Sam Brownback criticizes Wall Street jive that he once encouraged

Politicians love to imagine themselves as Winston Churchill, shaking a pudgy, defiant fist at Nazi Germany. Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback is no different. Speaking at a Rotary Club in Wichita on Monday, Brownback summoned the wartime prime minister to make a point about meeting the challenges of “sterner days,” as Churchill put it.

Brownback’s World War II nostalgia included criticism of the growth of the financial sector. He lamented the rise of “interesting instruments to change and trade money, rather than focus on how do I make something.” Of course, as a U.S. senator, Brownback made it easier for Wall Street to expand its socially worthless but profitable activities.