Let’s make it simple.
If Santorum is not a resident of Pennsylannia, then he cannot be a Senator for Pennsylvania. (Art. I, § 3-3). Right?
So is that what you all are saying? Santorum cannot legally serve as a Pennsylvania Senator?
Gotta love these arguments of semantics. Let’s take Ted Kennedy for example. Any reader of these boards knows I’ve no love for the man, but he indeed flies home to Hyannis, Massachusetts on a fairly regular basis, thereby deflecting any argument regarding his state of residency. Senator VA not PA? Not so much.
Tell ya what. You can have Santorum, and PA gets a first round draft pick in November. 
One can meet the letter of the law while still ass-raping the spirit. I don’t care if it’s legal. It’s sleazy, it’s greedy, it’s unnecessary (given his personal wealth) and given his past use of the same issue to attack a political opponent, it’s blatantly hypocritical. Just because it may not be technically illegal doesn’t mean it’s not worthy of criticism or that it doesn’t say anything about his character.
I agree with your assesment of the spirirt of the law, but disagree with your conclusion vis a vis the senator – indeed the law is intended to help residents of the district. I don’t think it’s supporters envisioned the credit being taken by those that own an empty home that they call their “legal residence,” when they actually spend little or no time in the home and actually reside (in the literal, not legal, sense) somewhere else. Perhaps some suspected a few would “take advantage” of the law, but certainly not their home Senator – it wreaks of gaming – I am not saying it’s illegal, or even unethical, just borderline sleazy, and a terrible move from a p.r. perspective. It’s also pretty rich coming from a guy who accused an opponent of the same act. Things don’t have to be llegal to be wrong, or to upseting. It’s okay to remind yourself of that.
I swear to God I hadn’t read this prior to making a wordier version of the same
Obviously you know what they are, then. Enlighten us, please, O Wise Man.
But before you do, read the linked PPG article, m’kay? :rolleyes:
Does anybody know if any upkeep is being done on the property? The PP-G editorial (not article) is unclear on this point. Is there a homeowner’s association or something that handles landscaping functions? This business about the Post Office returning mail marked “Not Deliverable As Addressed – Unable To Forward.” strikes me as odd. I don’t have a lof of experience in this type of thing, but what little I have suggests that as long as the address exists, the Postal Service will leave the article there, and it will only be returned if the address doesn’t exist.
Also, does anybody have any information on where he and his family hang during the summer recess (during non-election years, I presume that this year he’ll be stumping in the Keystone State, and his kids will be chillin’ in the back of the campaign bus with their Gameboys).
Does your book allow “maintain two residences” to apply, if one of the residences is a building that has not been furnished for, and is not being maintained for, habitation?
It’s not any of the above, except, possibly, hypocritical.
“Legal residence” refers to a person’s permanent domicile, as distinguished from a temporary residence. It is where a person has his or her fixed, permanent place of abode, to which the person intends to return despite temporary residences elsewhere. Representatives and Senators do not give up their local residences merely because they live in or around DC. It’s that simple. It’s not a matter of legal technicalities – if you think about it, pretty much every senator and representative would be ineligible to run again for his office, since he no longer resides in his state or district. That’s never been the model for residency applied to politicians.
Now, is it hypocritical?
Maybe.
Changing your mind is not hypocritical. If Smith runs on a platform of a tax cut, and derides his opponent Jones for having voted to raise taxes… and then votes to raise taxes himself once in office, he may not be hypocritical. He may say, for example, “I was mistaken when I said Jones was wrong to vote as he did. Having now been in office myself, I realize that in order to provide all the services we do, we must raise taxes.”
A person of intellectual honesty would take pains to explain the inconsistency, though, because it certainly places him in a situation where he appears hypocritical.
Now, if Santorum has changed his mind on the value of physically domiciling himself in Pennsylvania, then he’s not hypocritical. If he has, however, then as an act of intellectual honesty, he should take pains to make that change known. In the absence of such an admission, I agree that an observer is entitled to conclude, as a working hypothesis, that he is hypocritical.
I can, and I will, but after finally getting the stones to get rid of our scumbag legacy politicians, we are now forced to choose between Santorum and another legacy politician. I wasn’t real fond of his dad and I’m not real fond of him either, but he’s better than the alternative, and I’m not naive enough to vote for a third party and have the election play into Santorum’s hands.
Sure. The dispositive question is where the person intends to return despite temporary lodging elsewhere.
I’m about to renovate my house. The house will be almost completely razed; the Bricker family will be living in an apartment for the better part of a year while that goes on. Despite that, I will continue to vote in the district where my house is, not where my apartment might be. Even though it the home I own will be completely unfit for habitation, it will still be my residence. If my son were a public school student, h would continue to attend his regular school, not the school associated with wherever the apartment was.
And so forth.
This is not a case of forced relocation. He’s not comparable to a military person who is allowed to maintain residency due to a forced reassignment. He has chosen to live in Leesburg, which is far enough away from DC that it’s disingenuous to say that he’s there because of its proximity to DC. That is his home. The “residence” he has in Pennsylvania is quite clearly a token residence, which violates the spirit of the rules if not the letter.
Many of us up here do not consider him a resident of Pennsylvania and think that his sham attempt at portraying himself as one is reprehensible.
The house in question in Pennsylvania is a two-bedroom house costing $100,000. The Santorums have six children. The idea that they’re planning to return to this house is ludicrous. The idea that they’ve even seen this house is questionable.
A reasonable position. I’d sure be interested in seeing something that might shed light on whether he has such an intent.
F’rinstance, if he and the family tend to spend summers in their cabin in the Hamptons, it might tend to suggest that he doesn’t have any demonstrable intent to return to Penn Hills.
Good luck with your remodel.
So in your view, he is ineligible to run for re-election?
Most of Leesburg’s residents commute to work locations in and close to DC.
How many of them are disingenuous?
I don’t determine eligibility. If I did he wouldn’t be eligible.
None, because they admit that they live there, unlike Santorum.
He didn’t have six children when he bought the house. But that’s irrelevant.
The question is not, “Does he plan to return TO THIS HOUSE?”
As long as he plans to return to the district, then he is a resident, even if he only had a mailbox on a grass field there now.
You didn’t understand my question.
You said that living in Leesburg was disingenuous for Santorum, because it was too far away from DC. In other words, that Santorum’s choice of Leesburg could not have been made for the purpose of working in DC. In response to that, I pointed out that most of Leesburg’s residents commute to work locations in and closer-around DC.
So let me re-frame my rebuttal in very clear terms: since most of Leesburg’s residents commute to DC and close-in suburb work locations, why do you conclude that Santorum’s choice of Leesburg as a location to live while working in DC is disingenuous?
He has the same requirements any other Capitol Hill or K-street worker has. Many such workers choose to live in Leesburg, where their housing dollar will go farther, and work in or close-around DC. What is about Santorum making that choice that gives rise to the idea that he’s “disingenuous?”
I understand. But since he clearly ISN’T barred from running again, even givne his living conditions, doesn’t it seem a logical conclusion that he is considered a resident of Pennsylvania by the system at large?