I've been on the Santorum bandwagon ever since the election, and hope he does through some miracle get the GOP nod. The only problems are Palin and Huckabee, who take up most of what would be his base.
You forget some other problems:
1. President Obama. Slickest politician since at least JFK.
2. Election 2006. He couldn't win his home state when America was genuinely "moderate". In fact, he was absolutely crushed in the firmest defeat of an incumbent Senator since George McGovern.
3. As a GWB stooge, he will have a big handicap in 2012.
He was talking about the primaries, not the general. The only one of those three things you mentioned that matter is his loss in 2006, and you're characterization of America being moderate then as if it wasn't a huge Democratic year is crazy. He was very conservative in a left leaning state and the media had gone out of their way to destroy him(extreme mis-characterization of his homosexuality remarks, PA media being totally against him and very soft on his opponent). Not to mention the fact that his opponent was the son of a semi-saint in PA. Santorum campaigned his ass off while Casey barely showed up on the campaign trail(much like how he never showed up to his job before becoming senator). Santorum has done and said some stupid things, but he shouldn't be ashamed of that race. The people of Pennsylvania made the wrong decision and elected the wrong guy; regardless of how you feel about him, he brought a ton of cash back to PA and spent plenty of time there(despite the disingenuous attacks on his living arrangement).
As for #3 on your list, I don't think the fact that he had 16 years in the congress, even if part of it was under the Bush administration, is going to hurt him against a 4 year and a 2 year governor. Republicans aren't going to lash out at him for being a Republican in Washington while Bush was in office, it's not in their nature..
In all fairness, Santorum is a pretty good speaker and showed up for a lot of things in PA, but no I made the right decision. He was simply too conservative for the state and moderate (socially liberal) Philadelphia suburban voters finally saw his true colors in words unlike 1994 and 2000 when the focus of his message was responsible fatherhood and welfare reform. My moderate liberal self can agree with those tenets. Even Montgomery County, which is arguably the 2nd most socially liberal (Obama +21) in the state, voted from him as late as 2000. When he fell off the deep end rubbing the orthodoxy of the Catholic Church down peoples throats is when people began to dislike him and hence his out of touch views were brought to light. I think Joe Hoeffel, Allyson Schwartz, Barb Hafer, or Mark Singel would have got at least 10 points on Santorum because I think they would have campaigned much harder than Casey. Casey basically told the DSCC to spend cash elsewhere, which I am grateful for (MO, VA, close in TN). However, I still maintain Joe Hoeffel or Allyson Schwartz would have been a FAR better Senator than the mum Casey Jr. we have right now and it's not just because of his social views.
