Joe Klein‘s latest TIME column calls Rick Santorum “obnoxious,” “dangerously simplistic” (on foreign policy), and “brutal” (in his remarks about homosexuality).

Yet one senses that Klein likes the fact that Santorum could help delay a nomination win for Mitt Romney:

In the contest to come, he will pose a significant working-class challenge to Romney’s corporate conservatism. Santorum opposed the Wall Street bailout, and he worries about the Romney style of private-equity capitalism that has cost so many factory jobs. He has proposed eliminating the corporate tax on manufacturing. In his Iowa speech, he spoke about why he would tax retail operations at a higher rate than manufacturing. “Walmart isn’t moving to China,” he said. A real debate on these issues between Romney and Santorum could be valuable and enlightening.

And helpful to Barack Obama.