No, he didn’t. He said that if the Republicans nominate Romney, “we” might as well re-elect Obama because there’s not much difference between them.
Maybe he was going to call him a “nattering nabob of negativism?”
Good point. After all, Santorum has never been one to hide his affinity for alliteration.
I don’t know Rick Santorum or whether or not he hates black people (I certainly would think he’d be happy to call someone a faggot) but in context it doesn’t make any sense for “nigger” to have been the next word. It just sounds like he mangled what he was saying after “government,” which has the same basic sounds in it.
Can’t stand Santorum, but no way is this a racial slur. It sounds to me like he was trying to coin a new word, “governmentnik” (you know, like “peacenik”), realized a moment too late that it could be REALLY badly misheard, and then compounded the problem by stopping short.
Ooh. I like this theory better than any others I’ve heard.
I just don’t see Santorum as the kind of person who even thinks the word “nigger” frequently enough that it’s liable to slip out when he’s not thinking.
I agree. And for the record, it sounded to me like he was about to say nincompoop and tripped over his words.
I would vote ‘could go either way’, but it wasn’t there. So I had to vote dumb. Sorry Diosa.
I’ll forgive you this time.
Like the fact he wears sweatervests with his own name embroidered on them.
I think he meant to say “governmentnik” myself.
“Are you insane? Don’t you know that that man is a ni- aheheh. Sorry about that, wrong person. Are you insane?! Don’t you know that that man is a nit?”
I voted “racist” before seeing this post. We know that he started to say something but then worried it would give offense. “Nigger” was the only possibility that occurred to me, but I see that “governmentnik” might also be plausible.
Although I voted “racist” the real point is that, regardless of his true feelings, he wants to appeal to his supporters, who are mostly racist. I can’t rule out that the corrected slip was deliberate: sending a message to his base while preserving deniability if the left-wing media tries to call him on it.
The usage “government nigger,” while peculiar here, is not without precedent. First hit with related Google search is
It seems to be he was going to say, “anti-war government negotiator” or as others have said “governmentnik” like “peacenik”.
Santorum is an idiot and disgusting, but I don’t think he’s that type of racist. I think he’s the type who thinks that only white men are the victims of racism. To quote myself from another thread:
I don’t know, but I wouldn’t be surprised; remember Dick Armey letting out “Barney Fag”? The Republicans ARE a bunch of bigots, and pretty obviously talk like it in private. I expect that Santorum and the majority of the Republican leadership refer to Obama by racial slurs on a regular basis when the media isn’t there to record them.
I wondered, since he emphasized “anti-war” leading up to the slip, if maybe he was thinking “peace-nik,” but it all came out wrong?
Does anyone even use peace-nik as a slur anymore?
Other than that, I got nuthin’ and combined with the previous “blah people” thing…I dunno.
To a guy in a sweater vest? Probably.
Haven’t watched the clip, but maybe he was going for “government niggardly fool” or some such. Not that that makes any more sense. And not that a large percentage of people would object to “niggardly” as well, even though it’s not a racist word.
A Freudian slip for “nagger”? 
Negotiator? Looks like neg but sounds like nig.