After a lackluster career in the United States Senate -- including an incorrect, remote "diagnosis" of Terri Schiavo's condition, when he dragged the Senate into that nonsense -- outgoing Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) announced today that he will not seek the presidency in 2008.

As the leader of one of the most do-nothing Senate sessions in U.S. history, Frist evidently decided that he had no political capital in his own party and elected to bow out now and stop any further speculation on his candidacy.

This announcement is a big gain for the Republicans -- one less massive tool in the GOP presidential toolbox -- and a huge loss to late-night comedians and Progressive bloggers.

And thus, Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS) remains the Religious Right's favorite for 2008.

You can read more from Bob at BobGeiger.com.

AP reports: 

U.S. Senate majority leader calls for efforts to bring Taliban into Afghan government

QALAT, Afghanistan U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said Monday that the Afghan guerrilla war can never be won militarily and called for efforts to bring the Taliban and their supporters into the Afghan government.

Now let's get this straight: "the Taliban and their supporters" are the very people who attacked us on 9/11 and started Bush's "War on Terror" - Mullah Omar, Osama Bin Laden, Ayman Al Zwahiri, and the rest of Al Qaeda.

Blogging from Yearly Kos

I'm sure when Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) mapped out his ideal scenario for June, he envisioned banning gay marriage, outlawing flag burning, cutting taxes on multi-million dollar estates and making the gun people happy by passing an NRA-friendly carry-permit bill.

So far, the beleaguered Frist is zero for two.

The latest defeat came today in the Senate, when a vote to invoke cloture (end debate) on the House Death Tax Repeal Permanency Act of 2005, which would have repealed federal estate taxes on inherited wealth, went down in flames. The cloture motion, which requires 60 Senators voting to end debate and invoke a full Senate vote on the issue, failed 57-41, when the GOP could only strong-arm four Democrats into voting to proceed while two Republicans -- George Voinovich of Ohio and Rhode Island's Lincoln Chafee -- voted with the Democrats to kill the measure.

So how is Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist honoring our Veterans this weekend? By scheduling bitterly divisive votes on flag burning and gay marriage to "energize" the demoralized GOP base for the November elections - and for his 2008 Presidential campaign.

Asked on "Fox News Sunday" if flag burning and gay marriage were the most important issues the Senate can address in June, Frist said the agenda will focus on securing the country and its values.

In addition to the most recent revelations of George W. Bush authorizing leaks of critical intelligence information to silence Iraq war critics, Bush had this to say when responding to the decision by disgraced Republican Congressman Tom DeLay to retire from Congress: “I wish him all the very best and I know he is looking to the future. My own judgment is, our party will continue to succeed because we're the party of ideas.'' The party of ideas? Off the top of my head, here’s the only Republican ideas I’ve seen in the last five years:

• Doctoring evidence used to start a war with a country that did not attack us and posed no threat to America.

“Every morning we open the Senate by reciting, as we just did a few moments ago, the Pledge of Allegiance. Hand over heart, we pay solemn tribute to the American flag, that sacred symbol of America's history, values, and principles.”

With those stirring words, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist opened another day of Congressional business earlier this week and used it as a springboard to announce a bold plan to meet one of the major problems confronting our nation.

Did he plan to address a needless war that’s cost us $250 billion, left 2,300 military dead, thousands others maimed and our standing in the world trashed? How about the fact that our vaunted “war on terror” still has not turned up Osama bin Laden or kept al Qaeda from continuing to operate in 60 countries? Or was he going to tackle the reality that over 45 million Americans have no health care whatsoever?

From  AfterDowningStreet.org:

Glenn Greenwald writes:

With the March 7 vote looming on Sen. Rockefeller's motion for the Committee to finally hold hearings to investigate the scope and nature of the Administration's NSA warrantless eavesdropping on American citizens -- and with several Committee Republicans indicating their intent to vote for hearings -- Majority Leader Bill Frist threatened the Committee yesterday and warned it not to hold any hearings.

A great summary of how Bush and others, such as the media, vastly failed all Americans in 2005:

Call it the year of lame excuses,

Officials sought any shelter in the year’s storms, both natural and political

By Alex Johnson
Reporter
MSNBC
Updated: 9:04 a.m. ET Dec. 29, 2005

“I don’t think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees,” President Bush said on Sept. 1, three days after Hurricane Katrina punctured the system of dams protecting New Orleans and created the greatest natural disaster in American history.

(NY Times) Companies making vaccines to protect against biological agents or pandemic viruses would be shielded from lawsuits, even if they are negligent or reckless, under a provision inserted into a military spending bill by Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, the majority leader.

(AP) Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist paid $72,012 from his own pocket to his 2000 re-election campaign fund in August, two months after he was notified that trustees had sold millions of dollars of his stock in HCA Inc., the hospital chain founded by his father and brother.

That Aug. 30 payment was disclosed in Federal Election Commission filings last Friday. The documents also show the campaign fund on the same day paid off a $349,107 outstanding loan from U.S. Bank Corp.