Politico - Santorum: Perry 'Ignores Reality'

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By Dan Hirschhorn

Rick Santorum lambasted Rick Perry as a lightweight on Israel policy Tuesday, dismissing Perry's speech in New York as boilerplate rhetoric crafted by political handlers.

"I've forgotten more about Israel than Rick Perry knows about Israel," Santorum said during a conversation with POLITICO on Tuesday, while Perry was addressing a rally of people opposed to the Palestinian statehood vote in New York. "There he is, reading a speech that I'm sure he didn't write, and has never taken a position on any of this stuff before, and [the media is] taking this guy seriously."

In Washington for meetings that included a lunch with Senate Republicans, the former Pennsylvania senator continued the attacks on Perry that have become a central element of his fledgling presidential campaign in recent weeks, casting doubt on Perry's conservative credentials -- and his ability to stick to positions under pressure in the national spotlight.

"Rick Perry hammers Mitt Romney for being a flip-flopper and within a couple of weeks of being in the race, he's already flipped-flopped on two issues," Santorum said, citing Perry's positions on Israel and the HPV vaccine. "It's pretty amazing to see when these folks come into prime time and have to answer for their positions how wobbly these positions become. That's not the case with me. You're going to see someone who's been out there, been tested and stood as a principled conservative in a state where it's not easy to be a principled conservative.

Santorum hammered Perry for pushing a Texas mandate that would have forced young girls to receive an HPV vaccination. Since getting into the campaign, Perry has said that he regretted not bringing the measure to the Texas Legislature for review rather than issuing an executive order -- and then said that the measure should have been an opt-in rather than opt-out requirement. Santorum said he found all of the shifts deeply problematic.

"That's a pretty big change of mind on something like this that you felt passionately about, and fought for, for four years," Santorum said. "If we're looking for someone who can go to Washington, D.C., and take the heat and not back down when the heat gets turned up, I think you probably saw an example of someone who passionately felt that he was doing the right thing, defended it until the heat got too hard and then he flipped."

Perry's also wrong for opposing a fence along the Mexican border, he said.

"Good fences make good neighbors, that's all there is to it," Santorum said. "And to adopt the liberal line that you can build a taller ladder, that's just silly rhetoric. It has nothing to do with reality. Fences do make a difference; they've made a difference every place they've been built.

"We don't need another president who ignores reality for ideology," he added.

He even hit Fox News, his former employer, for lavishing so much attention on Perry: "Fox News is a dog following the squirrel."

Santorum predicted that the media scrutiny that comes with being the front-runner would very likely bring down Perry's poll numbers from his peak, much like he saw happen with Michele Bachmann, who's fallen to the bottom of polls just a month after winning the Ames Straw Poll. Citing the importance of his own legislative record, he was dismissive of Bachmann's three terms in the House but said he wasn't surprised at the attention she received for the first few months of the presidential race.

"We live in the age of celebritization of every walk of life, politics included," Santorum said.

Still running an underfunded campaign that's at the back of national and early-state polls, Santorum said he sees a path to the GOP nomination by finishing in the top three in the Iowa caucuses, performing above expectations in the New Hampshire primary and then making a strong showing in South Carolina. After his fourth-place finish in last month's Ames Straw Poll, Santorum plans to spend the vast majority of his time between now and the caucuses in Iowa and South Carolina.

Though Santorum said he doesn't expect to raise even $1 million for the quarter by the next fundraising deadline in mid-October, he said the continued clamoring for another candidate in the race is good news for him: It signals the hollow support for the better-known candidates in the field and the opportunity he has as he introduces himself to voters who haven't gotten to know him yet.

"When they say they don't like the pack, they're not talking about me," Santorum said.

He remains confident -- and he's fully grounded in reality in feeling that way.

"I'll do a blood test and pee in a cup," he joked.

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