Free Republic

Sam Brownback is only 52 and has a job he loves. But on Thursday, the Kansas Republican began the process of walking away from his seat in the U.S. Senate, announcing that he would not seek re-election in 2010. The reason? A term limits pledge he signed in 1996. Within minutes of his announcement, six-term Republican congressman Jerry Moran of Hays declared that he was entering the Senate race to replace Brownback. One other potential contender: seven-term GOP congressman Todd Tiahrt of Wichita. On the Democratic side, one question looms: Will Gov. Kathleen Sebelius seek to extend her political career...

Quietly for now, perhaps more visibly later, Sen. Sam Brownback has set himself a missionary task. That task involves persuading the so-called "religious right," his core constituency, to get behind the John McCain presidential candidacy. .... "You get down to the raw points of it, and that's the (Supreme Court)," he said. He tells conservatives that McCain's "very reliable on that... and so (in a different way) is Barack Obama." "Barack's a good guy - I like him - but he's a very liberal Democrat," Brownback said. "If you have a liberal Democrat plus a Democratic House and Senate, that's...

Brownback to Endorse McCain By LIZ SIDOTI Associated Press Writer MANCHESTER, N.H. (AP) - Sam Brownback, a Kansas conservative and favorite of evangelical Christians, will endorse his former Republican presidential rival John McCain, GOP officials said Wednesday. The nod could provide a much-needed boost, particularly in Iowa, for the Arizona senator and one-time presumed GOP front-runner whose bid faltered and is now looking for a comeback. Republican officials said Brownback will announce his support for McCain later Wednesday in Dubuque, Iowa, and then travel with the candidate to campaign in two other cities in the state. The officials spoke on...

WASHINGTON - Republican Sam Brownback will drop out of the 2008 presidential campaign on Friday, people close to the Kansas senator said Thursday. Brownback, a longshot conservative contender, had trouble raising money to compete in the race. He is expected announce his withdrawal in Topeka, Kan. He raised a little more than $800,000 in the third quarter of this year, his lowest quarterly amount since entering race. He has brought in more than $4 million overall and is eligible for $2 million in federal matching funds.

Senator Sam Brownback, a Republican trying to inject new life into his beleaguered presidential campaign, plans to offer a resolution this week for Congress to apologize for slavery and segregation. Brownback, of Kansas, told The Boston Globe's editorial board yesterday he will join an unnamed Democrat in sponsoring the proposal. He said he expects a tough fight on the resolution, even though it will not include any call for reparations. "They were federal policies," he said. "They were wrong. The only way for us to move forward . . . is at the end of day acknowledging those, taking ownership...

LIBERAL - Ignacio Rivas stands at his paletas cart chatting with another guy who also pushes frozen fruit treats on a three-wheel cart. It's about 7 p.m. in downtown Liberal, a town proud of its Yellow Brick Road and annual Fat Tuesday pancake race. But as Rivas tilts his straw cowboy hat down and pushes across the city's main drag before sundown, the scene looks like one out of Mexico. Perhaps a third to half of the independent business storefronts advertise in Spanish. Most others note that they habla español. This snapshot reflects what's happening in Liberal -- the heart...

"A Kansas court of appeals has ruled that it's illegal for an illegal alien to enter the country, but not illegal for an illegal alien to be in the country if the illegal alien can illegally make it past the Border Patrol without getting caught." "Ruling that it is illegal to enter the country without the proper documents and permissions, but it is not necessarily illegal to be in the country if you don't get caught upon entry, the court threw out the sentence of an illegal immigrant who pleaded guilty to possession of cocaine and endangering a child."

WASHINGTON - Republican presidential hopeful Sam Brownback said rival Mike Huckabee should apologize for a supporter's "prejudiced whisper campaign" against him for being Catholic.The supporter, a pastor in Windsor Heights, Iowa, sent an e-mail to Brownback supporters pointing out that Huckabee is an evangelical Protestant and Brownback is not. Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor, is an ordained Baptist minister."I know Senator Brownback converted to Roman Catholicism in 2002," Rev. Tim Rude, pastor of Walnut Creek Community Church, wrote in the e-mail. "Frankly, as a recovering Catholic myself, that is all I need to know about his discernment when compared to...

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- In a sign that Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback is seeking the pro-life mantle among the candidates competing for the Republican nomination for president, his campaign is going after Colorado Rep. Tom Tancredo. Brownback's camp says the fellow GOP presidential candidate accepted money from a pro-abortion activist. Brownback's team has been taking shots at top-tier candidates, including repeatedly going after former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. But, on Monday, the campaign complained that Tancredo has accepted thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from Dr. John Tanton, a founder of a major Planned Parenthood network. According to FEC donation...

I asked one of the few conservative Republican senators who stuck with President Bush on immigration to assess how Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell handled the issue. Asking not to be quoted by name, he replied: "If this were a war, Sen. McConnell should be relieved of command for dereliction of duty." Not only did the minority leader end up voting against an immigration bill that he said was better than the 2006 version that he supported. He abandoned his post, staying off the floor during final stages of Senate debate. Although I never before had seen a Senate party...

WASHINGTON: Republican presidential candidate Sam Brownback says he harbored a "hatred" of Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton until he experienced a religious awakening in the mid-1990s. "I was considering what I should say when I confronted all the anger that I held for the Clintons," the Kansas senator writes in the book, "From Power to Purpose: A Remarkable Journey of Faith and Compassion." "I thought, I hate them for what they are doing to the country and I feel justified in hating them for it," he writes. But Brownback says he realized there is never justification for hating someone regardless...

As is becoming a pre-debate/forum/being-in-the-same-room-as-Romney ritual, Brownback is attacking Romney’s controversial stance on… agriculture? (They’re going to be in Iowa tomorrow -- there’s the hook -- for the Iowa Christian Alliance/Iowans for Tax Relief Forum).“Romney suggested eliminating the Department of Agriculture and reducing farm subsidies during his unsuccessful 1994 Senate race in Massachusetts,” the first line of the memo states. By contrast, Brownback “grew up on a farm” and “has always made farmers and agriculture a priority,” says his Iowa communications director. We’ll let you know when we hear of -- yet another -- response from the Romney campaign. ********UPDATE************...

Brownback Writes of 'Hatred' of Clintons Jun 29 05:08 PM US/Eastern By SAM HANANEL Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON (AP) - Sam Brownback says he harbored a "hatred" of Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton until he experienced a religious awakening in the mid-1990s. Brownback, a Republican presidential hopeful, details in a new book how the change in outlook led him to make a stunning apology to Hillary Clinton a few years later during a Senate prayer breakfast. "I was considering what I should say when I confronted all the anger that I held for the Clintons," the Kansas senator writes in...

If you are an avid reader of this web log, you'll know that I sometimes put some of the upcoming political events in a header of "Path of the Cyclone: Calendar". Well, let me tell you, after driving the 3 plus hours to Ames on Thursday afternoon, I pulled into my favorite convenient store to get some Diet Pepsi and the sirens started going crazy. What was approaching? A Cyclone (tornado/twister). I headed over to Main Street to the old depot area and checked out the Brownback office that was being opened that night. It is a nice location with...

Beware of an aroused citizenry. It's an admonition that should be ingrained in the brain of any run-of-the-mill politician, let alone someone who has ascended to the United States Senate. But from the Olympian heights of the world's greatest deliberative body, it is often forgotten. So senators got a reminder in the humiliating defeat of a "comprehensive" immigration bill that had the support of the president of the United States, a bipartisan group of senators with the blessing of the leaders of their caucuses, and the support of the editorial boards of the country's most important newspapers. All of that...

Washington — When voting began Thursday on whether to advance President Bush’s immigration bill, Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback was among the first lawmakers to vote “yes.” About 10 minutes later, Brownback switched his vote to “no.” But don’t bother accusing the Republican presidential hopeful of flip-flopping — he says he did it on purpose. “I wanted to signal that I support comprehensive immigration reform, but now is not the time, this is not the bill,” Brownback said. Brownback explained that his “yes” vote initially was to “showcase” that reform is needed. The switch to “no” was because he didn’t think...

Brownback Scrubs Website of Earlier Immigration Vote by: Ben Weyl Thursday (06/28) at 14:08 PM Eleven minutes after voting in favor of cloture on the Senate immigration bill, Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback changed his mind—and his vote—to oppose cloture, MSNBC reported earlier today. Now it seems that the Brownback campaign has changed its mind again, this time on a press release it produced just days ago. On Tuesday, June 26, the campaign released a statement after Brownback voted in favor of cloture. The statement originally appeared here. It’s now gone, but was cached and can be seen here.In a...