No One Wants to Be a US Senator Anymore

It's a tough job and ... nobody wants to do it. Both Republicans and Democrats are having trouble finding people to run in next year's Senate races, a once-prized gig that has been tarnished thanks to gridlock and partisan politics, the Wall Street Journal reports. The GOP, which needs to pick up at least five seats to win back the Senate majority, still hasn't secured any top-tier prospects in the crucial states of Virginia, Michigan, Minnesota, and Colorado. Meanwhile, Democrats have no one in West Virginia, and are still waiting on their top picks for Kentucky and Montana.

In Iowa, the following Republicans all turned down the chance to vie for a soon-to-be-vacant seat: the state's lieutenant governor, agriculture secretary, secretary of state, and two congressmen, the Journal reports. And a Nebraska seat was seen as a sure-bet for Republican Gov. Dave Heineman—but he decided he had a better thing going where he was. "When you are a governor, every day you can get things done," he says. "But you look at the US Senate, you don't get the sense that people are willing to work together to do what's right for the country." (More Senate stories.)