Dr. Frist to N.H., Stat

On a Senate Call in the Granite State, the Majority Leader Checks the Party's Pulse

HAMPSTEAD, N.H. -- It's always fun to hear politicians who are clearly thinking about running for president tell you -- while in New Hampshire -- that they're not thinking about running for president.

"My job is 100 percent focused on governing," declares Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, the Tennessee Republican who has just finished "governing," to 300 Republican activists Friday night at a Lincoln-Reagan Day Dinner 472 miles from the U.S. Capitol.

He is here, in the Granite State, to nurture the GOP at its grass roots, he says. Never mind that this is his second visit in three months to the state that boasts (and boasts and boasts) the First-in-the-Nation you-know-what. He might as well be here for the stuffed mushrooms.

"All the questions I get up here about running for president," are premature, says Frist in an interview, unprompted by any such question. "You know, people associate it with running for president and all," he says.

Really, being in New Hampshire, what would give people that idea?

"I'm gonna be in Missouri tomorrow night," he says, as if to impose a generic harmlessness on this evening and neutralize any scent of ambition he might be giving off. He mentions the Missouri trip several times in the course of the evening -- in interviews, meet-and-greets and in remarks that sound a lot like a stump speech.

Friday's event is held at the Granite Rose, a sprawling function hall with fold-out walls and trays of sweating cheese. As he works the room, Frist, 53, brims with a slightly overheated enthusiasm, smiling big and tight, breaking into mechanical spasms of exuberance for everyone he greets. He is evincing the air of someone seeking a fresh start, and indeed, few politicians in Washington endured as lousy a 2005 as Frist did.

He was, among other thing, ridiculed for viewing a videotape of Terri Schiavo and questioning her doctors' original assessment that she was in a persistent vegetative state. An autopsy on Schiavo -- who died at 41, two weeks after her feeding tube was removed -- reinforced her first diagnosis.

In September, the Securities and Exchange Commission and Department of Justice began an investigation into Frist's sale of stock in a family-owned hospital conglomerate, a few weeks before shares of the company nose-dived. Frist has repeatedly said he acted properly, but there's no telling how long the investigation could linger.

All the while, Frist provided an object lesson in the well-catalogued perils of trying to lead the Senate while also trying to run for president. "He's shown repeatedly how difficult it is to skin that cat," says Republican strategist Scott Reed, who ran Senate Republican leader Bob Dole's presidential campaign in 1996.

Frist comes forth with a head-spinning metaphor that incorporates cattle, frogs and football: "My job is to herd these Republicans," Frist says. "And if I have too many frogs jumping out of the wheelbarrow as I'm moving down the field, it means I've gotta be putting people back in."

While Frist has struggled with all this, New Hampshire is as good a place as any to press a political reset button. "Frist had a bad year, but people here are inclined to say 'That's just Washington,' " says Republican National Committeeman Tom Rath, a Concord lawyer and veteran of many presidential campaigns.