Bill Frist says, “Thank me very much!”

Now we know why Bill Frist was cashing out HCA stock. It was to get an early start on the 2008 presidential election., Josh Marshall noted that Judith Miller and other embedded Times reporters in Iraq had a reporter overseeing them to make sure they followed SOP.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist paid $72,012 from his own pocket to his 2000 re-election campaign fund in August, two months after he was notified that trustees had sold millions of dollars of his stock in HCA Inc., the hospital chain founded by his father and brother.

That Aug. 30 payment was disclosed in Federal Election Commission filings last Friday. The documents also show the campaign fund on the same day paid off a $349,107 outstanding loan from U.S. Bank Corp.

Both transactions enabled the Tennessee Republican to close the Senate campaign fund in anticipation of his retirement from the Senate next year and a possible run for the White House in 2008.

Did he use any of that money to visit James Dobson, after his “slip” on stem cells?