Brownback in prison

World Magazine is starting a series of profiles of potential presidential candidates and first up is Republican Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas. World editor Marvin Olasky recently spent the night in Angola State Penitentiary in Louisiana with Brownback.

Brownback was on my list of possibles, but I think he just dropped off. He appears to be mushy on Iraq, on the death penalty, on illegal immigration. He may have been trying to come across as thoughtful, but he came across as muddle-headed instead. He's even muddled on theology -- he converted from evangelicalism to Roman Catholicism, but he still attends an evangelical church with the rest of his family, who apparently did not join him in his conversion.

We don't need a firebreather as the Republican nominee, but we do need someone who isn't blown to and fro by every breeze.