Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., was hamming it up Wednesday when he appeared at a Capitol Hill event alongside actress Jennifer Garner.

“I know a lot of you have come in here to see ‘Bennifer.’ I’m not the ‘Ben,’” Nelson said as the audience broke into guffaws.

“That was a really bad joke,” Garner told Nelson, although she seemed to be laughing herself.

The tabloid press coined the term “Bennifer” to describe Hollywood supercouple Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez.

Affleck and Lopez canceled their wedding plans at the last minute. Affleck later married Garner and the couple were dubbed by some as a new “Bennifer.” Affleck was not at Wednesday’s event.

Garner wore a pink dress to the event, while Nelson sported a dark suit and an aquamarine tie dotted with little horses.

Garner, who played a CIA agent on the television series “Alias,” was on the hill to push for passage of the Full Service Community Schools Act of 2009.

Nelson introduced the Senate version of the legislation, which would create a five-year grant program totaling $1 billion to expand the number of full-service community schools across the country.

Those schools go beyond traditional models and provide services to students and their families such as primary, dental and mental health care, career counseling and nutrition education.

They tend to stay open past regular school hours and during weekends.

Proponents say research shows that the enhanced support networks result in improved student attendance, scholastic achievement and parental involvement.

Nelson said that the $1 billion is a lot of money but that it must be compared to the societal cost of children who can’t learn due to hunger, family financial problems or mental health problems.

“It’s an investment,” Nelson said of the funding in the bill.

In addition to rubbing shoulders with a Hollywood star, Nelson was named Wednesday as one of Washington’s top 50 “party animals” by the newspaper Politico.

The publication described Nelson as an “enthusiastically social guy” and a regular at high-profile Washington soirees.

“You can find him grabbing drinks at Capitol Hill joints such as Charlie Palmer Steak or Sonoma wine bar,” according to Politico. “And when he’s not out being a party animal, Nelson is just as social on the Senate floor.”

Nelson said the publication was just having fun with him and that he’s hardly a party animal. He noted that he made his own dinner Tuesday night at home by microwaving a potato and an onion.

“And some cottage cheese,” Nelson added.

Source: http://www.omaha.com/