We can’t blame the Democrats for gloating a bit about their victory in Wednesday night’s 48th Annual Roll Call Congressional Baseball Game — they hadn’t won since 2000, after all.

[IMGCAP(1)]In fact, the party was so giddy about the win that one leading Democrat couldn’t help but bring it up on the House floor less than two hours after the game ended.

Republican Rep. Jeff Flake returned to Capitol Hill just before midnight to offer five amendments against certain earmarks in the fiscal 2010 Commerce, Justice and science appropriations bill. But just like in the game, Flake lost.

And that led Appropriations Chairman David Obey (D-Wis.) to poke a bit of fun at the earmark-hating Arizonan.

“I just want to take this occasion to express my sympathy to the gentleman on his loss this evening. I’m not talking about anything that happened here on the floor, but I understand he was a victim in a 15-to-10 drubbing of the Republicans in the Congressional Baseball Game by the Democrats,— Obey said. “And I understand that [although] the gentleman had hit a triple, alas it was in a losing cause.—

Obey did show Flake some sympathy. “We know how you feel — we’ve lost many times in the last decades,— he added.

Bearing the brunt of his back-to-back losses, Flake responded: “I thank the gentleman not at all for bringing that up.—

“I had hoped to improve my batting average by coming to the floor tonight, but it doesn’t seem I have,— he added. “So I’ll have to settle for the triple.—

The House actually had taken a recess to allow Flake to play in the game, come back and offer his amendments. And that was something Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-W.Va.), who was managing the bill, couldn’t help but mention — and gloat about.

“I was just gonna tell the gentleman from Arizona that learning [about the Republican’s loss] makes us all feel, on this side of the aisle, better for waiting for him tonight,— he said.

Poor Flake had taken jabs from Democrats all night — an HOH spy overheard an aide who had accompanied Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to the game shouting “earmark!— every time Flake swung at the bat.

Post-Game Revelry. The baseball game didn’t bring about too much partisanship — an HOH tipster spied Reps. Gene Taylor (D-Miss.) and Anh “Joseph— Cao (R-La.) dining at Tune Inn on Pennsylvania Avenue Southeast at about 11 p.m. Wednesday.

Dan Peake and Clayton Hanson of GalleryWatch contributed to this report.

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