Imagine you’re a Senator with almost 30 years of seniority. You’re the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, which deals with wonderful and exciting issues like taxes.

In the past, you’ve spent considerable time promoting how “power-full” you are as the chairman and the “power” your committee has.

All of a sudden, the economy is going into the tank. There’s talk of a stimulus package. You sharpen your pencil, get out your calculator, prepare your staff, and wait for the call from your leaders, your fellow Senators and Representatives, or the President. You wait and wait.

But, the call never comes. A deal was made and you were left out. You watch from the sideline. The spotlight missed you. You and your committee are an afterthought. You are basically told to “pass this quickly.” You are just an observer.

To make sure folks back home know you are still a player, you schedule some “spotlight time” by doing an interview on CNN. You send out a notice to the Montana media so you can get noticed – to let them know you are there fighting for all that is good in America – like a few billion dollars in tax rebates.

Your leaders left you behind. How horrible. To compound the problem, it’s your re-election time. Double damn. Luckily, the senator has about $9 million in the bank to blow back up the “powerful” balloon.

It seems this may have happened to U.S. Senator Max Baucus this week, at least according to a story in today’s Billings Gazette, in which we found:

The senator said he was not privy to the negotiations that produced the current bill, although the legislation needs his committee’s approval to stay alive. Baucus did not seem to dwell on that fact.
“We are where we are,” he said. “Let’s just move forward and find a way to get this passed quickly.”

Heartbreaker. Now Montanans may have to remove Max’s photo from the dictionary, where it’s located beside the word “Powerful.”