On Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace, Senator Rick Santorum (R-Virginia [most of the time] ) really lost it.
http://www.foxnews.com/...
I was listening to it on XM Radio, so I don't know if there was a desperate look on face matching the voice I heard. (Other readers can chip in on that point.)
During Wallace's questioning about his ad using the image of Casey and a nuclear mushroom cloud, the issue of illegal immigration came up.
Here is the text of the question from Wallace: Senator, if I may, let's talk about the reality of this situation with regard to the vote on illegal immigration. All he said was that he would have voted for the comprehensive immigration reform package that was passed by the Senate, a package, incidentally, that was supported by 23 of your Republican Senate colleagues, as well as President Bush. Does that make all of them soft on terror?
SANTORUM: Well, I think in that particular respect, yes...
...I think anything that says to the people of the world, if they can come into this country and break the law and cross our borders and we're going to give them amnesty, number one, you encourage more people to come and I think that does allow the opportunity for, if we do not secure our borders first, which is what now we're trying to do, after people rejected the Senate bill.
The overwhelming majority of Pennsylvanians have rejected the Senate bill because it puts the cart before the horse. We need to secure our borders first and if we don't we're going to have problems.
Wallace seemed somewhat shocked by the answer and does a followup...
WALLACE: Senators, you're saying your Pennsylvania colleague, Arlen Specter, and George W. Bush, both of whom supported that bill, are soft on terrorists?
SANTORUM: All I would suggest is -- I don't know how I can make it more clear, Chris. If we don't secure our borders first and what we say to people is that we're going to provide you amnesty if you cross into this country, you're going to get more people in this country that I believe could be a threat to this country, and I think we're seeing that.
My view is that Wallace gave Santorum a chance to take back his attack on Bush and Santorum didn't do that.
I am not a fan of either Bush or Santorum, but my take of this interview was that Santorum level of desperation seemed even greater than his Pittsburgh Debate performance.
Two other recent points about Santorum:
I have heard him say several times in the media that the war in Iraq will be won or lost at home. While I believe that is wrong in so many different ways, I have not heard this comment said by very many other political leaders recently, until I heard Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld make the same exact remark a few days ago.
Finally, I heard that on a local radio station interview in Central Pennsylvania, Santorum said that he personally contacted President Bush to ask him to launch first strike miliary operations against Iran if and when the U.S. believes Iran is about to acquire nuclear weapons. When the talk show host asked how the President responded to this request for military operations against Iran, Senator Santorum refused to reveal the President's answer.
Santorum has talked about his Iran sanctions, diplomacy and regime change legislation that he introduced a year or two ago and seems to want to be viewed as Churchill in the 1930s.
But if has already personally asked President Bush for military action against Iran, Santorum has already skipped past sanctions, diplomacy and regime change by 3rd parties directly to war.
Yet, Senator Santorum, people are not voting against you because we don't think Iran is a potential problem or because we disagree with your call for potentially an immediate attack on Iran.
You are not going to be able to spin your defeat because you are too forward thinking about Iran. Senator, you are not symbol of a nation wanting or not wanting war with Iran or recognizing your "gathering storm" theory.
Senator Santorum, you are symbol of the democracy established in Philadelphia in 1776, where people can choose their leaders of their own free will and rejecting them if they please. You are losing today because they don't think you represent them well. But, keep on working on excuses Rick.