Rick Santorum says women shouldn't serve in combat, but he's happy to have his wife jump on a grenade for him. When ABC's George Stephanopoulos asked the presidential candidate about a passage of his 2005 book -- "The radical feminists succeeded in undermining the traditional family and convincing women that professional accomplishments are the key to happiness" -- Santorum claimed his wife wrote the passage. But as The New York Times' Brian Knowlton points out, Karen Santorum's name isn't on the cover of the It Takes a Family, and she's not listed in his acknowledgments of people "who assisted me in the writing of this book." 

On the other hand, you could argue that Santorum has remained consistent when saying that in the heat of battle, if women are involved, emotions take over. He told ABC News that his wife wrote the passage because her feelings were hurt. When Karen quit her job to raise her kids, she "felt very much like society and those radical feminists that I was referring to were not affirming her choice... All I'm saying is... we should affirm both choices... That's what the book says, and I stand by what I said."

On Meet the Press Sunday, David Gregory also asked Santorum about the line from the book. He took the question further -- would Santorum allow single women to work in his administration? Santorum laughed and said there were single women working on his campaign, and that he affirmed all choices. Still, it's telling that Gregory felt the need to ask the question. Both leading Not Romney candidates have woman problems, though Santorum's is obviously very different from Newt Gingrich's. "The book It Takes a Family was written in response to Hillary Clinton's It Takes a Village in the 1990s, and it was not generally taken by women's rights groups as a tome of affirmation, and it's one of the reasons Santorum will keep facing questions about whether he can appeal to a key general election swing group," Politico's Maggie Haberman writes.

Mitt Romney's strength is among women, and that's why his campaign aired so many ads with family photos in New Hampshire. 

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Elspeth Reeve