Brownback's campaign interfering with senate duties

Is Senator Brownback in? No, he's here or there campaigning to be
president. Oh, I thought he was supposed to be serving the people of Kansas
as a United States Senator. I hope we're not paying him to campaign...

The 2008 presidential election is already unlike any before it. Debates
began over a year and a half before the election, and campaigning has been
going on for at least two years. The prices of these campaigns are setting
new records by reaching into the tens of millions.

For certain candidates, your Obamas and Clintons on the left side, and,
well I don't know who on the right side, the campaigning can by justified.
These are the candidates leading in the polls. These are the candidates with
the sound byte each night on the evening news. For others, however, the
campaigns were over before they began, and each day the facade continues, it
is we the people who pay the price.

In Brownback's case, his campaigning has pulled him away from his
senatorial duties. Granted, Brownback is the religious right's candidate,
and they do have a disturbingly large say in American politics. However, one
needs more than a few votes to pull down this highest office in the world.
While Brownback was away from his paid job, he missed the vote on the ever
important minimum wage vote. Of course, he would have voted against it like
he had in the past, but at least then we could have called him on it. He
also missed a vote to give aid one of his consitituent towns in Greensburg.
How better to serve the people who got you there, huh? I would complain
more, but maybe his absence is a good thing...

Brownback's case can be multiplied many times over with these silly
campaigns. Governors, senators, and congressmen have all been pulled away
from the jobs we are paying them to do. It would be disappointing albeit
understandable if they had a chance, but all but few candidates on either
side really do. And what happens next election? The one after that? Will we
soon have continual campaigning, merely electing these people so that they
can use their position as a pedastal for the presidency? Let's hope not. Get
back to serving those who pay your salary.

-Mike Courson