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[RedKing]

Santorum released his tax returns. Four years of them, actually. This will turn out to be an astute move for him.

Not only was his annual income well below Romney and Gingrich ($600,000 or so to $1.1 million, depending on the year), but his effective tax rate was 27%. About double that of Romney. And he apparently files his own taxes instead of using a preparer. Those things are going to resonate well with blue-collar Republicans. Dude also racked up on the child tax credit...he's got seven kids, all of whom live at home.

[GlyphGryph]

Impressions: Note, none of these have valid evidence, this is just the general gist I've gotten from the grapevine.

Santorum - god, while he has the most reprehensible positions of the bunch, I'm actually thinking I might prefer him over the others. Like Paul, he seems sincere if batshit insane, and like so much of the population I am just so incredibly sick of politics as usual. He seems like the least likely candidate to rob me or ruin my life for personal profit and to enrich his friends in high places.

Of course, he's also the most likely to do it "for my own good" "because I'm a sinner" or just because "god said so" or because I'm some sort of deviant. And he's still likely to do quite a bit of the other kind, regardless of how he looks. He's still a politician after all.

But at the very least I can see how he's getting so much support. He's the only one who seems like he'd be willing to follow the rules he makes, in spirit as well as implementation, and is in it for something other than personal empowerment.

He's also pretty terrible, so I'd never vote for him, but I can see why people who are sick of "politicians" would do so.

/completely unjustified gut feelings

[scriver]

and claimed that Christians have never conquered or governed anyone (unlike Muslims).

*looks at Europe*

*looks especially hard at northern Europe*

...

[Nadaka]

and claimed that Christians have never conquered or governed anyone (unlike Muslims).

*looks at Europe*

*looks especially hard at northern Europe*

...

*Looks at America*

*looks especially at ALL of the Americas*

[USEC_OFFICER]

and claimed that Christians have never conquered or governed anyone (unlike Muslims).

*looks at Europe*

*looks especially hard at northern Europe*

...

*Looks at America*

*looks especially at ALL of the Americas*

*looks at all the world*

*looks especially hard at ALL the European colonies*

Well at least now we know that Santorum isn't big on history. Or small on history for that matter.

[mainiac]

Is there any people in history that have never waged a war of aggression against their neighbors?  Iniuts maybe?  Not trying to excuse anyone, just curious thanks to this topic of discussion.

[GlyphGryph]

Quakers?

[scriver]

Even the Greenland Inuit would surely have waged war against other Inuit tribes, or against the Norse colony.

[Frumple]

War of aggression... if you're specifically looking at attempted conquest, sure, there's plenty of people in the world that haven't done that, specifically. Plenty of cultures and people weren't and aren't expansionistic. If you're looking for no violence at all, well, that's considerably more rare; you usually have border skirmishes and raids and so forth as kind of par for course.

But wars of aggression, especially in the sense that term's used nowadays is comparatively rare, from what I understand.

[USEC_OFFICER]

Is there any people in history that have never waged a war of aggression against their neighbors?  Iniuts maybe?  Not trying to excuse anyone, just curious thanks to this topic of discussion.

Eh, it seems like even the Inuit decided to fight a war or two when their populations reached a significant density. To me it seems like you'll have to go back to before the invention of farming to find peoples who didn't fight against their neighbors (and even then you'd have to search for a bit).

Quakers?

They're a religious group, so I don't think they'd count.

[GlyphGryph]

Wasn't the whole inspiration for this tangent over religious groups and their conquering? Don't see how it wouldn't apply.

[Montague]

Is there any people in history that have never waged a war of aggression against their neighbors?  Iniuts maybe?  Not trying to excuse anyone, just curious thanks to this topic of discussion.

The Swiss, I guess, not to say they've never historically been prepared for war and didn't lend out mercenaries and whatnot, though.

Luxembourg, which doesn't count because it's actually populated by Germans and Frenchmen.

Iceland, if you consider them to be distinct people and not just a colony of lost Scandinavians. They also did base American military in the Cold War.

[Darvi]

Luxembourg, which doesn't count because it's actually populated by Germans and Frenchmen.

Fuck you too.

[scriver]

The Swiss, I guess, not to say they've never historically been prepared for war and didn't lend out mercenaries and whatnot, though.

Indo-Europeans didn't take over Europe by hugging the natives

[Karlito]

Santorum is big on the ipad gaming, apparently