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Brownback Gives Props to Firefighters

March 14, 2007 3:05 PM

ABC News' Paul Fidalgo Reports: While traveling his "yellow brick road to the White House," GOP presidential contender Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., stopped to address the International Association of Fire Fighters Wednesday for their presidential forum in Washington -- and brought along some props to help him do it.

Beginning by joking, "I hope there are no fires breaking out across the country with all you guys here," Brownback quickly shifted from joviality to gravity declaring, "We must win the war on terrorism, period," and criticized the very term 'war on terrorism,' saying, "That's a misnomer. Terrorism is a tactic. It's like a war on bombs, a war on planes," he said.

Hoping to win favor with voters in Iowa, Brownback made a point about substituting corn starch for oil, by holding aloft a piece of fabric that he said was made half from wool and half from corn.  "It actually feels pretty good," said the Senator, rubbing the fabric. "It doesn't feel like a corn shirt."

To illustrate the need for his proposed alternative flat tax, Brownback left the podium and dragged into view a dolly heavily laden with large books and documents, and asked, "You know what this is?  That is the internal revenue code -- with regulations," he said. Quoting one of his law professors, he said to a standing ovation, "This deserves to be taken behind a barn and killed with a dull axe."

"One of the big American-sized goals I think we need to do is say that in ten years we will end deaths by cancer in America," said Brownback, throwing down the gauntlet to what he said was the #1 cause of fear in America.

“You know what #2 is?" he asked the audience. "Public speaking."

March 14, 2007 in Thompson, Fred | Permalink | User Comments (0)

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