'A utlitarian approach to human life'

Charging RINO blog reports on Sen. Rick Santorum's appearance on ABC's This Week.

The Pennsylvania conservative said: ""I disagree with Senator Frist. I think that you cannot take a utilitarian approach to human life. And this is an innocent human life. You’re destroying this life for the purpose of research which has questionable value."

No indication on if the senator made his comments with a straight face.

Now even taking the quote at face value: his statement suggests that destroying what he calls innocent human life would be acceptable if the research had unquestionable value. Doesn't that sound like a 'utilitarian approach to human life'?

Sen. Santorum is a man who supports state-sponsored murder because the state needs to murder some people in order to save others. Doesn't this sound like a 'utilitarian approach to human life'?

Sen. Santorum is a man who approved the Iraq aggression which has caused thousands (tens of thousands?) of innocent civilian lives. Of course, no government authority has bothered to count Iraqi civilian deaths so we don't know if it's thousands, tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands. Or maybe they have counted but aren't publicizing it. They sure know exactly how many American soldiers have died in Iraq (though even that official number may be questionable). Deaths of American occupation forces matter; deaths of 'liberated' Iraqi civilians don't. Doesn't this sound like a 'utilitarian approach to human life'?

Killing embryoes is just as unambiguously evil, according to Sen. Santorum. Pulling the plug on a brain dead (American) woman is unconscionable. Yet, killing criminals is right. Killing innocent civilians is unfortunate but inevitable and necessary for the achievement of the greater good. Killing fetuses is evil under all cirumstances. Doesn't this sound like a 'utilitarian approach to human life'?