Santorum Mocks Paul's "Craziness" in Cedar Rapids

Up and coming GOP presidential hopeful at rival Ron Paul during a campaign stop in Cedar Rapids on Wednesday night.

Santorum equated Paul’s foreign policy plans to fringe Democrat Dennis Kucinich, called some of the Texas Congressman’s policies “craziness,” and suggested some of the changes Paul proposes to make are dictatorial.

“He is out in the Dennis Kucinich wing of the Democratic party. He may even be left of Dennis Kucinich,” Santorum said of the libertarian Paul. “What people don’t like about Ron Paul is this craziness about cutting military in half, pulling our troops in from all over the world. (As president), he can do that."

“Let’s get serious about what message Iowa is going to send to the country. We want a responsible conservative,” he said. “Where you can be a dictator is the scary stuff he is for.”

Santorum also blasted President Barack Obama as a practitioner of “bureaucratic socialism,” while declining to make the leap to call Obama a socialist.

“Some people have suggested the president is a socialist. ... What he is basically doing is a term I would call bureaucratic socialism. It's still private ownership, but bureaucrats are managing it,” he said.

Santorum appeared at the campaign rally fresh off a recent surge to third place in the polls, although polls are not to be trusted, he said.

The former Pennsylvania senator had a simple message for Iowans during the stop: don’t let national media and polls decide whom to vote for on caucus night, less than a week from now.

Polls are based largely on uninformed responses and the national media follows those polls, he said.

“This is crunch time,” he told a crowd of about 100 at a campaign rally Wednesday evening at TrueNorth Learning Center in Cedar Rapids. “Iowans fight to be first. Don’t defer your judgment to those who aren’t paying nearly the amount of attention to this race as you are. … Don’t defer judgment about what you know and see to polls of people who don’t know nearly as much about this race as you do.

“You decide, lead. That is what you have been charged to do,” he said.

The setting was in a fairly sterile meeting room of the financial company. The crowd listened intently, but quietly and only applauded a handful of times. The event didn’t garner heckling treatment some of his rivals have experienced. 

For months, Santorum couldn't catch a break, but now finds himself gaining momentum at just the right time.

The GOP presidential hopeful visited all 99 Iowa counties before it became a cool thing for candidates to do. He's shaken hands, chatted with farmers in coffee shops and indulged in pies up and down the Iowa landscape.

Santorum has spent 97 days in Iowa this cycle (the most of any candidate) and said has held 357 town hall meetings. He’s put in the time and effort and embraced the grassroots caucus mentality (if for no other reason than it's far more economical campaigning than slick advertising). But, Santorum couldn't crawl out of the basement of GOP candidates and consistently polled in single digits.

“If you don’t have the money you don’t do it,” he said.

Suddenly, the candidate who espouses social conservative values is peaking. He is racking up and his campaign is trying to capitalize, plugging on Twitter to “Help me deliver an #IowaSurprise on Jan 3rd! Support my #IowaSurprise Moneybomb today!”

Jenn Jones, 40, drove down from her home in Anamosa to attend the event. She has been with Santorum since June, and plans to be a precinct captain in Jones County next week. He has captains for nearly 1,000 of the 1,700 precincts in Iowa, she said.

Santorum’s message hasn’t changed, and his base of support has been consistent, too, she said. While much is the same, the recent successes are energizing his supporters.

“His grassroots support has been very consistent all along, but the energy is starting to pick up because we are seeing the hard work paying off,” she said.

Her husband, Freddie Jones, 46, added, “It’s frustrating he didn’t catch on more quickly,” but it will benefit him that “he’s stuck to his principles” now that he’s “starting to catch fire.”

Santorum said he hasn’t bent his message to curry favor, particularly on social issues.

“There are far too many candidates on the Republican side who bob and weave and duck and hid when it comes to these,” Santorum said pointing to a sign for his “Faith, Family and Freedom” tour.