MANCHESTER, New Hampshire -- Rick Santorum's big word today: Hope.
His economic policy, he told an audience of students and reporters at St. Anselm College that his plan to restore economic manufacturing is based in "the importance of hope, the importance that you believe America is still the land of opportunity."
It's a positive, emotional pitch with echoes of President Obama's 2008 campaign, and a step away from the strident, at times angry, appeals he and other Republican candidates have made.
Santorum's plan cuts corporate taxes in the hope of creating new jobs. He's been unusually focused on manufacturing, for a Republican, since his days helping Pennsylvania's declining steel industry. But his focus on poverty and on economic dislocation strikes a very different note from his Republican rivals', though his solutions are similar.
Santorum is "going to help businesses compete so that opportunity is available – that’s what hope is all about," he said.