there has got to be a BILLION better ways ...

COULD WE NOT be just as compelled to vote for candidate A or B with only debates on TV ... could we not be BETTER represented by a "real" John Smith who is able to run because there is a reasonable limit on campaign spending?  AS MUCH AS I want to protect & honor "my" president ... does he/she have to live in a house (mansion) that costs over $30,000 dollars a day to run???  (and don't even get me onto the subject of paying & protecting them for the rest of their lives after they leave a 4 year job!!!!!!!!!!!!)  YOU WANT TO BACK A CANDIDATE SPECIFICALLY?  pay their back taxes, pay to investigate their personal life, pay someone to teach him/her what the people they are SUPPOSEDLY representing REALLY need, pay someone to teach them to answer a question in direct english!  Hand out a survey to the people that work for them in the private sector, & to the people they represented before.  Harder yet perhaps ... find an honest, moral, compassionate person(s) to advise them, not a staff of overpaid, often underworked "yes" people.
AND- kick everyone out of the senate & house that aren't present to vote on bills at least 90% of the time!  I PAY them to be there, and I don' appreciate them coming & going as they please, voting for their own raises, and IN FACT voting on issues they have no understanding of or that which will have NO AFFECT on them either!!  OMG ... I am sooooo not looking toward this election !!