Posted by Joel Mathis February 9, 2006 at 9:10 a.m.

Brownback, Roberts and national security

The views of Kansas' senators on warrantless wiretapping continues to draw attention today.[Washington Post columnist David Broder][1] writes: _No member of the Senate is more conservative than Sam Brownback of Kansas -- a loyal Republican, an ardent opponent of abortion and, not coincidentally, a presidential hopeful for 2008.As a member of the Judiciary Committee, he has supported President Bush on every one of his court appointments. He is not one to find fault with the administration.And that is why the misgivings he expressed Monday about the surveillance policies that Bush has employed in the war on terror are so striking.What Brownback put in gentle terms is exactly the issue that clearly troubled all but six of the 18 senators in the hearing -- the absence of any external checks on the secret wiretapping the president ordered after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks._Sen. Pat Roberts has defended the program, but apparently also has questions about the Bush Administration's accountability to Congress.[Conservative syndicated columnist Robert Novak][2] reports: _Currently circulating in the Senate cloakrooms is word that Sen. Pat Roberts, Republican chairman of the Intelligence Committee, brought up with Dick Cheney the administration's need to disclose to Congress sensitive security information. "There is no upside for us in that," the vice president is reputed to have replied.Roberts, a square shooter from Dodge City, Kan., over the years usually has answered my questions. When I asked him about the vice president's "no upside" comments to him, however, he did not deny his saying it but told me: "I'm not going to comment about Cheney."_Other links today:Sam Brownback links[(Wichita Eagle) Evangelicals pressure Brownback on climate:][3] Sen. Sam Brownback is being urged to take a tougher stance on global warming by members of a constituency he normally counts among his staunchest supporters: evangelical Christians. A group called the Evangelical Climate Initiative will begin airing television ads in Kansas in the next two weeks urging the government to pay more attention to global warming. They're courting Brownback, a leading Christian conservative in Congress, to support mandatory limits on the emissions many scientists believe contribute to climate change. Brownback said that "climate change is happening and I believe it is a problem," but that "with climate change legislation, we must be persistent, tempered and wise."[(TheFactIs.org commentary) Rolling Stone Magazine Attacks Senator Brownback:][4] A 7,000-word profile of Kansas Senator Sam Brownback in the current issue of Rolling Stone Magazine is full of factual errors a review of the article by Culture & Cosmos shows. The article also contains numerous observations that are stated as fact but are simply the opinion of the article's author Jeff Sharlet.How to contact As always, you can find information to contact members of the Kansas congressional delegation [here.][5] [1]: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/08/AR2006020801989.html [2]: http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/robertnovak/2006/02/09/185805.html [3]: http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/13827068.htm [4]: http://www.thefactis.org/default.aspx?control=ArticleMaster&aid=1479&authid=12 [5]: http://ljworld.com/extra/where_to_write.html#fed