The last sitting senator to win the presidency was JFK. Since then, 4 sitting senators have run and... 1960 Sen Kennedy def VP Nixon 1964 Pres Johnson def Sen Goldwater 1968 Nixon def VP Humphrey 1972 Pres Nixon def Sen McGovern 1976 Gov Carter def Pres Ford 1980 Gov Reagan def Pres Carter 1984 Pres Reagan def Mondale 1988 VP Bush def Gov Dukakis 1992 Gov Clinton def Pres Bush 1996 Pres Clinton def Sen Dole 2000 Gov Bush def VP Gore 2004 Pres Bush def Sen Kerry ...all 4 senators lost. In contrast, 5 state governors (not including George Wallace) ran for president and only one (Dukakis) lost. The lesson? Senators make lousy presidential candidates, when in doubt, go with a non-segregationist governor. Also, Nixon, Mondale and Gore were all in the Senate 8 years before their presidential run (all left the Senate to be VPs), and lost. Nixon is the only post-Kennedy senator to overcome his Senate career, and he was lucky to have served just 2 years, and he had to wait 16 years before he won. So the shorter your senate service, the longer removed you are from the Senate, the better. But it's probably best not to serve in the Senate at all, just to be safe. I guess the real lesson here is that Iowa Democratic Caucus and New Hampshire primary voters are a stupidface. Should've gone with Sharpton. Or rolled the dice with Dean. In any case, the Democratic Party needs to be dismantled and started back up from scratch. They need to stop being the party of ************** and stop trying to play it safe.