Posted on 03/04/2009 11:55:34 AM PST by presidio9
After a day of uncertainty, Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas said Tuesday he would vote to confirm Gov. Kathleen Sebelius for secretary of health and human services.
“The president won the election and has nominated a Kansan to the Cabinet,” Brownback said in a statement. “Despite our profound policy differences, I will support my fellow Kansan.”
Brownback joined Sen. Pat Roberts, who also made his intentions known Tuesday.
Earlier Tuesday, Brownback had deferred. “He doesn’t plan to say anything either way at this point,” said a spokesman.
Some questioned how Brownback would decide, considering how abortion opponents — who have long seen Sebelius as unacceptable — are a major part of his base.
Brownback’s position had been a concern to the White House. Two sources have told The Kansas City Star that President Barack Obama himself called Brownback last week to gauge his reaction. The president wanted to be sure that Brownback wouldn’t work to derail the nomination, a top Democrat said.
Unlike Roberts, Brownback was not at the White House ceremony Monday and seemed to be wavering.
“He’s between a rock and a hard place,” Kansas State University political scientist Joe Aistrup said before Brownback issued his Tuesday statement.
Ron Thornburgh, the four-term secretary of state running against Brownback next year for the GOP nomination for governor, had ripped Brownback for “backpedaling” from a joint statement issued Saturday with Roberts that said:
“We are hopeful Governor Sebelius will be a voice for Kansas and rural America at the department. We look forward to working with her on issues important to the state…”
Thornburgh called the weekend statement tantamount to an endorsement: “I’m stunned that Sam would endorse her because she’s an individual who goes against everything he has said he believes in
(Excerpt) Read more at kansascity.com ...
This mystifies me. Democrat Senators are under absolutely no obligation to support Republican nominees from their home state (e.g. Carnahan voting against Ashcroft).
Yet somehow, Republicans must do so. WTF?
Oh yes, Senator. By all means, support a person who advocates murder because she is from your home state. I guess if Charles Manson lived in Kansas, you would vote for his confirmation.
No wonder America is in the shape it is in!
You sir are a damned coward.
The standard for these appointments should be the competence of the nominee. Granted, I have issues with Sebelius in that category, too. However, the President SHOULD be given broad lattitude in his picks of a cabinet. Absent a criminal or absurdly incompetent appointment, the President should get who he wants.
If Brownback voted against, she would STILL win -— and Brownback would not vulnerable to those who want to paint him as a radical.
Again, we need to play a bit smarter, and QUIT demanding that our fellow Congressman and Senators jump on every single grenade that is rolled in front of them.
The political bloodbaths that we have had in this state would humble ALL Of you, if you had any idea at all what we have been through.
Do you want to make statements or do you want CONTROL?
Brownback has the best chance of anyone to become the first truly conservative governor of Kansas in my lifetime, and I am 50.
QUIT EATING OUR OWN!
STOP THE CIRCULAR FIRING SQUADS!
This is a principled vote. It has long been a Conservative principal that the President should, with few restrictions and reservations, have the cabinet that the President wants.
Your reasoning is why this country is sinking (along with the GOP).
Abortion is murder of a baby in the womb. There is never any reason to support someone who is in favor of it. Never.
Again, we need to play a bit smarter
I agree with you there but disagree with just about everything else you said. So why have the senate vote at all?? We ELECTED these people and I refuse to play dead and let them make decisions simply to support their own political gain in DC. In my opinion, Selebius’ attitude toward Tiller and late term abortion (why Obama loves this person) IS criminal.
Taking a principled stand against a zealous pro-abortionist is NOT jumping on a grenade.
(And if it were, I would be dead.)
STOP IT WITH THE LITMUS TESTS ON STUPID PR MOVES!
You demand that our politicians waste their ammunition when it does nothing for the cause.
Brownback OR a radical proAbort buddy of Tiller -—
THOSE are our choices. Grow up, study politics, realize that the vast majority of the world is NEITHER prolife nor PROCHOICE but apathetic on the issue.
Hurt Brownback, at this state, and you guarantee another Tiller buddy wins.
“Despite our profound policy differences, I will support my fellow Kansan.”
Gee, wonder who he’d support if he were German in 1933?
These people NEVER cease to amaze me. Geography trumps principles. What a way to vote. I guess if you are clueless, it’s as good as anything else.
Brownback has given his “advice” -— he does not get to pick the next nominee, if this one doesn't go through, and she WILL go through, regardless.
Obama is going to get a pro abort appointment.
This appointment will weaken the pro aborts in Kansas.\
Learn to play the game.
A conservative movement without ambitious conservative candidates has little chance of success.
Politically, Brownback could be playing this perfectly. Sebelius is popular in Kansas with moderate Republicans whom Brownback needs in the 2010 election. Let someone else bring up the Tiller connections and then Brownback can change his mind. Brownback should try and stay above the fray in this situation. That way Brownback avoids appearing to be a knee-jerk partisan while being principled enough to change his publicly-stated stance when the evidence requires it. A properly-timed reversal of his opinion would maximize the damage done to Sebelius and really highlight the charges being leveled against her.
Let's let this whole confirmation process play out before we judge. I have disagreed with Brownback before but I've never questioned his commitment to the pro-life movement.
I too live in Kansas . . . I am SICK of the games and feel it is time to stand up for what you believe in REGARDLESS of the consequences. Yes . . . Obama will get a pro abortion appointment but we do not need our conservative representatives supporting it. THAT is Obama’s agenda.
You may be right on it weakening the pro abortion in Kansas but what about this country????
he would support Hitler or Stalin if they came from Kansas
What if the consequence of your prideful and ignorant need for self-affirmation means:
POLITICAL DEFEAT?
Huh?
Look prolife purists:
Many “PROLIFERS” called the late prolife Democrat Governor Joan Finney a “Traitor” for signing legislation several years ago.
The idiots for Right to Life of Kansas, an American Life Lobby affiliate, did not like the restrictive bill that Finney signed.
Why not? Well, first off, the radicals do not like ANY 3rd trimester restrictions. The “purists” want to “save all the babies” (Which means, in Kansas, NONE of the babies).
NO COMPROMISE NO EXCEPTIONS NO PROGRESS! That is the way I see the RTLK, Operation Rescue, ALL stupid view on the abortion issue.
Next, the radicals did not like the bill Finney signed because that bill, which is now LAW, was weaker than the previous Kansas law that was struck DOWN by Roe and Doe. This, even though that Kansas was the MOST proabortion state in the Union prior to Roe! (Their reasoning being that when Roe fell, we would have a better law, lol. This was more than a DECADE AGO!!)
Now?
Now Tiller is being prosecuted.
Under the LAW signed by JOAN FINNEY! (The woman you all called a “traitor” at the time)
Yes, I understand your emotion.
Emotion does not win in the political world.
Get off Brownback’s back.
With his idiotic logic, why bother having hearing? another stooopid republican RINO.
What an utter smack-off. And a gutless smack-off at that. A Kansan? So I guess it’s a good thing Bin Laden wasn’t born in Kansas, huh Sam? He’d be in charge of the friggin FAA by now.
Sounds to me that it is more important to get Sebelius out of the Governor’s chair than it is to have her in the Obama cabinet. I know she has arbitrarily overruled decisions of state agencies (e.g. the southern Kansas power plant permit) and Obama will pick a pro-abortion person in any event. Get rid of her as gov for the good of the state, and if this is the only way to do it, so be it.
Words fail me.
May God have mercy on his soul.
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