I don't know who Rick Santorum is trying to appeal to with this fearmongering on CNN's State of the Union this Saturday, but it seems to me he's taking aim straight at the GOP's base with his complaints about people over sixty now being able to get health insurance due to the Affordable Care Act.

As his fellow guest on CNN, Howard Dean pointed out, that's what the law is supposed to do -- make sure people previously being denied insurance can now get it. If the Republicans want to run on a message that it's a bad thing for those over fifty five or sixty to have access to health insurance, by all means feel free to follow Santorum's lead here.

SANTORUM: Well, let me just add that one of the solutions that President Obama tried to accomplish was to let people keep their own insurance. It turns out that a lot of insurance companies are actually allowing that to happen, and that could cause even more problems for Obamacare, because that means fewer and fewer people getting into the exchanges. And the ones who, at least to date, it's just facts Gov. Dean, the ones in the system are much older.

I talked to one insurance company today, a third of their enrollees are over sixty years of age. That is not how an insurance system would work, but those are the people signing up and the folks who can keep their plans because they're more customized and lower cost, will now. And the folks who are going to get into these exchanges are going to be probably sicker, older, and as a result, premiums are even going to go higher.

CROWLEY: You know Governor, you know, you're right, this is going to play out... go ahead.

DEAN: I think it's great that we're insuring people who can't get insurance that are over fifty five and sixty. That's what this is supposed to do.

h/t David