Two years before our next president takes the oath of office, not one but three presidential hopefuls joined the candidate field this past weekend: Sen. Hillary Clinton D-N.Y., Gov. Bill Richardson, D-N.M., and Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan.

Barack Obama, the freshman Democratic senator from Illinois, announced his candidacy the previous week.

All of them joined a growing pack of presidential wannabes that includes, on the Democratic side, Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden, Connecticut Sen. Christopher Dodd, former John Kerry running mate John Edwards, Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio, former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack and former Alaska Sen. Mike Gravel.

On the Republican side, Brownback joined former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who announced his candidacy for his party's nomination way back on Jan. 3. Arizona Sen. John McCain has not yet announced -- but by all accounts is running as well.

We long ago stopped counting on our fingers the number of folks jockeying for position in the wide-open 2008 presidential race. According to a Duke University political scientist, the reason for all the action is that neither our sitting president nor his vice president are vying for the job and that creates a vacuum that few high-level politicians are able to resist. We probably couldn't fit on this page the list of senators who, in the last year, have looked in the mirror and seen a president staring back at them.


morning sentinel