I remember that move and I was thinking, “Could this administration possibly be any stupider ?” They took out our best chance at getting the seat. Ricketts was a fiasco as a candidate, he lost in the worst showing for a Nebraska GOP Senate candidate since 1982 (64-36%).
I thought Johanns was undecided on the Senate race but if he was indeed all but certain to jump in then appointing him to the cabinet was indeed retarded. So much so in fact that while I hate to even think it, could Bush have made a deal with that whore Nelson? He did vote for the tax cut and the judges didn't he? I don't think he provided the margin of victory on anything but. It's probably more likely Johanns's interest in running against Nelson was exaggerated.
Oh and damn those fools.
Watch Brown lose by a fairly narrow margin that could have been overcome with some help.
I’m about 98% sure that I read somewhere that GWB had a deal with Nelson not to run a strong challenger in 2006, because he worked with him on taxes, WOT and judges.