Fear the vest? Santorum markets signature sweater

You too can look like Rick Santorum, the Sleeveless Wonder who almost won (or won) last week’s Iowa caucuses.

Santorum’s presidential website is offering an official Santorum vest Just Like the Candidate Wears for a $100 contribution (A hundred bucks? We smell a markup).

The vest is “perfect for demonstrating solidarity with true conservatives,” the website says. Or, you know, spring.

Santorum’s beloved sweater vests became a symbol of his fast rise in Iowa, where he finished just eight votes behind Mitt Romney, a count that still has yet to be certified amid claims that Santorum may have indeed won the contest.

Santorum told talk-show host Laura Ingraham earlier this month that the look was born out of a speech that went well in Iowa in December when he was wearing the vest. “If there was one event that really began the moment, it was that speech,” he said. “And I think most people recognized that here, so all the sudden the sweater vest was like, ‘Fear the vest,’”

As these things go, the vest even has its own Twitter account, @FearRicksVest.

Although Santorum isn’t expected to finish close to Romney in today’s New Hampshire primary, a major challenge awaits in South Carolina. And not just with the voters. Thursday’s high temperature is expected to reach 70 degrees. That’s not sweater weather.