Ignorant and Proud

Catholic blogger Mark Shea, who is generally conservative in his opinions, cuts loose on Santorum for denouncing Obama’s desire that more Americans go to college. Excerpt:

Time was when Catholics (who, you know, *invented* the university) worked and saved and struggled so that their kids could get through college. Now you have guys like Santorum talking like dimestore Protestant preachers denouncing them fancy pants college boys with their degrees and championing the glories of Know Nothingism as a moral virtue.

Being learned and proud is a grave spiritual danger, as the Pharisees show. But the cure for it is not to be ignorant and proud, and that is what Santorum is encouraging. And for what? To truckle to his audience’s burning sense of resentment in order to grab for power.

He’s right, of course, and again, this is why Santorum is so frustrating. There is an excellent appeal to be made to blue-collar voters who are being ground down by the economy, and whose prospects are dimming. There’s a lot that can be said for vocational training and other alternatives to college. A smart candidate could go at this any number of ways — ways that give people reason to hope, not to hate. But Santorum has a gift for being able to find the dumbest and the nastiest ways. Ignorant and proud, aye. He is by no means a foolish man, but his temperament is increasingly repulsive.