Minimum sentencing laws? There has always been minimum sentencing. Certain crimes carry certain prison sentences. The recent policy of minimum sentencing is being revised and revoked in many cases, thank goodness. A person who sells a mar1juana cigarette to his buddy does not deserve to be in prison with rapists, and armed robbers for the same length of time. That is not justice. What aspect of cultural liberalism professes it is ok to cover up child molestation? Santorum didn't just say cultural liberalism either. He mentioned political, cultural, and other liberalism. It is speech meant for the sole purpose of dividing, and with no basis in reality. I am saying that conservatives aren't specifically concerned with poverty, as a means of crime fighting. There are bad decisions from the court. Some of them let people off too easy. Minimum sentencing has forced some inappropriate sentences on people that are totally out of proportion. But none of that has anything to do with Child Molesters and covering up of child molesting. It is not related in any way to liberalism, and in every way to mental sickness, and the desire to not publicize the crimes. Liberalism doesn't enter to it.
Santorum's main point is that the Catholic Church has been (overstating it) gutted from within in America. That's why he is calling for an uprising of the laity to demand more of the Catholic Church and to actively facilitate its return to form. You want it to be too simplistic. I would argue for some causality but not necessarily direct causality. It is far too complex.
It was probably a mistake to refer to "minimum sentencing laws." What I meant to point out was the high incidence of violent criminals getting out of jail only to repeat their crimes. It's not just about someone being popped for selling a joint to an undercover cop. http://www.heritage.org/Research/Crime/BG1020.cfm "The Failing Criminal Justice System In 1970, not a single prison system was operating under the sweeping court orders common today. By 1990, some 508 municipalities and over 1,200 state prisons were operating under judicial confinement orders or consent decrees. Indeed, led by the federal bench, judges over the last quarter-century have undone almost every major governmental anti- crime initiative. For example, in the 1970s, when state legislatures attempted to cut funds for ineffective "rehabilitation" programs, judges declared that prisoners have a legally enforceable right to some such services. In the June 1993 edition of Justice Quarterly, Professor Charles H. Logan of the University of Connecticut and Dr. Gerald G. Gaes of the Federal Bureau of Prisons offered an exhaustive analysis of the literature on such programs. They found no evidence either that these programs rehabilitate prisoners or that they come any closer to doing so today than they did twenty years ago. Largely because of the courts, today about half of every tax dollar spent on prisons goes not to the basics of security but to amenities and services for prisoners. Prisons have about twice as many staff per inmate today as they did in 1958. Yet most of the staffing increases have been to administer the services and programs that judges have declared essential to prisoners' rights -- recreation, education, and medical services."