Rick Santorum’s group Patriot Voices is out with a new contest focused on saving the American dream before President Obama destroys it. During an appearance on Patriot Voices Radio last month, Santorum declared that it is necessary to protect the American dream from companies like Starbucks that support gay rights.
Starbucks is the focus of a boycott campaign backed by groups like the National Organization for Marriage, Concerned Women for America, Liberty Counsel and the Family Research Council over the company’s endorsement of Washington state’s marriage equality.
At a recent shareholders meeting, CEO Howard Schultz rebuffed an effort from the head of the Corporate Morality Action Center to drop the company’s pro-gay rights stance, which he said led to “disappointing” sales. Schultz refused, saying “If you feel, respectfully, that you can get a higher return than the 38 percent you got last year, it’s a free country. You can sell your shares of Starbucks and buy shares in another company.”
Naturally, Santorum is outraged that Starbucks has “taken a very aggressive stance against natural marriage and for changing the definition of marriage” and claimed Schultz said “if you are a shareholder of Starbucks and you support traditional marriage then sell your shares, we don’t want you as a shareholder.”
Santorum suggested that both the company’s support for marriage equality and the customers who patronize the chain are endangering American values and urged listeners to boycott: “So are you going to live out your life and say we’re going to support institutions, we’re going to support businesses, we’re going to support colleges and universities, we’re going to support media that are out there fighting against the values that we know are important to this country or are we going to live our lives consistent with that.”
“So when I say, what are you doing to support the American dream?” Santorum asked, “Are you going to live it or are you just going to say well I support this and then go out and do things that actually support organizations and things that undermine the causes of our country?”
What we ask people is: how do you see the American dream today and what are you going to do to make it happen? For example, I just passed a Starbucks on the way in and I don’t know if you saw this this past week but the CEO of Starbucks was asked a question by one of the shareholders at the shareholder meeting, you know they’ve taken a very aggressive stance against natural marriage and for changing the definition of marriage and they made the point that: hey look this is hurting your company, it’s hurting our sales because people are not buying Starbucks anymore. He made this bombastic statement, he said: if you are a shareholder of Starbucks and you support traditional marriage then sell your shares, we don’t want you as a shareholder. Unbelievable.
Now, a lot of Americans will say well that’s too bad, but are you going to live out what you believe? Do you believe that this is a good for society? Do you believe that this something we should stand behind? The left does and they live it in their lives every day. So are you going to live out your life and say we’re going to support institutions, we’re going to support businesses, we’re going to support colleges and universities, we’re going to support media that are out there fighting against the values that we know are important to this country or are we going to live our lives consistent with that.
So when I say, what are you doing to support the American dream? It’s not just, what are you doing to support your dream; what are you going to do to support the basic concepts and values of this country and are you going to do it in every aspect of your life, are you going to live it or are you just going to say well I support this and then go out and do things that actually support organizations and things that undermine the causes of our country? That’s the difference I think between a group of people who believe that the country is—well I hear this all the time, you know America is in trouble but we’ll be OK and everything will be fine—and the bottom line is it won’t be fine unless we make it fine, unless we actually stand up and have the same revolutionary zeal, if you will, as the left is in trying to change America. We have to have the same kind of intensity if we want to keep the values and virtues of our country solid.
