The Anti-Sam Brownback Blog

From Monday’s New York Times:

Congressional Republicans have also been signaling that they want to put some distance between their agenda and the White House’s potential legal and political woes, seeking to cast the leak case as an inside-the-Beltway phenomenon of little interest to most voters.

“I think we just need to stick to our knitting on the topics and the subjects the American people care about,” Senator Sam Brownback, Republican of Kansas, said on “Fox News Sunday.”

I would think the American people would care about treason. I would hope that the American people care about protecting those who protect us abroad. By attempting to belittle the endangering of intelligence assets Brownback is showing his true colors. He only cares about protecting Americans when their husbands agree with his party. He isn’t concerned about building intelligence networks and trivializes the dangers that covert operatives endure every day in an attempt to keep us safe.

This is pure party politics and stinks of the of Republican culture of corruption.

Now this is very puzzling. Senator Brownback, staunch conservative and ever-ready defender of the President’s war in Iraq, voted twice in the last month against the troops.

On April 12th Senator Brownback voted no on S.Amdt. 344 to H.R. 1268. H.R. 1268 is the giant emergency appropriations bill named “Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense, the Global War on Terror, and Tsunami Relief, 2005 ” Whew… what a mouthful. The amendment in question, S. Amdt. 344 was “To provide $1,975,183,000 for medical care for veterans”

It was practically a party line vote,with only Arlen Specter and Jim Jeffords joining the democrats in voting for the amendment. My question would be “What does Brownback have against the veterans of this country?” Why would he vote against their health care? How can he in good conscience support a war and then turn around and not fund veteran’s health care. Irresponsible and reprehensible.

The sad thing is, this vote is not an anomaly. On April 21st Senator Brownback voted against S. Amdt. 520 to the same appropriations bill. This amendment was “appropriate an additional $213,000,000 for Other Procurement, Army, for the procurement of Up-Armored High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles” AKA Armored Humvees. This amendment thankfully passed due to a significant number of republicans crossing the aisle and supporting a clearly worthy cause.

This vote against armor for Humvees is perhaps the most disturbing of the two. How many times have we heard reports of soldiers dying from IEDs while riding in un-armored vehicles? I can see no good reason to oppose this amendment. Apparently many republican senators agree with me, including: Lott, Martinez, Lugar and McCain among others.

Why does Brownback want to send our troops into battle without the necessary armor to protect their lives and limbs? Why does he pay lip service to veterans and then stab them in the back when they need health care? Why does he think he has any chance of becoming president with these types of votes hanging over his head?

That is what I find most interesting about this. These votes were the action of a senator who feels safe in his district… not of a presidential hopeful who will undoubtedly have his record scrutinized.

I have contacted the Senator’s Press Office and was transferred to voicemail. If I ever get a call back, I’ll update here.