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The world is a dangerous and complex place, former Sen. Rick Santorum told the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday, even more so than when he ran for the presidency in 2012.
He called out President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in particular, two perennial targets at the annual gathering of conservative activists.
“We don’t need just someone with a strong economic plan. Thanks to the Obama-Clinton foreign policy team, we have gone from a policy of peace through strength to a policy of leading from behind,” he said.
“In fact, the president’s popularity is so bad around the world today that I heard a source that the Kenyan government is actually developing proof that Barack Obama was actually born in America,” he joked.
Santorum broached the possibility of a GOP candidate facing Clinton in the general election next year. That candidate had better call “radical Islam” by its name, he said.
“The likelihood that we’re going to face a former secretary of state means that we need someone who has a long and deep understanding of the threats we confront, particularly the threat of radical Islam,” he said, adding that the president’s “profound lack of experience has created problems.”
“Commander in chief is not an entry-level position,” the former Pennsylvania senator said, touting his time on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Santorum called for boots on the ground to defeat the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, as well as increased aid to Jordan and Egypt.
“We need to start by crushing ISIS. Now,” he said, using an alternative name for the terrorist group. “We must start in Iraq. We need to get ISIS out of Iraq. The first thing we need to do is arm the Kurds. Instead of sending them bandages and bodybags, we need to send them weapons.”
If Iran develops a nuclear weapon, Santorum warned, the U.S. will have failed in its negotiations.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s upcoming address to Congress has become a political flashpoint, with many Democrats, including Vice President Joe Biden, declining to attend.
“In the end, Prime Minister Netanyahu would not be coming to America, he would not be risking the most important national security arrangement that Israel has if it wasn’t for the fact that he believed in his heart that Iran’s and the United States’ nuclear negotiations was going to end up being an existential threat to his country,” Santorum said.
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