Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson retiring

Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) will announce today that he is retiring after two terms, a serious blow to Democratic efforts to hold on to the majority in the chamber next November. A fact which the folks at Politico didn’t see fit to mention was that Benny cast the 60th Senate vote in favor of the Fast n’ Furious of health insurance, Obamacare. Here’s a paean to the Cornhusker Kickback. Adios, Ben.

This post was last modified on December 27, 2011

Bonfire of the Absurdities: After 35 year career writing software for IBM mainframes, am now self-employed contractor thinking of joining a union and striking for higher wages. Cured morbid fear of heights when I learned to look at them as lengths standing on end. Uncompromising in refusal to accept browser cookies. Amateur investor who has accumulated a small fortune in the market after starting out years ago with a large one. For recreation, I run, hike, kayak and play tennis but will not consider synchronized swimming under any circumstances.

View Comments (11)

  • Nelson's the poster boy for no matter how conservative a Democrat seems, when the chips are down for the vote to go socialist, they'll kick in with the reds every time.

    • He's more of a poster boy for "about the time you think a donk isn't so bad after all, he goes and shits all over his constituents".

      He committed two sins, the second one worse than the first in the eyes of the local politicians. He sold out for a hell of a price, and when he got his tit in the wringer, he didn't even hang onto the bribe. Nobody wants to associate with the guy that drug your name through the mud and still didn't bring the bacon home.

    • ...and boy, howdy, he *is* corrupt. Just ask him about his farmland. Bought himself an acreage, and didn't like paying residential property taxes on it, so he claimed the pheasants he had running around on it made it farmland.

  • Don't let the door smack you in the ass on the way out, Benny.

    However, this is their strategy to hold the seat for the donks. They want to run Bob Kerry -- and he does actually have some qualifications, like being a Medal of Honor Vietnam vet that isn't a banana-faced traitor.

    However, we're still pissed, and so I don't think he'll have the chance he's hoping on. That combined with him often saying things that he shouldn't:

    "Even before John Edwards was chasing ambulances in North Carolina and Barack was voting ‘present’ in the Illinois state senate, Senator Clinton was involved in major policy initiatives."

    ...not to mention the lesbian jokes on open mikes.

    • Kerry was a Seal who won the Medal of Honor. Hard to imagine that he is ideologically aligned with the current makeup of the Democratic Party.

      • He was an old-style donk, and they don't make them like that anymore. That said, he bowed to the new donk power structure, and supported Barry -- so I'd say that he isn't the same guy he was in '67.

        If any Nebraskan has a chance, he'd be it -- except that he's a carpetbagger -- spent WAY too many years out-of-state.