Dear Rooster:
(That's what former Senator Santorum’s friends in Butler PA called him.)
You said that students who took part in the March For Our Lives would do better learning CPR or doing something else to prevent gun violence in their schools. I suspect you really meant it, which is yet another reason for me to be glad you no longer represent the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
You don’t know the community where I live. You don’t live in Pennsylvania, you only visited when you were running for office. However, it is a blue collar suburb of Pittsburgh, with a lot of nice steep hills, like we have in Western PA. We have a small problem on my street. People drive through here like it was a NASCAR track. As some of our residents are elderly, and others have kids, nobody likes this. We are trying to convince the borough to do something about it. What we’d like are a couple of signs that say SPEED LIMIT 15 MILES AN HOUR, and, occasionally, a police car parked on one of the side streets, to discourage speeders, and ticket the ones who aren’t discouraged.
There are things we could do ourselves, of course. Somebody could rent a jackhammer and make holes in the street. That would slow people up. It’s possible we could build our own speed bump. With luck the borough wouldn’t take it apart.
Somebody could wait on their front porch and shoot out speeders’ tires. Once word got out that this was happening, I’m sure nobody would speed on my street. I’m also sure the tire shooter would be arrested.
A 15 mile an hour speed limit, and an occasional cop car would make my street safer, and bring some revenue into the community.
Holes in the street would make it difficult for everybody. Shooting tires would cause more problems than it would solve.
We elect representatives to pass laws to protect our communities, from fools who don’t know the difference between residential streets and the Autobahn, from people who are sure they’re fine to drive after only nine beers, from crazies with guns, who threaten our children. We don’t do it ourselves, because we have jobs to do, classes to pass, homes to maintain. Not to mention it just works better that way.
The fact that you don’t understand that makes me glad all over that you aren’t in the Senate anymore.
Please stay out of the Senate, and the House, and Washington D.C. and Harrisburg, and Richmond (Since you live in Virginia.) Maybe next time Fox News goes looking for a fresh pundit, they’ll hire you. You’d be great for the job. You’re everything they look for: white, Republican and deranged.
Young Americans protested peacefully for a good cause. The world, including the Pope, was impressed. You weren’t and you said something dumb, which is what you do. It’s why you aren’t a senator anymore, and not likely to be one ever again. For this, Oh Lord, much thanks.