Sam Adams Alliance

By Rachel Stewart

For Ken Vaughn and virtually any other private citizen not named Romney, Kerry, Roosevelt, Kennedy or Bush, running for Congress is a costly proposition. Of course, it’s costly even if you have pots of money. But for most of us, seeking public office at the national level comes at life-altering financial sacrifice. (Even a Kennedy, as Romney likes to remind us, sometimes has to mortgage one of his houses to remain competitive.)

Vaughn is a traffic engineer and small business-owner, but he is prepared to make such a sacrifice. He wants to unseat Rep. Gerald Connolly, a seemingly well-entrenched two-term Democrat from Virginia’s 11^th congressional district. To that end, Vaughn has spent at least $100,000 of his retirement fund just to get into the race.

John Douglass, a retired Air Force Brigadier General and former Assistant U.S. Secretary of the Navy is, like Vaughn, a newcomer to elective politics. He is entering the Democratic primary in Virginia’s 10^th congressional district, in hopes of unseating Rep. Frank Wolf, who is even more entrenched than Connolly. A Republican, Wolf has been in Congress for 30 years.

To do so, Douglass is spending almost all day working the phones just to raise money. Since May, he has made 9,000 calls and raised $500,000, which isn’t nearly enough to win.

The Center for Responsive Politics estimates that the typical winner in a House election spent roughly $1.4 million in 2010, 70 percent more than winners spent a decade ago. That staggering sum will surely continue to rise, further insulating incumbents from real competition. Reporting requirements alone make it next to impossible for challengers without batteries of lawyers and accountants on their payroll.

That is why the buttresses of incumbency must be removed. It’s also why public-spirited citizens like Vaughn and Douglass deserve our gratitude for defying the odds, at great cost to themselves and their families, and maybe our support.

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