Romney seeks to undercut Santorum on spending in GOP debate Wrestling for the front-runner's mantle in the Republican presidential race, Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney clashed fiercely Wednesday night over their conservative credentials and their past support of earmarks as the four GOP candidates met for the first debate in nearly a month. Romney's imperative, just days before the potentially pivotal contest in his home state of Michigan, was to halt Santorum's momentum as the contest hurtles toward Super Tuesday, when more than 400 delegates will be at stake. He attempted to do so - with some help from Rep. Ron Paul - by questioning Santorum's claims that he is a fiscal conservative. But Santorum was able to hold his ground, often fending off Romney's attacks with a relaxed smile and an amused shake of his head. The debate got heated early during a discussion of fiscal policy when the former Massachusetts governor drilled into Santorum for voting to raise the debt ceiling five times and seeking scores of earmarks -- pots of federal money that members of Congress steer to their states and districts. Santorum had defended the practice by stating that Congress has a role to play in appropriating money. "Sometimes the president, the administration, doesn't get it right," he said. What happened was an abuse of the process. When that abuse occurred, I stepped forward. Romney, calling for a ban on earmarks, pounced, while seeking to put some distance between Santorum's earmark requests and his own, which were to help pay for security at the 2002 Olympic Games. "While I was fighting to save the Olympics, you were fighting to save the bridge to nowhere," Romney said, referring to a famed would-be bridge to a small island in Alaska that became the cause celebre for earmark opponents. Romney added that the earmarking process was broken and should be changed so that Congress votes up or down a bill before the president weighs in. "The process you just described - an open process, where members of Congress put forth their their suggestions on how to spend money, have them voted on individually - is exactly how the process worked," Santorum interjected. Trying to explain himself, Romney slipped in a shot at former House Speaker Newt Gingrich: "The 6,000 earmarks that were put in place under the speaker's term, for instance, were oftentimes ... bundled onto other bills." "You're entitled to your opinions, Mitt; you're not entitled to misrepresent the facts, and you're misrepresenting the facts," Santorum snapped. You don't know what you're talking about. Paul joined Romney in questioning Santorum's credentials when asked by CNN moderator John King why he was running an ad accusing Santorum of being a fake. "Because he's a fake," the Texas congressman replied with a laugh. "I'm real, Ron, I'm real," Santorum said with a grin, playfully feeling his own arm to show his authenticity. "Congratulations," Paul replied, before going on to castigate Santorum for calling himself a fiscal conservative even though he supported the "No Child Left Behind" legislation in Congress, as well as foreign aid. Santorum defended his record by noting that he advocated for major entitlement reforms, including of the Social Security system even though he was representing a state with many seniors who depended on it. The debate at the Mesa Arts Center came at a pivotal stage of the race, underscoring the contest's volatility and how quickly things could change again. The last time the four candidates gathered, on a stage in Florida, Romney was fending off a challenge from Gingrich and hoping to clinch the nomination with a big win in the Sunshine State. Romney turned in one of his best debate performances that night and staked a convincing Florida victory a few days later, topping it with an easy win soon after in Nevada. But then Santorum reeled off a string of surprise victories in low-turnout elections in Minnesota, Missouri and Colorado, cracking the contest open and turning Michigan, which votes along with Arizona on Tuesday, into a must-win for Romney. Polls show the race there is tight, even though Romney was born and raised in Michigan and his father served three terms as a popular moderate governor. Santorum has a penchant for provocative statements and several have drawn attention over the last week as he surged back into contention, among them his questioning of President Obama's religious faith, his opposition to many prenatal tests -- which, Santorum said, often lead to abortion -- and his suggestion that government's role in public education is "anachronistic." When the discussion turned to contraception on Wednesday night, the audience grew angry and booed the question from a viewer who submitted a email question asking the candidates whether they believe in birth control, and if not, why not. (The matter has been in the news in recent days because of an Obama administration mandate that employers including churches must provide their employees with insurance that provides preventative care including contraception. The administration backed down under a wave of protests by religious organizations, notably the Roman Catholic Church). Gingrich said the debate was not about contraception but about the government's power over religious institutions, which he deemed a "legitimate question." He went on to scold King, arguing that the media is hypocritical about such matters. "You did not once in the 2008 campaign -- not once did anybody in the elite media ask why Barack Obama voted in favor of legalizing infanticide," he said. If we're going to have a debate about who the extremist is on these issues, it is President Obama, who as a state senator voted to protect doctors who killed babies who survived the abortion. It is not the Republicans. Romney argued that Obama's policies amounted to an unprecedented war on religion. "I don't think we've seen in the history of this country the kind of attack on religious conscience, religious freedom, religious tolerance, than we've seen under Barack Obama," Romney said. King noted that the other reason the matter had been in the news was because of the controversial comments by Santorum, notably that contraception is dangerous. Santorum didn't directly answer, instead talking about the straits of children born to single mothers, or to young parents, such as greater incidents of drug use and poverty and less education achievement. We hear this all time -- so you cut spending, limit the government, everything will be fine. No, everything's not going to be fine," Santorum said. There are bigger problems at stake in America. Paul, an obstetrician, argued that poor morality and not contraception is to blame. I think it's sort of like the argument -- conservatives use the argument all the time about guns. Guns don't kill; criminals kill," Paul said. The pill is there and, you know, and contributes, maybe. But the pills can't be blamed for the immorality of our society. But there was not universal agreement -- Gingrich attacked Romney for requiring religious hospitals to provide rape victims with emergency contraception, a stance Romney said he did not take. And Paul took a shot at Santorum for voting to fund a federal program that provides family-planning healthcare to the poor, partly through Planned Parenthood. Santorum replied that the funding was contained in larger appropriations bills, and that he also proposed counter-funding for abstinence programs.