Republican U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum's office acknowledged yesterday that it cannot locate public statements
of the senator questioning the Iraq war, despite the senator's claim last week that he has publicly expressed his concerns.
But Santorum said that doesn't mean he hasn't made the comments.
In an interview last week, he said he had publicly and privately raised questions about efforts to contain
the insurgency and to limit Baathist involvement in the new Iraqi government. He made his remarks in response to a charge
by his leading Democratic challenger, Robert P. Casey Jr., that Santorum has failed to "ask the tough questions" about Iraq.
Robert L. Traynham, Santorum's spokesman, said a search of Nexis, a news database, and the office's press
clippings had not turned up any account of those comments. He noted, however, that the office's records are incomplete because
the office is unable to record everything the senator says.
"I do a lot of interviews on TV, on radio, with print reporters who don't happen to write everything I say,"
Santorum said yesterday. "The fact that it hasn't turned up in print doesn't mean I haven't said it."
The skirmish over whether Santorum has criticized President Bush's handling of the war is just one aspect
of the Iraq debate that could vex the senator and Casey in the 2006 Senate race.
Casey, the Pennsylvania state treasurer, has begun faulting Santorum but has declined to offer an alternative
vision for Iraq - reflecting the division among national Democrats on how to deal with the issue.
Santorum, the third-highest-ranking Republican leader in the Senate, won't distance himself from Bush's
policy, even at a time when other Republicans are speaking out and polls show rising public dissatisfaction with the war.
With Pennsylvania soldiers dying, Casey said last week, Santorum should be pressing Bush as firmly as he
did President Bill Clinton over U.S.-led raids of Kosovo in 1999, which did not involve ground troops.
"There were no Pennsylvanians in harm's way last time. This situation is dramatically different," said Jay
Reiff, Casey's campaign manager. "Pennsylvanians on the ground deserve a senator who is going to put aside partisanship and
ask simple questions about their safety in the war."
Santorum was a vocal opponent of the Kosovo conflict, he said, because it lacked a compelling national interest.
He criticized Clinton in March 1999 for taking military action in Kosovo "with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy."
Iraq is different, Santorum said last week, "because this is something we have to do to protect our country.
I feel strongly about that."
His reluctance to publicly question Bush has more to do with Santorum's style than his priorities, Santorum
aides say. He prefers taking a longer view, and if the war looks grim for several weeks, Santorum won't suddenly protest,
Traynham said.
"He can understand where the President is coming from, the complexity of the issues," Traynham said. "That
is why he keeps his counsel quiet."
Casey faces his own challenges, among them finding a position that portrays him as neither an antiwar defeatist
nor a passive war supporter.
On the major Iraq votes - authorizing force and funding the operation - Casey said he would have supported
those measures, just as Santorum did. Another Democrat in the race, Bucks County professor Chuck Pennacchio, said he would
have voted against the use of force.
In recent weeks, Casey has attempted to differentiate himself from Santorum by chastising the senator for
failing to speak out as soldiers die. Casey's latest criticism of Santorum came in the same month that seven Pennsylvania
National Guard soldiers were killed in Iraq.
But when asked to describe what he would do differently in Iraq, Casey says the Bush administration has
not given the public enough information to make a decision on what to do next.
"This is starting to look remarkably like Casey's race against Ed Rendell, which he seemed to do nothing
but attack Rendell and distort his record while offering little in the way of positive change for Pennsylvania," said John
Brabender, Santorum's media consultant. "Ultimately, this caught up with him on Election Day."
One constituency that responded was left-wing bloggers, who have been praising him for raising questions.
Santorum's stance falls in line with his party; polls show strong GOP approval ratings for Bush's handling
of the war. But a potential pitfall for Santorum could arise a year from now if the war looks unwinnable, said Christopher
Borick, a pollster at Muhlenberg College in Allentown.
"He is so closely tied with the President, there is some kind of residual effect," Borick said. "It will
be hard for him to disentangle."
There's no proof of what Santorum didn't ask
I read with amusement, and a smirk, the article about the fruitless search by Sen. Santorum's staff for
documentation to confirm that he has asked "tough questions" about the Iraq war ("Staff can't document war questioning," Aug.
25).
How ridiculous must it look when our junior senator cannot find one piece of paper documenting these alleged
statements in an era of unprecedented, round-the-clock media coverage? The reason Sen. Santorum can't find such a statement
is that he has never made one. Questioning the Republican authority is not something that he does. Perhaps he would be better
served by just admitting that he has no interest in challenging his party on this issue.
That type of honesty and candor would at the very least be a breath of fresh air in our commonwealth.
Andrew S. Kessler, Whitpain
Letter to the editor, Philadelphia Inquirer, Sep 1, 2005
