Ben Nelson’s Holograms: Aging Senate is Out of Touch

During a recent interview with the Omaha World-Herald, Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson was asked if he supported an amendment to the Senate’s financial reform bill that would have capped ATM fees at 50 cents per transaction. As the senator tried to explain his position, things took a turn for the bizarre:

“I’ve never used an ATM, so I don’t know what the fees are,” Nelson said, adding that he gets his cash from bank tellers, just not automatic ones. “It’s true, I don’t know how to use one.
“But I could learn how to do it just like I’ve . . . I swipe to get my own gas, buy groceries. I know about the holograms.”
By “holograms,” Nelson clarified that he meant the bar codes on products read by automatic scanners in the checkout lanes at stores such as Lowe’s and Menard’s.
“I go and get my own seating assignment on an airplane,” Nelson said. “I mean, I’m not without some skills. I just haven’t had the need to use an ATM.”

The amendment in question was the brainchild of Iowa Senator Tom Harkin, who argued that it was needed to “ensure that fees charged to consumers at ATMs bear a reasonable relation to the cost of processing the transaction.” However, he was not able to bring the amendment to a vote and it was not included in the bill that passed on Thursday.

Senator Nelson’s response has drawn comparisons to former Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska, who famously described the Internet as “a series of tubes” that could be clogged by sending too many e-mails and videos through them. The Daily Show leaped on Stevens’ mangled metaphor and turned him into the poster boy for politicians who are out of touch with the modern world.

Comparing Nelson to Stevens doesn’t seem quite right, though. It was at least possible to see what Stevens was getting at, if you cocked your head to the side and squinted. Nelson sounds like he just beamed down from the mothership and didn’t have time to finish reading his briefing on Earthling technology. Like poor Miss South Carolina, it’s obvious that he was caught completely off-guard by the interviewer’s question and just started saying the first thing that came to mind. “I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to pay their ATM fees because some people out there in our nation don’t have holograms…”

It’s easy to poke fun at politicians like Ben Nelson, but his clueless response to this issue highlights a serious concern. Many of our leaders have been so comfortably ensconced in the halls of power for so long that they have little to no memory of life on the outside. As Ezra Klein notes, this is especially problematic in the current Senate, which is the oldest on record. That’s why it’s so important for average Americans to engage in the political process and demand results from their representatives in Washington. When the members of Congress are crafting policies that will have a profound impact on the lives of working families, it’s not enough for them to know about the holograms.

We need to speak up and remind them of what the real world is like.