Keller @ Large: Satan's Attack On America, According To Rick Santorum

BOSTON (CBS) - Rick Santorum is nothing if not consistent.

Listen to Jon's commentary:

When the Catholic church sex scandal broke open around here in 2002, Santorum blamed it on "cultural liberalism," and concluded that it was "no surprise that Boston, a seat of academic, political and cultural liberalism in America, lies at the center of the storm," meaning the Boston archdiocese, run at the time by a staunch conservative.

And over the years, Santorum has stuck with his concept of a sinister force infecting our culture, distilling it by 2008 into a specific form – Satan.

The political world is buzzing over the details of a speech Santorum gave, in which he states – either with dead seriousness or an amazing imitation of it – that Satan is on the attack against America; just the US, apparently, he doesn't mention Canada.

Watch: Keller @ Large

Satan has attacked, Santorum explains, by "using those great vices of pride, vanity and sensuality" to corrupt academia, the Church, the culture, and political life.

Since Santorum has made this a consistent theme of his public speaking and writing, and since he's leading in the polls for his party's presidential nomination, we'd better refrain from all the obvious jokes – about how the devil made us do it, for instance, or how now we understand about global warming – and analyze the senator's argument seriously. So let's look at where Santorum says he sees "the corruption of culture, the corruption of manners, [and] the corruption of decency…now on display."

He cites the NBA, but that one escapes me. Yes, there's a lot of elbows being thrown, whining about calls, and trash talk in the NBA, but usually no more than there will be in the Republican debate tonight.

He cites rock concerts, but last time I checked, it was Santorum's big hero, Ronald Reagan, who ordered that the Beach Boys be allowed to perform on the Mall. If they didn't glorify sensuality, who did?

And Santorum also fingers the movies, and I must say, he's got a point there.

Except, the last movie Rick Santorum probably saw was "The Exorcist."

He probably thought it was his new campaign ad.

You can listen to Keller At Large on WBZ News Radio every weekday at 7:55 a.m. and 12:25 p.m. You can also watch Jon on WBZ-TV News.