Frist: What's It All About?

Outgoing Majority Leader Shares His Thoughts In Farewell Address

(AP)  Their farewell hug was awkward at best.

When Democratic leader Harry Reid held open his arms to the man he battled and will replace, retiring Majority Leader Bill Frist, the Tennessee doctor hesitated before returning the embrace.

Loosely.

Frist, serving the last days of a self-imposed two-term limit, held the Senate itself at a bit of a distance during four years as majority leader. The Tennessee Republican, who was often talked about as a possible presidential candidate, came to Washington in 1994 after a career as a heart transplant surgeon.

The partisan warfare and scheduling minutiae of the Senate's top job often exasperated Frist. He recently reported suffering what sounded like a case of burnout, and abandoned a nascent bid for president.

In a somewhat contemplative mood Thursday, Frist's farewell speech to his Senate colleagues offered a glimpse of the questions the GOP leader asked himself at weary moments during his tenure. He urged his fellow lawmakers to do the same.

"What is it really all about?" Frist said. "Is it about keeping the majority? Is it about red states versus blue? Is it about lobbing attacks, in some way, across the aisle? ... Is it about war rooms, whose purpose is not to contrast ideas, but to destroy?

"Or is it more?" Frist intoned to the more than 40 Republicans and 20 Democrats in attendance.

Frist's Senate career bookended a Republican revolution. Never having run for office, the Harvard-trained doctor ousted Sasser as part of the storied class of 1994 and helped turn Democrats out of the congressional majority for the first time in 40 years.

In between, Frist rose from 100th in seniority to its top job when Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., was forced to step down as majority leader over remarks interpreted as supporting segregationist policies. Frist was elected to that post with the White House's blessing - and Lott's resentment.

But on Thursday, with Lott returning to GOP leadership as Republican whip and past bitter battles with Reid over judicial nominations, Frist and his colleagues bid pleasant and respectful farewells.

Speaking in the collegial tradition of the Senate, Democratic lion Edward Kennedy said he did not trust Frist at first, but came to hold him in great regard. Reid saluted Frist's commitment to his family - wife, Karyn, and sons Harrison and Bryan - who watched Thursday's events from a perch in the gallery.

Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., an old Senate bull who admitted to calling Frist "Sen. First" in his early days, revealed that during private meetings Frist secretly also gave the older senator medical care.

So back to practicing medicine Frist will return, when the 109th Congress concludes this week.

"You're not going to be some little country doctor, you're not even going to be a regular doctor. It'll be something bigger than that," Domenici predicted.

[randalds]

I'm not a doctor and I've never seen Frist in person or examined him. However I am an expert on watching people on short peices of video tape and I hereby diagnose Bill Frist as in an irreversible coma and brain dead. Plug the plug and put him out of his misery and everyone else's too.

[firststate]

In the practice of heart surgery one can only kill one person at a time.

[emhawks]

I am a Tenneseean. I have always considered Bill Frist a disgrace to the state of Tennessee. I have never voted for him.
The only bright spot is that he's leaving politics.
"...to destroy..." will be his political legacy. As for his medical legacy, he still has time to leave a legacy for the better. Time will tell.
"Man's character is his fate."-Heraclitius(540-580BC).

[jvman4u]

Yeah, it's very scarrrrry! this guy is going back into private practice and do alot of harm to the public, one at a time now, not enmasse as before, still it's scarrrry, ho many women that need an abortion, won't get one, and how he'll probably deny the proper treatment to any openly Gay (HOMOSEXUAL)that sadly finds themselves in his office... goo riddance to this hate-monger...

[energyecon]

Ah, but Howard IS still practicing medicine - at least he delivered a dose of it to the GOP in this election cycle!

[frankly6]

"What is it really all about?" Frist said. "Is it about keeping the majority? Is it about red states versus blue? Is it about lobbing attacks, in some way, across the aisle? ... Is it about war rooms, whose purpose is not to contrast ideas, but to destroy?

Frist pretty much summed up what his tenure in the Senate was about here. Too bad he waited so long to reflect on his legacy.

[getcentered]

Boo HOo!

"What is it really all about?" Frist said. "Is it about keeping the majority? Is it about red states versus blue? Is it about lobbing attacks, in some way, across the aisle? ... Is it about war rooms, whose purpose is not to contrast ideas, but to destroy?

"Or is it more?"

Is Frist weird?

[frankly6]

When they were in the majority they viewed the Democratic party as a mere spead bump in handing over the government and the country to special interests. Their idea of bipartisanship was to attempt to literaly destroy all oppossition at all costs. Their vision of a government by the corporation, of the corporation, and for the corporation would not be hindered. Before long, corporate lobyists were actually stepping in and writing the legislation meant to benefit their industries. Ocassionaly they would throw their constituencies a bone with a bridge to nowhere or a gay marriage amendment. They skillfuly used devisive issues to distract and devide the country while they proceeded to rob and mismanage.

It's too bad Frist waited this long to reflect on the legacy of his term in office. It's too bad for the American people.

[bluestardad]

Bipartisan When the Republicans were in power all we heard was that they would step all over the Democrats and pass what they wanted. That is the Rove and Bush way. Now they got spanked in the election and the Republicans are preaching Cooperation and Bipartisanship and all what a bunch of hypocrites.

[antoniof123]

The two that will be leading the senate now are deal makers and maybe they can make some deals on getting this country out of the radical religious right wing and into a more forward and pleasent mood for the country. There is too much anger in America too many rights have been surrendered in the name of security this will have to be undone before anything can move forward. It means that all religions will have to be put in there place.