GOP Presidential Candidate Santorum Says Of Same-Sex Marriage “What New York Did Was Wrong”

The Des Moines Register reports that at a campaign stop Tuesday morning in Cafe Diem in Ankeny, Iowa Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum’s commented on same-sex marriage. Said Santorum, “I am not, as some in this race have said, OK with New York doing what they’re doing. What New York did was wrong. I will oppose it and I will go to New York, if necessary, and help overturn it.” That was a reference to Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who, although not yet declaring his candidacy, said at a forum in Colorado this past weekend that he’s “fine” with the New York state legislature legalizing gay marriage because “that is their call. If you believe in the 10th Amendment, stay out of their business.” Santorum continued: “I’m for great latitude for the states to do a lot, but not anything. And this idea that the 10th amendment means there is no boundary to what the states can do is a misunderstanding of the 10th amendment and I will stand on that ground.” Asked about life expectancy, the former governor of Pennsylvania answered bizarrely “We created a society that changed the world. Why? Because it’s bottom up. Free people. … That combination took civilization from a point of view that for 2,000 years from the time of Jesus Christ to the time of the revolution, life expectancy was the same: 40. … Didn’t change for thousands of years. Until America. We’ve gone through an industrial revolution, a technological revolution. Life expectancy has doubled. Why? Because for the first time we let people be free. No king, no monarch, no emperor, no big government telling people how to run their lives. That’s the key of America. That’s why people want to come here. It’s not because of the government guarantees of benefits. It’s because of the government guarantee of freedom. That will be lost if Barack Obama is re-elected.”