**Watch Sen. Rick Santorum debate Bob Casey, Jr.
on Meet the Press this Sunday!**
Read the message from Rick below, and tune in Sunday to hear Rick's positions on key issues and solutions for a stronger Pennsylvania and America.
Dear SEGOVIA,
You've heard from me asking you to get involved in our campaign ... and regarding my fight to reform Social Security, increase tax relief, combat the threat from illegal immigration, and a whole other host of issues.
But now, I want to discuss an issue that doesn't get talked about enough, particularly in an open and honest way in the public square. In fact, most elected officials try to run away from it, even while our short-term and long-term safety -- which should be their first order of business -- depends on it. I hope we can continue this conversation through the course of the campaign and beyond.
We are at war. All of those other issues, while very important, pale in comparison to ensuring we are secure as a country.
Some people would say we're not at war; some people would say it's not really serious, that the enemy isn't really something we should be too concerned about; some have called for withdrawal of our troops and said that we're creating more terrorists.
I disagree.
Some saw we're at war with Iraq. I disagree.
Some say we're at war with Afghanistan. I disagree.
We're at war with Islamic fascism, and Afghanistan and Iraq and Southern Lebanon and every country around the world that is a front to Islamic extremist fascism.
It is not a separate war, any more than during World War II. Then, we were at war in several nations. Were they the same? Not completely. The Japanese imperialists, was their mindset and ideology the same as the Nazis? Obviously not. Were they the same as the fascists in Italy? Obviously not. But they were still a common enemy.
Now today, whether it's Iran or Syria or Islamic Jihad or Al-Qaeda or Hezbollah or Hamas or Somalia or Syria -- the enemy is the West, us, the infidels.
And I know that's a hard thing for us to grasp because we're a nation that's tolerant. We like to think that people can be negotiated with and that we can discuss these things in a rational way. I think it's hard to discuss in a rational way with people who don't think rationally like we do here in the West.
These people are after us not because we've oppressed them ... it's because we stand for everything they hate: we stand for modernity, we stand for freedom, we stand for choices, and they don't. They want to destroy everything we have built here in the United States, and this is not new.
We woke up when Al-Qaeda hit us on Sept. 11, yet that attack was not new. Islamic fascists were at work when Iran took our embassy in Tehran in the late 1970s; they have continued, whether it's the Marines being killed in Beirut to bombing the U.S.S. Cole and the World Trade Center in 1993, they attacked us. And for 20-some years, we did nothing. For 20-some years, we didn't oppress them, we didn't aggravate them, we didn't show up in their community and cause problems. No, we were the enemy because of who we are.
Now the president and I agree on a lot of things. You'll hear that from my opponent all the time. And we do agree that we need a presence and we need to fight this war. We disagree on one very important thing, and that is what we tell the American people what this war is all about.
The president terms this as a war on terror. This is no more a war on terror than World War II was a war on blitzkrieg. Blitzkrieg is a tactic; it's not our enemy. Terror is a tactic; it is not our enemy.
Our enemy is people who have an ideology. We need to understand that ideology; we need to focus our attention as Americans to understand that the ideology and the tactics are both important, but the foundation is the ideology. They intend to defeat us by making sure every single day that it's really hard for you to turn that television on and to read the news. They know if they can kill just one civilian or person in the military -- they don't care who it is -- it'll be in the newspaper, it'll be on television, it'll be on the radio.
You talk to our men and women coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan, they are proud; they know what war we're in; they see it, they experience it. They know they're not going to allow the extremists to defeat us on the battlefield, but that's not our enemies' intention. Their intention is to make it so painful for you to wake up every morning and look at what's going on over there that you'll finally say to your elected leaders, 'We've had enough. Leave them alone; maybe they'll leave us alone.'
Well, they are not leaving us alone, and we can't wait to address this great threat. We have an obligation to do something about it here, not just on the foreign policy front, which I've been very active on, but by reducing our dependence on foreign oil.
My opponent says that I don't ask the tough questions; well, not only do I ask the tough questions, I answer them. I have solutions to the problems we face, though I acknowledge they won't be solved quickly or easily. But, I am at least willing to address them.
I authored the Syria Accountability Act, which helped Syria move out of Lebanon, albeit too late because the administration opposed me.
I'm the author of the Iran Freedom and Support Act, which puts increased sanctions on Iran, sponsors pro-democracy groups and calls for free and fair elections in Iran, and we voted on this Act earlier this summer. And I was the only one who spoke out in favor of it, even though there were 61 co-sponsors, because others were afraid of offending Iran. They say they're crazy. Being crazy doesn't make them less of a threat. Meanwhile, the administration opposed me and the Iran bill lost by four votes. That was before the invasion of Hezbollah into Israel.
So, I will continue to ask the tough questions, and answer the tough questions, and we're going to have a vote again on the Iran Freedom and Support Act.
These are tough issues. The threat we face is hard to digest. But, we can't afford not to have a policy towards nations that harbor and support Islamic fascism like Syria, Iran, Iraq Lebanon and others.
In response to my work in fighting this war, my opponent says he "doesn't think it really matters what you call it."
It doesn't matter? The most troubling issue our nation faces, and it doesn't matter?
It matters. We have to win it together. And I am committed to stepping up and doing whatever it takes to keep us safe and secure.
Thank you for your time. This conversation: to be continued.
God Bless,
Rick Santorum