Ben Nelson Has Apparently Learned Nothing

That all 41 Republicans decided to lock arms and block consideration of a financial regulatory reform bill late yesterday wasn’t a surprise. The GOP doesn’t say it opposes any effort to bring Wall Street to heel, but whatever ideas they may have about modifying Chris Dodd’s proposal they don’t want to talk about them in public so their strategy is to prevent formal debate while the press the case for watering the bill down in private.

Ben Nelson’s vote, by contrast, is puzzling. Annie Lowrey summarizes:

Regardless, the optics are terrible. Nelson’s “Cornhusker Kickback” delayed health care reform. Today [i.e., yesterday], news broke that Warren Buffett, the head of Berkshire Hathaway and a resident of Omaha, lobbied for the Senate Agriculture Committee, on which Nelson sits, to create a derivatives loophole that would benefit his company to the tune of billions, a proposal Senate Democrats swatted down. And now, Nelson is holding up progress on the financial front again.

Has Nelson forgotten how the Cornhusker Kickback saga played out? That it became a huge embarrassment for him personally, for his party, and for his state? These close votes on big issues are a great opportunity for Senators with specific policy priorities to get things done. It’s an opportunity that Nelson squandered on health care by asking for something petty and squalid, and it’s something he seems to want to squander anew with this purely parochial concern for the interests of his richest constituent.