I don't know if I can hold my nose to vote for this guy either This whole idea of personal autonomy, well I don’t think most conservatives hold that point of view. Some do. They have this idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do, government should keep our taxes down and keep our regulations low, keep our regulations low, that we shouldn’t get involved in the bedroom, we shouldn’t get involved in cultural issues. That is not how traditional conservatives view the world. There is no such society that I’m aware of, where we’ve had radical individualism and that it succeeds as a culture.”
The United States was that society and rose from being nobody to being a world superpower while fighting a massive civil war, in 100 Years. Why? That "Radical" Individualism.
I don't know what a "traditional conservative" is to him. I am obviously not one, and neither were any of the Founders. As FrankJ said "I’m a classical liberal; I hold to the unfortunately still radical notion of individual liberty."
Using government as a weapon to enforce the moral code of the culture - the Thou Shalts as Well as the Thou Shalt Nots (the latter being within legitimate government jurisdiction when it coincides with real, direct harm) is against the inalienable right of conscience. If you do this you have no right to complain when the government is run by the Taliban, The Spanish Inquisition, or a Liberal. You have established that such persecution using the government is "right" and "just" by your precedent.
Religion is supposed to be the body and institution encouraging individuals to regulate their own behavior. The government has stolen the communities main weapon of censure, and the institution has largely been rotted with "moral relativism" from within. But this does not change the fact that there are not enough police in the world to make fallen and sinful men govern themselves. Only the world of God and Persuasion can be used to get them to do so, and sinners are saved ONE PERSON AT A TIME. If a majority or even a large minority decide that what they are doing is not sinful or wrong, government force will not convince them otherwise, and you do not govern with the consent of the governed. If you forced a man at gunpoint to behave virtuously, preventing him from doing sin, when in his heart he desired to do nothing but evil, will you have saved him in God's eyes? Individual Repentance and acceptance of God's law is the only salvation available, and no earthly law can force or coerce that action. That is the basis of the right of Conscience. The government has the right to protect citizens from harm, not to protect sinners from sin.
It is our differences, and right of self determination that make this country strong. If you use the government to erase those difference, and determine for others what they should be, then we are only as good as the people in charge, and History has shown those who seek such power to be the worst sort of men. Santorum is unfortunately one of them.
