• Santorum whacks Obama SOTU, Romney on health care

    AP

    Former Penn. Sen. Rick Santorum speaks at the Iowa Renewable Fuels Summit on Tuesday in Des Moines, Iowa. Santorum commented on President Obama's State of the Union address during an interview with a Des Moines radio station.

    By Domenico Montanaro, Deputy Political Editor, NBC News

    From NBC's Catherine Chomiak
    Likely presidential candidate and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum (R) dismissed President Obama’s State of the Union address as “a speech of platitudes with very little substance.”

    "I thought it was a speech of platitudes with very little substance,” Santorum said on Newsradio 1040 WHO in Des Moines, IA. “You know, he talked about, we're going to be pro-business and the only concrete thing that I saw there about business was raising taxes on job creators, by increasing the top rate. He said they want to do something about spending, and he spent the first half of his speech talking about more spending."

    Obama did, however, also talk about cutting the corporate tax rate.

    When asked a question about the constitutionality of health care reform, Santorum took the opportunity to hit a possible Republican opponent.

    "When Mitt Romney gets up and says ‘RomneyCare’ is OK and Constitutional, he's right -- under Massachusetts [law],” Santorum said. “Massachusetts can require you to buy health insurance, auto insurance, to buy whatever they believe is in the best interest for the people to do, and it's bankrupting Massachusetts.”

    Santorum also addressed his comments to Christian News Service where, when referring to President Obama’s pro-choice stance on abortion, he said, "I find it almost remarkable for a black man to say, 'We're going to decide who are people and who are not people.'"

    Today, he said he welcomes "this battle. I'm not someone who backs down from a fight when you know you're right. In this case, what I said was dead on, and I believe it. I'm glad that we're having this debate. It's a debate we need to have in America."

  • Santorum doesn't back down from controversial comment

    From NBC's Catherine Chomiak
    In an appearance yesterday on FOX, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum (R) was asked about his earlier comments that appeared to compare slavery to abortion.

    Referring to President Obama's pro-choice stance, Santorum told Christian News Service: "I find it almost remarkable for a black man to say, 'We're going to decide who are people and who are not people.'"

    When asked point-blank by FOX's Greta Van Susteren if his comments were racially charged, Santorum responded, "This is one of these great taken-out-of-context [moments]." He added, "When I use the word 'black,' all of a sudden it gives people a reason to say, 'Ah, he's trying to make some sort of racial comment.' I was not. I was trying to talk about a historical fact about how the Constitution was interpreted and how it’s interpreted today," he continued.

    Santorum maintained he was arguing a fetus should be considered a person under the 14th Amendment, and given the same protections as people under the Constitution. "This is an argument that has been made by the pro-life movement for as long as I've heard the argument," he added.

  • Daschle, Frist, Strickland stress bipartisanship on health care

    From NBC's Catherine Chomiak
    As House Republicans return to their health-care reform repeal effort -- and as the tone of political discourse is examined -- former Senate leaders Tom Daschle (D-SD) and Bill Frist (R-TN) and former Gov. Ted Strickland (D-OH) announced the creation of a bipartisan health project. The project's goal is to aid states with the new law's implementation and to find bipartisan solutions to health challenges.

    At a press conference in DC, the three men stressed the importance of working together and across party lines. "Progress cannot be achieved in the absence of bipartisan support. We need to move past the political divides and inflammatory rhetoric, especially in the wake of the terrible national tragedy in Arizona, and dedicate ourselves to substantive discussion and find real bipartisan solutions to our health-care system's most critical needs," Daschle said.

    Strickland added, "We do have differences. We are committing ourselves to working together on this joint effort because we know how important it is. We know what we're working for is the people and the nation we love."

    Frist clarified what they see as bipartisanship, "It doesn't mean abandon partisan principle. It doesn't mean abandon principled leadership. But it means getting together and discussing in an intelligent, substantive, civil, respectful way."

    While House Republicans are working to repeal the law, Frist -- a Republican doctor -- disagreed with their course of action. "It is not the bill that [Republicans] would have written. It is not the bill that I would have drafted. But it is the law of the land and it is the platform, the fundamental platform, upon which all future efforts to make that system better, for that patient, for that family, will be based, and that is a fact."

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