John Mellencamp for senator from Indiana

I first heard the idea of John Cougar Mellencamp running for the Senate in Indiana when Katrina vanden Heuvel of The Nation advocated this on MSNBC, and I wholeheartedly agree. This is a truly inspired idea. John Mellencamp would make an outstanding and even brilliant United States senator and represents exactly the spirit and soul the Democratic Party should stand for.

This is not the time or place for me to critique Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.). I will say that when I first came to Washington I worked for his father, Sen. Birch Bayh (D-Ind.), who I believe was one of the greatest senators who ever served. John Mellencamp is one of the great artists of our age. And John Mellemcamp is one of the great advocates of small-town America, of the kind of "square deal" for Americans that Teddy Roosevelt once championed. He is a voice for working people and a champion of farmers who puts his talent, his body and his money behind his words. Mellencamp has long been a great champion of the Farm Aid cause and concerts, along with the extraordinary leadership of his friend and a truly great American, Willie Nelson.

Indiana has many fine Democrats who would make good Senate candidates, but John Mellencamp is unique, one of a kind, a voice for the people who believes America needs a new brand of politics and new kind of leadership in the Senate.

I am not a Hoosier, but I have ties to the state going back to my years working with Birch Bayh. I believe John Mellencamp would electrify the campaign and electrify Democrats who want a fighter for working people, farmers, small businesses and small-town America to have a loud and clear voice in the Senate.

To those working to draft Mellencamp: You are fighting a good and worthy battle and I hope you succeed. America needs champions of justice and fairness and high principle in the Senate. John Mellencamp is exactly the kind of leader and voice our people need to lift the standards of our politics and the spirit of our nation.

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