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Brownback ‘not jumping ship’ on Iraq

By Staff Report - | Dec 12, 2006

Here are today’s headlines from the Kansas congressional delegation:

Sen. Sam Brownback (R)

(Fox News Sunday) Transcript: Senators Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) and Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) on ‘FNS’: WALLACE: But let me – I don’t want to put words in your mouth, Senator Brownback, and I’m sure I won’t, but I get the sense that you’re getting a little close to jumping ship on the president’s policy (on Iraq).
BROWNBACK: I’m not – I’m not jumping ship. I just think it’s time that we really put pressure on the situation. And we’ve been very patient with this, and we’ve invested a lot.
I do think as well it’s time for us to put diplomatic pressure to the point where you just park the vice president and the secretary of state in the region. It’s shuttle diplomacy, going back and forth between the countries that will receive us, really pushing on them to stop funding things into Iraq and start working with us, because they don’t need a civil war in that region either, and to really have them start coming to the table instead of just sitting back and even hurting the situation inside of Iraq.

(AP) Senator boosts cause in prison: ANGOLA, La. – Sen. Sam Brownback took his budding presidential campaign to prison this weekend, spent a restless night among inmates and pressed his message that faith can work even to improve the lives of hardened criminals. The Kansas Republican had no expectation that the drug cartel hit man, serial rapist or other convicts in his cell block would vote for him. After all, about nine in 10 of the inmates are serving life sentences. His mission at the Louisiana State Penitentiary, rather, was to promote religious-based prison efforts to curtail violence and provide inmates with an alternative to crime once – or if – they got out.

(AP) Candidates Seem to Be Emulating Reagan: In these early days of the 2008 presidential campaign, when politicians still are exploring the notion of a run and trying to fill out their political profiles, candidates are trying to glom on to a little of the luster from the Reagan glory days. They seem to be trying to out-Reagan one another. … Brownback, in a recent Associated Press interview, passed up a chance to comment on what the Reagan lovefest might suggest about the popularity of the Bush administration, instead offering Reagan as the modern model for a “happy conservative.” “Reagan just always presented things nicely,” Brownback said. “He was avuncular. He was pleasant about it. I think we have to be happy conservatives. I don’t know that I get that done all the time, but I do try to do that.”

(AP) Sen. Brownback May Lift Hold on Nominee: Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback, a potential presidential candidate, said Friday he would lift his hold on a federal judicial nominee if she agrees to step aside from any case dealing with same-sex unions. Brownback, a Republican raising money for a possible White House bid, has stalled the confirmation of Michigan Court of Appeals Judge Janet Neff to the federal bench because she once attended a lesbian commitment ceremony. Neff has said she attended the ceremony as a friend of one of the two women, a longtime neighbor. She insisted in an Oct. 12 letter to Brownback that the ceremony had no legal effect and would not affect her ability to act fairly as a federal judge.

Rep. Dennis Moore (D)

(AP) Moore, Blue Dog leaders encouraged by meeting with Bush: Kansas Rep. Dennis Moore got right to the point when he and other Blue Dog Democrats held a rare meeting on Friday with President Bush in the Oval Office. “Mr. President, I’m one year older than you are,” Moore says he told Bush. “I have seven grandchildren. A lot of people think we’re mortgaging the future of our children and grandchildren in this country, and that needs to change.” It’s the first time Bush has ever invited leaders of the 44-member group of moderate and conservative Democrats to the White House. Moore, one of three Blue Dog Coalition co-chairmen, said he thinks Bush is sincere in seeking to work more closely with Democrats now that they control Congress.