In the wake of the latest debate and with the New Hampshire primary a day away, Glenn interviewed Rick Santorum on radio this morning. What does the candidate think of the latest attacks coming his way?
Read the transcript below:
PAT: Rick, everywhere I go people are asking me is Rick Santorum going to want condoms. Everywhere I go, that's the main question on their mind.
GLENN: And the answer you'll have us believe is no.
PAT: Is that the answer? Is that the answer?
GLENN: Is that the answer you have us believe?
SANTORUM: The answer I have you believe is no.
PAT: Really?
GLENN: Now ‑‑
SANTORUM: But ask Chris Matthews. There's a secret plan.
PAT: Uh‑huh.
GLENN: No, that's not a con ‑‑
SANTORUM: That I really do deeply ‑‑ I mean, this is crazy.
PAT: Yeah.
SANTORUM: I mean, we were talking about the Griswold decision which you know very well which was the precursor to the Roe versus Wade decision and judicial activism and, you know, the creation of new rights because the Court says so. And that's what I've opposed and will continue to oppose.
GLENN: Okay. Well ‑‑
SANTORUM: In this country.
GLENN: We hear your BS answer on the contraception. Now let me ask you this, because it's all about the right question: Is it a state's right to limit all private body parts to bowel and urination evacuation only?
STU: Jeez.
GLENN: Is that what you're going for?
SANTORUM: (Laughing). All I ‑‑
GLENN: Are you going to rename Kansas City Vatican City?
SANTORUM: Oh, my goodness.
GLENN: Do you believe when it comes to language that America should be Latin only?
PAT: Now you're asking the right questions.
SANTORUM: Oh, now you're ‑‑
PAT: Now you're pinning him down.
SANTORUM: You've pulled back the veil.
GLENN: Yeah, I told you it would be tough. We see you squirm in there.
Let me get to some real ‑‑
SANTORUM: I do support English‑only but it's really a ploy to get to Latin, just so you know.
PAT: Uh‑huh.
GLENN: Yeah.
PAT: Uh‑huh.
GLENN: Yeah.
SANTORUM: Uh‑huh, there you go. Once you start one, there you go.
PAT: Slippery slope.
GLENN: You notice he didn't talk about the bowel and urination evacuation‑only.
PAT: Yeah, yeah. He conveniently ignored that question.
GLENN: He skipped over that.
SANTORUM: I skipped that. I skipped that, yeah.
GLENN: Let me get to a real question here. You have ‑‑ you have spent some money in your past, Rick, and you have also been for, you know, earmarks. You told us last time you were on, you explained the earmarks, you said that it was your duty. Well, you go ahead and explain it. Real quick, just try to do it real quick because I want to get to a bigger question.
SANTORUM: All I've said is that, you know, under the Constitution congress has the ability to appropriate funds and, you know, one of the ‑‑ one of the things that was generally done and frankly was done for decades is that members of congress, you know, in working with their states would identify things that they would want to spend money on and money that came from my state, taxes that were spent that were going to be reallocated back to the states and the senators in congress in that state would make sure that they were spent in a proper fashion and not just given to the executive branch and let them decide where that money was spent. There was abuse, that abuse led to higher spending, and Jim DeMint who also did those earmarks, too, and I and many others said we should end that abuse.
GLENN: Okay. Some people are saying that you're an economic liberal. And I mean, honestly just about everybody is an economic liberal compared to me now. I want to shut the whole, whole darn thing down enough to the point to where it doesn't ‑‑ we don't become the Articles of Confederation but we still have enough government to be able to manage the country and stop all this spending because we're completely out of money. Tell me about your economic liberalism.
SANTORUM: Well, I propose ‑‑ this economic liberal has proposed $5 trillion in spending cuts over five years, a balanced budget in five years, specific ‑‑ as the Wall Street Journal says, nobody was out there working on entitlement reform. Well, you know, Glenn, that's where the problem is in this country. It's the whole idea that Washington has entitled you to certain things simply because you are here in this country and/or you may be in a situation that requires some help at some point this time. That is the problem. We need to get Washington out of that business, get those ‑‑ get those responsibilities back to the states and give them the flexibility to design programs, if they want to design programs, to deal with ‑‑ to deal with these issues. So if you're looking for the person, the only person in this race and one of the few people who actually stood up when it ‑‑ when we weren't running deficits, when we weren't in fiscal crisis as we are today and said, in the second oldest state in the country, Pennsylvania, as the youngest member of the Senate and talked about the need for Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid, these big programs that affect disproportionately seniors and I was leading the charge in all those issues. In fact I'm getting questions here in New Hampshire: I can't believe you're out there talking about specific reforms to Social Security, and the answer is yes, I am. Why? Because we need leadership. And so if anyone actually questions my bona fides, don't look at, you know, a few earmarks here and there during my, what I believe my constitutional duty to represent the interests of my state, look at the fundamental reforms that I have been advocating for 20 years in Washington D.C. before anyone was talking about them.
GLENN: By the way, I just want to point out, I don't think it's ‑‑ I think it's bona fides and not bona fatties unless that was a comment about me, Rick. I'm just ‑‑
SANTORUM: Did I say that?
PAT: No.
GLENN: No. All right. It sounded like it.
PAT: Rick, we learned last week from the New York Times ‑‑
GLENN: Maybe I'm sexy.
SANTORUM: It's that Latin again.
GLENN: No, I know. It might be sensitive every time somebody says fatty. Go ahead.
PAT: And we learned last week from the New York Times, and you just said the word: Entitlement. Now, we know that's code speak for your hideous racism. Do you want to explain why you hate all people of color?
SANTORUM: Oh, my goodness. You know ‑‑
GLENN: You know what, can you play this ‑‑ I would like to hear this answer. Can you play this? I hate to bring this up on you, Rick. You know you're a friend but this really was ‑‑ this really doesn't make sense to me. Do you have that audio by any chance?
PAT: No. It was actually printed. It was the op‑ed, remember, from last week?
GLENN: No, no, the audio of where you said, you know, look, we want to make sure that we take care of all people but we shouldn't be giving, you know, black people a handout or ‑‑
SANTORUM: No, no, no, no, no. First off, I didn't ‑‑ I listened to that, I looked at it. I think it was one of those things where I sort of got my tongue tied there for a second and because I just, first off I don't think that, I don't believe that. But I do believe in the concept of what I said that we shouldn't create dependency, that we should create opportunity and, you know, I'm ‑‑ the more I look at it, the more I ‑‑ and by the way, no one in the room ‑‑ and there were 100 reporters in that room ‑‑ came up to me with that question. I think it was ‑‑ I feel to this day that it was simply just, you know, I started to say one thing and then sort of stopped and said something else. But the point is a valid point. The point is that we need to create a society of opportunity instead of dependency and I would absolutely encourage everyone to look at the work that I've done when I was in the United States Senate in working with the African‑American community in the State of Pennsylvania and across this country, no Republican had more interaction and worked closer with the urban areas of my state, with the African‑American community. I got the endorsement of the Black Pastors of Philadelphia which is not, let me assure you, a conservative group because of the work that I did in the inner city in trying to ‑‑ tried to help improve the quality of life there. And the idea that, you know, you make a little bobble with your language and all of a sudden you're ‑‑ you know, you're someone who's insensitive or feels ‑‑ or tries to stereotype blacks is an absolute absurdity and it simply is not what I said and certainly from my actions nothing close to the record that I have.
GLENN: I will tell you that I'm sick of even the pandering now of saying, "Well, I've worked with this group or this group." It's not that you were pandering but people that are pointing this thing out and, you know, "I work with this group or that group." What difference does it make? We all need to work together. The policies are for white, black, brown, yellow.
SANTORUM: I agree.
GLENN: Purple, orange. It doesn't matter. It should be for humans. We are all helping humans and American humans first. I mean, that's just the way it should be. And I don't ‑‑ you know, now I'd be ‑‑ now I'll be a xenophobist for saying that, you know, it should be Americans first.
Let me go to the reduction in the military and its connection to the private hill tear that is being created. Can you tell me anything about the reductions and the private military, the use of ‑‑
SANTORUM: Well, when you say "private military," I'm not ‑‑
GLENN: State Department ‑‑
SANTORUM: It does ‑‑
GLENN: Reducing the number of troops ‑‑
SANTORUM: Private contractors?
GLENN: Yeah, private contractors, reduce ‑‑ the reduction of troops in Iran and using private contractors instead.
SANTORUM: Right.
GLENN: Taking the uniform off and doing it in a different way.
SANTORUM: Well, again, I mean, we've seen this over and over as we originally entered Iraq, it was because we simply didn't have the military capability, we didn't have the force structure to be able to support the mission that we had and so we brought in a bunch of former, you know, former military, on a private contract basis to do a lot of the personal security for people in the country and the like. And now we have the president further now proposing reductions in the military, which is going to lead, as you mentioned, to further growth in these ‑‑ in a variety of these companies that do private, sort of a private military. That is ‑‑ that's not the direction we should be going. You know, we need to be very up front about our costs, we need to be very up front about the accountability of the people that we are deploying around this, around the world to defend our interests, and the less we have of the private military and the more that we have of our men and women in uniform who are accountable to the behavior, the better off we are.
GLENN: Tell me about your ‑‑ because this is being touted ‑‑ your anti‑gun record.
SANTORUM: What?
GLENN: You haven't heard that one yet?
PAT: You haven't seen that yet.
GLENN: Oh, that's everywhere. You're anti‑gun.
PAT: Every time we talk to you, Rick ‑‑
SANTORUM: I'm (inaudible) with the NRA. I'm an NRA member.
GLENN: Yeah, but you can buy that.
SANTORUM: Oh, yeah, sure.
GLENN: Yeah, that and the Better Business Bureau, you can buy into those. For 50 bucks, they will give you an A‑plus rating. Yeah, that's what they all say.
SANTORUM: Well, call Chris Cox. He's the head of the NRA.
GLENN: Yeah, I know.
SANTORUM: And goes out there and fights for the rights of gun owners on a daily basis.
GLENN: I know.
SANTORUM: We work with them very, very closely. I'm as a leader with them in pushing forward. Here's the amazing thing. The guy who attacks me on this is Ron Paul. Ron Paul, if it was Ron Paul had his way, he voted against the most important gun issue in, well, maybe ever because it was a gun manufacturer's liability bill. As you know, Glenn, there were all these trial lawyers were going out and suing gun manufacturers if their gun was used in the commission of a crime. Whether the gun functioned properly or not didn't matter. They were going to hold them liable for any damage that occurred from someone being shot with their gun. And literally manufacturers were going to pack up and leave the United States, which meant we wouldn't have any guns ‑‑ there wouldn't be any guns made in this country or be able to be available to be made in this country and so I'm one of the guys that led the effort to put a ban on these types of lawsuits that passed on a bipartisan basis. Ron Paul was one of I think three Republicans who voted no. This is the kind of ‑‑ for him ‑‑ which would have eliminated de facto, de facto eliminated, one of those Latin words again, de facto eliminated the ‑‑
GLENN: He's slowly working it in. He is a Papist ‑‑
SANTORUM: (Inaudible) the Second Amendment.
GLENN: He's a Papist progressive. He just throws those words in and before you know it, we're all speaking Latin. I know. How long before you make us wear the hat and the shoes that the pope wears?
PAT: (Laughing).
SANTORUM: Got to wear the red shoes, though. Got to wear those red shoes. Slippers, not shoes. Slippers.
GLENN: May I ask you ‑‑
SANTORUM: Slippers, you can't work and so we're going to keep you in the house and keep you under control. You didn't know about all this, huh?
GLENN: May I ask you, how much money have you raised since ‑‑
SANTORUM: Well, we've got a money bomb going right now at RickSantorum.com. We're trying to raise a million dollars here between now and the next few days to get us ready so we can aggressively go out and compete in South Carolina which is the next big primary after New Hampshire and so that's RickSantorum.com if you can help. I can tell you we raised more money in the three days after the Iowa caucuses than I did in the entire year before.
GLENN: Well, wait. Rick, I think you were, you were running your campaign off of candy wrappers.
STU: (Laughing).
SANTORUM: That's an insult to candy wrappers.
GLENN: (Laughing). I mean, that's not really a big statement there.
SANTORUM: Yeah.
GLENN: You're facing ‑‑
SANTORUM: It's true.
GLENN: You're facing Rick Perry alone who I think has, what, $65 million?
STU: No, I don't ‑‑
SANTORUM: Well, reports are that I guess his ‑‑ the reports says his following is like, he has like $3 million left in the bank or something like that. He, I tell you he burned through millions and millions in Iowa. We spent $30,000 on television in Iowa.
GLENN: How are you doing in the polls in New Hampshire and South Carolina? Can you win South Carolina?
SANTORUM: Yeah, absolutely. I think the last poll I saw, we were within three points of Romney in South Carolina.
PAT: Wow.
SANTORUM: And we were just down there yesterday, just made a little quick visit down there for the day and had huge enthusiastic crowds up in the upstate which is, you know, the conservative upstate of South Carolina, the Greenville/Spartanburg area and we'll be heading down there first thing Wednesday morning and do the sprint. We feel like that's a great place for us to really make this a two‑person race.
GLENN: I ‑‑
SANTORUM: We need to get it down to a two‑person race and if we can finish very strongly in either first or second, a strong second in South Carolina, we'll turn it into a two‑person race.
GLENN: I only have just about two minutes left here. Can you help me ‑‑ not even that. Ninety seconds. How are you going to appeal to ‑‑ because while you're not Mitt Romney and certainly not Newt Gingrich, you're not a libertarian.
SANTORUM: I'm not.
GLENN: How are you appeal to the people that ‑‑ like I really lean ‑‑ I think I'm a libertarian that leans more ‑‑ you know, I believe in a little more government than some of the Ron Paul people do. How do you appeal to those people while not compromising your values? So what are the things that you can say to a Ron Paul supporters that they will understand that is true about you, that's not some campaign promise? Where is the libertarian streak in you?
SANTORUM: Well, you know, if you look at, look at the ‑‑ I go with entitlement reform. I mean, you know, welfare reform was a bill that I helped author and I was representing a state with, you know, with big cities and lots of folks who were dependent upon these programs and the second highest per capita population of seniors in the country and I'm out talking about limited government and I'm talking about removing entitlement. I'm talking about, back in the 1990s talking about removing personal retirement accounts which is something that the Cato Institute was pushing back then. So I mean, I think you'll find that I very much believe in free people, free enterprise and free markets but, you know, I do believe in a referee private sector and I do believe government has some roles for helping, for being involved in not just national security but providing some sort of, you know, basic safety net, particularly for those who are on the margins of society, it should be done at the state level, not at the federal level, but I do believe that government has a role to play in that regard to make sure that, you know, we have some basic transitional safety net or help for those, particularly those with disabilities, and it's a little personal to me because of my own situation but it's something that I think is an important safety net that has to be out there.
GLENN: Gotta go. Laus deos. Yeah! You know what it means!
PAT: Starting already.
GLENN: All right. Thank you very much, Rick. I appreciate it. RickSantorum.com.
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