramis working on some campaign speeches and literature right now...