Senator John Thune: Hunk #1 or #2?

If John Thune is bitter about sharing the title of hunkiest United States Senator with Scott Brown, he didn’t show it today, telling the I-Man he thinks Brown is “a rock star.” He wasn’t terribly surprised that Brown voted to pass the Democrats’ jobs bill, because he has a different constituency than many of his Republican peers.

“I think we’re going to see him showing an independent streak around here,” said Thune, who is from South Dakota, adding that Brown will be cut some slack. “We’re talking about a Republican Senator from Massachusetts for the first time in 40 or 50 years.”

Thune belives the so-called jobs bill is a bit of a “nothing burger,” because there isn’t a whole lot in it. Besides dealing with the highway trust fund and providing incentives to small businesses, Thune said, “There are few things in there that could be helpful.”

He’d rather focus on the troubled economy, but will instead participate in President Obama’s bipartisan health care summit, which begins tomorrow at the White House.

"This health care bill is sucking all the oxygen out of the atmosphere here,” Thune said. He believes the Obama administration will ultimately push the bill through the Senate using a process called reconciliation, despite the wishes of most Americans.

While Thune does not approve, he sees no other cure for Washington’s inertia. “Until we get this in the rearview mirror, I don’t think anything else much is going to get done around here,” he lamented.

An article in the New York Times last weekend talked about all the lost jobs that may never come back; for this reason and many others, Thune is concerned about the future.

“We may be handing off to the next generation a lower standard of living, a lower quality of life than we’ve enjoyed because we’ve been borrowing and spending like crazy,” he said. “We haven’t lived within our means. The economy is never going to start taking off again until we get rid of this policy of uncertainty in Washington.”

Surprisingly, the less depressing news today came out of Iraq, with Thune telling Imus how his most recent visit there a month ago was different from his first three.

“On previous trips, everything was done by U.S. military personnel, every checkpoint,” he said. “This time around, those checkpoints were manned by Iraqi security forces. It really had a feel like these folks are in charge now, and that’s a good thing.”

Imus wished his guest good luck in the “hunk off” in the Senate, and noted a point in Thune’s favor.

“You got where you are not having to pose nude in some magazine,” he said. “As far as we know.”

-Julie Kanfer