RICK SANTORUM FOR PRESIDENT IN 2012?

If this is true - and assuming that Santorum has learned from his mistakes - he could leapfrog many of the candidates now on the table for the Republican nomination. The 2012 election is nearly three years away and someone like Santorum entering the race is a prime example of why debating who the front runners are in early 2010 is a vain endeavor.

TPM Reports:

Former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA), who was defeated for re-election in 2006 by a whopping 18-point margin, has been slowly but surely re-emerging on the political scene -- and could be a presidential candidate in 2012.

Over the last few months, Santorum has built up a schedule of visits to the top three primary and caucus states: He has already made two trips to South Carolina, one in December and another in January; he visited Iowa this past October, and will be headed back in March; and he just announced a trip to New Hampshire on April 30.

What lessons will Santorum necessarily have needed to learn if he is going to make a serious run? I wrote about one of them not to long ago.

Then-Sen. Arlen Specter was in a primary against conservative and current Republican candidate Pat Toomey, who most closely aligned with – or so he thought – that state's junior Sen. Rick Santorum. However, along with George W. Bush, Santorum threw his support behind Specter in that primary. Not only did Santorum lose his seat in 2006, but Specter defected to the Democrats in 2009.

In 2010, Tommey is the odds-on favorite to win Specter's seat. For someone like Santorum, a professed conservative, to have on his record the endorsement of Arlen Specter over a real conservative in 2004 is something he cannot escape. Instead of spinning it, he needs to put his head down, humble himself, and admit wrongdoing. The only way Santorum proves viable is if he delivers a heartfelt mea culpa.

Santorum almost seems to make light of it here by doing it in a way that not everyone would get it.

"In 2004, President Bush and a Senate colleague from Western Pennsylvania made the difference for Specter. Those dogs don't hunt anymore," Santorum wrote, adding that the primary against Specter "will be fun to watch. And watch I will."

As TPM points out, Santorum was referring to himself as the "Senate colleague". Notice that Santorum focuses exclusively on Specter without alluding to Toomey. A public apology to the latter from Santorum would be a good start.

This is not something that Santorum can afford to be flippant about and needs to assert in no uncertain terms that he was WRONG and became a victim of inside the beltway groupthink. As we all know, politicians cannot be trusted and must be watched constantly. That includes Rick Santorum and he must feel the heat.

Sarah Palin is doing in Arizona, by endorsing John McCain over Tea Party favorite J.D. Hayworth what Santorum did in Pennsylvania in 2004 and I still believe it will hurt her with conservatives. She's also endorsed Rand Paul in Kentucky over a Tea Party conservative in Bill Johnson.

h/t to Hot Air