President Bush was in Pennsylvania yesterday giving a Veterans Day speech at the Tobyhanna Army Depot. Rick Santorum was invited to attend the president's speech, but did not due to what he termed a scheduling conflict.
While Bush was in Tobyhanna, Santorum was delivering a speech to American Legion members at the Union League in Philadelphia. After his speech, Rick took the opportunity to place partial blame for the unpopularity of the war in Iraq on the White House.
However, Rick wanted to make sure that no one thought that, by not attending the presidential visit to Pennsylvania and blaming administration mistakes for the low approval of the Iraq war, he was trying to distance himself from President Bush. Here's how the Allentown Morning Call put it:
Sen. Rick Santorum took a rare swing Friday at President Bush, saying the war in Iraq has been less than optimal and that some blame for that lies with the White House.
Santorum, a conservative Republican and usually a strong Bush ally, said the unpopularity of the war should be shared between the White House and the media.
"Certainly, mistakes were made," Santorum said of the war's conduct. "But that's a criticism you can make of every conflict."
The comments, made after a Veterans Day speech at the Union League in Philadelphia, came at the same time the Pennsylvania senator stressed he wasn't trying to distance himself from the president, who spoke moments earlier about 80 miles away at the Tobyhanna Army Depot.
Bush's poll numbers are the lowest of any time during his presidency, in part due to the climbing death toll in Iraq...
Now, knowing all of that, why would anyone suspect that Rick Santorum was trying to put some distance between himself and President Bush?
