In the Loop: Start packing for Prague! PLUS: Can a nice trip to Tokyo smooth the rocky Inouye-Cochran relationship?

The U.S. Ambassador's Residence in Prague -- 

great digs, and it comes furnished

by Ken

Here's one reason I try not to miss Al Kamen's "In the Loop" column in the Washington Post. You go in looking for embarrassing tidbits -- and of course soul-nourishing snark -- about our fine government servants, but you never know when you may stumble onto, well, it's not quite clear whether this item from today's column is a piece of career guidance or a hot real-estate tip:

House Hunters Int'l

Stop what you're doing! Right now! Double-check any household employees and especially your old tax returns. The beautiful ambassadorial residence in Prague, one of the finest homes in the U.S. diplomatic world, is apparently open again.

We're hearing that Marc Nathanson, a mega-contributor, cable television mogul and former chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, is letting people know he's no longer looking to be nominated as ambassador to the Czech Republic, citing "personal reasons." We're told something came up in the vetting process that scotched the long-expected nomination.

The residence has been empty for a year, so you'll need to clean up some cobwebs, but trust us, we've toured that joint. To die for.

ELSEWHERE IN LOOPLAND: VIOLATING THE SANCTITY
OF THE CHAIRMAN-RANKING MEMBER RELATIONSHIP

This is also why we try not to miss "In the Loop."

It's too intimate to be talked about much in public, but there are few relationships more sacred than that between a congressional committee chairman and the ranking minority member. What, for example, would Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) do without his significant other, Chuck Grassley (R-IA)?

Sometimes the relationship has to be put to the ultimate test to show just how deep the bond is. After all, did our Max take it personally when he spent all those months devising a health care "reform" bill designed for his Chuck to love, while Chuck was making it clear to everybody else on the planet that there wasn't any kind of Democrat health care bill that he would vote for? (Um, apparently not.)

Just how far one of these partners will go for the other was illustrated when the Senate Appropriations Committee's Daniel Inouye (D-HI) actually testifed on behalf of his committee mate, Ted Stevens (R-AK), in Stevens's corruption trial. The lesson is apparently lost on Stevens's replacement as ranking member on Appropriations, Thad Cochran (R-MS), however, in the era of the "Just Say No" Republicans:

Many seconds over Tokyo

Now that health care has been voted on in the Senate, the jets are warming up in earnest at Andrews Air Force Base to wing our nation's lawmakers off in search of those elusive facts. The Senate Appropriations Committee's chairman, Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), and ranking Republican, Thad Cochran (Miss.), are off to Japan next week. (Weather is not that great -- Wednesday's forecast high in Tokyo was only 50 degrees -- and the Japanese economy isn't that hot, either, but 50 degrees is better than here.) The miljet is actually picking up Inouye in balmy Hawaii.

The trip is to discuss defense issues, economic matters and the disturbingly rocky relationship between the two longtime allies. But maybe there'll also be a chance for the two top appropriators themselves to fix a little rocky patch in their longtime relationship.

Seems the duo, who've worked together for a long time, wrote the recent Defense Department approps bill together. It included about $167 million in earmarks that Cochran wanted. But Cochran then voted to filibuster the bill as part of a Republican-leadership-driven effort to block Democrats from returning to the health-care debate.

Inouye, we hear, was particularly upset by the move.

Cochran replaced Ted Stevens (Alaska) as the committee's ranking Republican. Stevens, Loop Fans may recall, was so close to Inouye that Inouye testified on his behalf during Stevens's trial for false statements regarding gifts he received from a contractor.

Meanwhile, there's some lingering resentment among Senate folks at Maine's GOP duo, Sens. Olympia J. Snowe and Susan Collins, for not explicitly committing themselves in advance to vote for cloture. The Dems hauled 92-year-old Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.) to come in at 1 a.m. to make sure there were 60 votes to choke off the filibuster. As it turned out, both of the Republicans did indeed vote to stop debate.

Could be a long flight.

This just illlustrates why it is that I'll never be a Senate committee chairman (or, in all likelihood, ranking minority member). If that was me sitting there in Dan Inouye's chair with egg all over my face from that shithead Cochran's treachery, it would be just a matter of minutes before:

(a) Thad's $167M worth of earmarks were insta-ripped out of the package, and

(b) everyone who was scheduled to score a windfall under any of those earmarks is instead slated to have to cough up an amount equal to what he/she was going to pocket -- the full $167M worth, now coming back to the gov't instead of going out to Thaddites.

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