Daily Santorum 3/8/11
ABC News called it the first cattle call of the 2012 Republican presidential race as several -- but certainly not all -- GOP hopefuls converged on Waukee for the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition's presidential forum. And your boy Rick Santorum was right in the middle of it. Newt Gingrich and Tim Pawlenty were more of the "headliners" from a national media sense, but Santorum didn't fall into the "curiosity" camp like Buddy Roemer and Herman Cain. The event naturally sparked a flood of coverage, and Santorum's Youtubeified speech is above.
Some of the news was kinder to Rick than others. Politico gave him a single sentence in its writeup -- "Santorum spoke about his push against abortion, and his religion." -- while declaring that Cain and Roemer stole the show with animated speeches. But Joshua Green at the Atlantic (whose piece was helpfully distributed by Santorum's spokeswoman this morning) gave the blue ribbon to Santorum, though Green is pessimistic about Santorum's actual chances:
For my money, Rick Santorum won the evening in a rout, which surprised me. The trick at these sorts of events is to pander to the audience, but not in a way that's flagrant and embarrassing, like Mitt Romney does. Santorum seemed relaxed, genuine, and sunny, even when talking about unpleasant issues like partial-birth abortion. He noted almost offhandedly that he had been "attached at the hip" with groups like the event sponsor during his time in the Senate, which is true. Then he spoke about the many battles that he lost in the Senate, often ones that involved abortion and marriage, the kind of fights that were hopeless from a numbers standpoint, but that were nonetheless worth waging. As a senator, this had made his life difficult. "My kids used to think my first name was 'ultra,'" he said, in reference to the media's (not-unjustified) habit of referring to him as "the ultra-conservative Rick Santorum." Santorum used this as a badge of honor, which was both clever and effective. Where I was sitting the crowd was hushed and rapt.
Afterward, I sought out Santorum and asked about the status of his prospective presidential bid. He'd just fended off a series of charged and provocative questions from fringe conservative-journalist types trying to get him to say outlandish things about Muslims. He looked tired. I got the pat answer about how he's going to "keep putting one foot in front of the other, see how things go, and see how fundraising goes--that's a big issue." I gathered it wasn't going especially well. Santorum hadn't taken a shot at Newt on stage, but couldn't resist now. "I think Newt's found one way to do it," he said, with a hint of a grin. "We're going to do it a different way." Then he winced. "I forgot to hawk my website." He looked disappointed. Even so, he helped himself tonight.
After the show, Santorum tweeted that he was heading to On the Record with Greta van Susteren "for free!" a joking reference to the fact that he is no longer on the Fox News payroll. This morning he was on the Today Show, with Politico reporting that he said for his waters-testing last night was "a good little swim."
Also, Talking Points Memo notes that Santorum's op-ed in the Des Moines Register on gay marriage we mentioned yesterday might have been a shift to -- get ready for this -- the left on whether sodomy should be legal, because he wrote "if two adults of the same sex want to have a relationship that is their business."
The Schedule: Santorum is still tearing up Iowa today, appearing at the Crawford County Republican Women Lunch in Denison and the Woodbury County Republican Party presidential forum in Sioux City.