That Was A Campaign;
This Is Different

WASHINGTON — Politics does indeed make strange bedfellows, all the while generating campaign rhetoric that both sides readily ignore later.

Kansas treasurer Sally Thompson's nomination as chief financial officer for the U.S. Agriculture Department is on its way to a full Senate vote, partly through the support of the man who defeated her in a bitter campaign last year — and in so doing criticized her handling of financial matters.

Republican Sen. Pat Roberts sits on the Senate Agriculture Committee, which last Thursday unanimously voiced its support for Thompson.

"I think the president and any cabinet member should certainly have the right to name the team that they want to work with," Roberts said. "There is a time for campaigning and a time to express yourself on the issues, and that's passed."

In Washington for her confirmation hearing this month, Thompson said Roberts has been nothing if not gracious: "We all understand what elections are about, and when they're over, they're over."

Thompson, a Democrat, gave Roberts his toughest race in years. Painting the 16-year U.S. House member as a Washington insider who took advantage of congressional perquisites, Thompson vexed him so that in the final weeks of the campaign, a frustrated Roberts referred to her as a "bitch."

Roberts immediately apologized to the reporter who overheard that conversation with his son, but the incident underscored the rancorous contest.

Roberts' own charges about Thompson's qualifications make his support of her nomination even more surprising. In his campaign, Roberts zeroed in on poor investment decisions Thompson made that lost more than $20 million in interest earnings from trading securities. State legislators eventually stripped Thompson's office of its power to make day-to-day investment decisions.

Now Thompson is likely to take over finances of one of the largest federal agencies, which is run by a fellow Kansan, Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman. Also a Democrat, Glickman served most of his 18 years in Congress with Roberts.