Think 3 readers hate Rick Santorum

As we wait for the primary votes to be counted in Michigan, allow me to note a milestone. Sometime yesterday, approximately, my January post nominating Rick Santorum as an Idiot of the Week became the most popular item ever blogged here, as measured by unique pageviews. It surpasses a profoundly off-topic 2008 post about the career of overhyped MMA fighter Kimbo Slice which had held the top spot practically since Blogger first allowed me to keep track of pageviews. While I allow that the Jan. 6 post surged to the top mainly because it had video content, I also observe that two more Santorum posts have entered my all-time top ten. I don't feel that I have been more scathing toward the Pennsylvanian than toward his Republican rivals -- a post on "the Gingrich Mania" briefly flourished in the top ten a few weeks ago -- but there appears to be an appetite for Santorum-scathing that websurfers have sometimes tried to satisfy here that surpasses any demand for condemnation of Gingrich or Romney. I've probably been too soft on Paul for us to measure online hatred for him by Think 3 pageviews. On the other hand, I've been too soft on Santorum lately. The man's been on such a tear, from his rediscovered screed against Satan to his dismissal of collegiate aspirations as snobbery, that I could start an Idiot of the Day blog and then retire it in his honor. You might have believed it had Paul called him a "fake" at that debate and then produced evidence that Santorum was actually some Stephen Colbert-type comedian with the carny instincts of an Andy Kaufman hired by the Democratic party or an allied SuperPAC to make conservatism in general look menacingly stupid. It would be the ultimate joke to learn that the work was so subtle that the clown could get elected to the U.S. Senate -- but, regrettably, the truth is somewhat less funny.