The Senate has been making no concessions to the shortness of life in its deliberations on S. 2, the minimum wage bill. A welter of far-flung amendments was debated and voted on this week, with most of them rejected in the end. One amendment related directly to the Baucus small business $8.3 billion tax amendment - Sen. Kyl's (R-AZ) effort to extend tax breaks for restaurants and retailers for a whole nine months - ended up a 50-42 loser. A few others have related to the wage increase itself, such as Sen. Jim DeMint's (R-SC) bid to increase every state minimum wage by $2.10 - which went down 18-76. "One hundred seventy-nine amendments from the other side, zero from our side!" counted Ted Kennedy (D-MA). The other main amendments losing on roll call votes were from:

• Sen. John Ensign (R-NV) on health savings accounts (47-48)
• Sen. Gordon Smith (R-OR) on extending education tax incentives (43-50)
• Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) repealing the 1993 Social Security tax increase (42-51)

But aside from a no-brainer amendment by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), to bar companies from receiving government contracts if they are caught hiring illegal immigrants, none of these was adopted. As the debate continued through the week, it was in noticeable contrast with the alacritous House action on minimum wage (noted here earlier) - showcasing how a bare majority in the Senate is barely a majority at all. Yet there may be a method to their slowness. If the GOP is so eager to keep a no-confidence vote on President Bush's Iraq policy off the floor -- one which threatens to divide and deflate them -- as least they could sound like they care about the putative impact of the minimum wage hike on small business. Reid finally moved to end debate on the Baucus tax cut amendment today, with votes on it likely next Tuesday and then on S. 2 itself later next week.