Santorum, Gingrich speak to packed house at Alabama Theatre

Birmingham News ^ | March 12, 2012 | Martin Swant

[red flanker]

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama ---Republican presidential primary candidates Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich, vying for the image of the most conservative candidate, spoke to a packed audience in downtown Birmingham tonight.

The candidates, speaking at a forum at the Alabama Theatre sponsored by the Alabama GOP, both heavily criticized President Barack Obama while also critiquing the other candidates, even if it wasn't always by name.

"You need to look to a leader that believes in you, and that's where I lie," Santorum said.

The crowd was friendly to both candidates but seemed most warm to Gingrich, as was apparent by multiple cheers of "Newt, Newt, Newt."

[AmericanInTokyo]

With all due respect, you may well have to change elements of your tagline, after viewing the short YouTube clip which I liked in Post #60, if you can bear to see New Gingrich and what he said about Ronald Reagan in that interview, now a part of the permanent record. Let us please not re-write history. This was a well known fact on Capitol Hill among Conservative Republicans regarding Newt Gingrich and President Reagan. :-)

[brityank]

"You need to look to a leader that believes in you, and that's where I lie," Santorum said.

Oooooooooh!

Yo, Diogenes - does this make Ricky an honest politician?

LOL

[Kenny]

What Rick Santorum has that Newt nor Romney lack is passion and a sense of urgency. It doesn’t fly to say this is the most important election of your lifetime, you have to feel it and express it. That’s what rick does that makes his audiences enthusiastic about his candidacy.

[CharlesWayneCT]

Well, she did say "the republican congress", and he was a member of the house, until he won election and was a member of the senate, which means he was part of the republican congress.

Every republican in congress could claim the torch was passed to them based on what Nancy Reagan said:

"Barry Goldwater handed the torch to Ronnie, and in turn Ronnie turned that torch over to Newt and the Republican members of Congress to keep that dream alive."

Newt was on stage with her at the time, hence the direct reference to him. But that doesn't mean she wasn't addressing ALL the republican members of congress, of which Rick Santorum was a prominent member, having served in the House and now serving in the Senate.

[CharlesWayneCT]

Sorry, but I don’t hear anything in that clip which would equate to “bad-mouthing” Reagan. He said that Bush Sr. couldn’t just run on a platform of 4 more years of Reagan, because people like change. He didn’t say in that clip that there was anything wrong with 4 more years of Reagan, or bad-mouth what Reagan did. He was talking political reality.

[Antoninus]

Final thing tonight: Rick’ pro-labor rating is 13%. Newt’s is 9%. What the hell are people talking about here??

Exactly. Saying that Santorum is "pro-big-labor" is a complete lie. Unfortunately, a lie and $30 million is more than enough to destroy someone's reputation.

[Tribune7]

Ouch!

[alstewartfan]

As I’ve said, go cast you vote, and then head toward the Romney campaign HQ to celebrate. Hey, I voted for Thompson last time, even though the race was over, BUT THIS TIME we still have a candidate *with a chance* who is 10X better than Mitt. A candidate who is being killed off now by YOUR vote, and the votes of others who cannot accept mathematical reality. Bob

[alstewartfan]

Rick is NOT a soft-on-crime socialist like the Huckster. Madison Ave. liars have pushed such nonsense, and I am sorrowed to find that so many here have been receptive to it. I love Sarah, but her candidate has LOST.

[newzjunkey]

For someone who attacked Romney as thinking he's "God's chosen candidate," Santorum's pitch was focused on religion rather than the issues.

Last night he claimed ObamaCare was the "game changer" that lead him to run but he'd endorsed its spiritual father, Romney, in 2008. He propped up the ObamaCare deciding vote, Specter, in the prior election saying, among other things, "he's with us on the votes that matter."

He's never come clean about his own push for requiring individuals to have health insurance as a congressman in 1992 or in his 1994 senate race, instead denying he was ever "tainted" by the issue while claiming he alone is "honest with the American People."

[Sun]

Some people THINK that running the Olympics means Romney would be good for the people’s economy. But Romney got $billions of money for the Olympics from the taxpayers.

Also, this shows Romney is not so good at helping the economy, especially when:

“Massachusetts Health Care Reform Has Left Small Business Behind: A Warning to the States
By Joshua Archambault
September 17, 2010”

snip http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2010/09/massachusetts-health-care-reform-has-left-small-business-behind-a-warning-to-the-states

[combat_boots]

Originally, I was willing to look at Romney for the Olympics thing alone.

That was then. The man’s a Democrat, and, by NBC standards, is not one.

The whole AGW, RomneyBama care, anti-gun, pro-abortion, ‘it’s my turn’ issues are all I need to just say that his used car salesman tactics ain’t flyin’ around here.

Even if he gets his custom-fitted jeans made up to look worn and scuffed Bruno Maglis, he can take his millions and write his own dam check to the US Treasury.