Former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) delivered a comparatively somber speech at the Values Voter Summit on Friday where he critiqued his own party and called for conservatives to be more active.
“Quit being scared and start being an activist,” Santorum said in his speech.
There was a clear contrast between Santorum’s speech and the ones delivered by other headliners on Friday. Where Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst (R) and others devoted their speeches mostly to bashing Democrats and President Barack Obama, Santorum, a former presidential candidate, instead used much of his time on the podium to criticize the Republican party.
“If you look at the current conservative movement, the Republican Party, there are issues that we haven’t even lost yet and we’re talking about giving up on,” Santorum said. “We’re not even willing to fight the fight to stand for what we say we believe in.”
To be sure, Santorum did also spend a big portion of his speech to raging against favorite conservative targets. He said that “the most popular history text book today is written by a Marxist, anti-American … Howard Zinn.”
At one point during the speech Santorum said that it was important for Republicans to pick up as many seats in the 2014 cycle because in the 2016 cycle more Republican senators would be up for re-election and, according to Santorum, the chance of the GOP picking up Senate seats “are pretty much zero.”
