Family values that break up families?

Conor Friedersdorf takes on Rick Santorum (my emphases):

 I presume everyone reading this post is either married or is close to someone who is married, whether it's parents or close friends or a boss or teacher or colleague. Think of that married couple. That family. Imagine if they got a letter in the mail informing them that by order of the federal government, their marriage is no longer valid. I submit that a man who would send out letters like that to gay and lesbian married couples does not deserve to be labeled as the candidate with the most pro-family agenda. His desire to invalidate the unions of people who are already married, some of whom have kids -- to invalidate existing families by federal mandate -- makes him arguably the least pro-family candidate, despite his other pro-family positions.

That Rick Santorum and his ilk so casually would dissolve my marriage reveals much.  He doesn't think we have real relationships, that we are really married.  Even Mitt Romney would "grandfather in" existing marriages. But Santorum thinks it's nothing.

It's the degradation of our being... it reminds me of the post-Prop8 period when we had no idea whether the CA court would annul our marriages.  (They decided that Prop8 could not apply retroactively, meaning our marriage was safe).  It's a kick in the gut.

Fortunately, Santorum got some pushback in New Hampshire from young people.  His response was the invoke polygamy.  As a reader at Andrew Sullivan's blog commented, that's a slippery slope argument more apporpriate for HETEROSEXUAL marriage.  Because after all, isn't it heterosexuals (largely fundy Mormons) who endorse polygamy?

 Santorum's daughter Elizabeth, on the trail with her dad, claims they have gay friends who support him.  Uh, yeah, right.  Dan Savage has asked for proof.  It's hard to imaging any gay person actually supporting this guy.

But, some conservative voters seem perfectly happy to overlook Santorum's deeply unconservative desire to dissolve our marriages.  However, maybe his stand against birth control will get the attention of straight people. That, and those who really DO have gay friends. Conor Friedersdorf:

The more than a quarter of a million families with a gay married couple at their core are not disconnected from American society. They have extended families: brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews, friends who come over every Thanksgiving -- and for all these extended families, for everyone who has a gay person in their extended family, Rick Santorum isn't a pro-family candidate, because he is hostile to their family as it actually exists, and would invalidate it by decree if he could.

Rick Santorum has no family values.  He's a bullying ignorant fundamentalist.  Jay Michaelson writes, 

[W]hat Santorum is motivated by is actually religion: a fear of sexuality and of women souped-up by a misreading of Leviticus, Romans, and Corinthians.

But he can’t really say that on television. If he were honest, he’d just come out and say something like: “I’m sorry, but God just cannot abide any homosexual behavior.” But he isn’t.
....
Let me take one further step. Santorum and other homophobes cannot speak frankly because their real motivations are private, emotional, and incoherent.