I had always believed rumors that Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) would use his high-profile leadership position to launch a bid for president in 2008. But in an interview late last week with the Christian Science Monitor, Frist sounded like a man planning to wrap up his career in politics, instead of planning to move to the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue.
Asked if he’s planning a White House campaign, Frist sounded like he’ll be leaving politics altogether in 2006.
“I am a heart- and lung-transplant surgeon. I spent 20 years doing that, and that’s my life. … My life is medicine, and … that’s where my heart is, that’s where my family’s been, that’s what I do, moving living tissue around.
“So I’m not making any announcements what I’m going to do in terms of election or reelection … but my intention has always been, and it hasn’t changed, to serve 12 years in the United States Senate and then return to medicine.”
Somewhere in DC right now, Rep. Harold Ford Jr. (D-Tenn.) is smiling.