So how about spending 10 months of your life running for elective office and then losing in a primary? That's what I did. Sound like fun? It's good to be back.

A political campaign is like a free-floating focus group. You talk with thousands and thousands of people who tell you what's on their minds in no uncertain terms. And the biggest thing on peoples' minds isn't Iraq or even terrorism. It's the economy.

National opinion polls bear this out: Most Americans are worried first and foremost about holding on to their jobs and incomes.

Listen to business economists and we're in a recovery. Listen to ordinary people and we're still in a recession that's getting worse. And the data bear out this view from the street. The nation lost 43,000 jobs last month. Many people who were looking for jobs last year have given up. Even before September's job losses, the total number of jobs in America was declining relative to the number of potential workers.

Meanwhile, take-home pay is going nowhere. And health-insurance costs are going through the stratosphere -- this year, 27 percent more for a single person than last year; 16 percent more for a family.

And of course you know what's happened to 401-Ks and mutual funds. Most of the people I met on the campaign trail have little or no savings, but whatever they now have is a fraction of what they had before.

Okay. You get the point. The interesting political question is why, less than four weeks before Election Day, most politicians aren't talking about any of this.

It's not just that terrorism and the pending war in Iraq are dominating the headlines. I mean, if voters are more worried about the economy, it doesn't matter what's on the front pages. I think the real reason politicians aren't talking much about the economy is they don't have a solution that's even half- way convincing.

The only thing Republicans say is they want to make the President's tax cut permanent. Well, even if you believe in the dubious nostrums of supply-side economics, a permanent extension of the tax cut beyond 2010 won't help today's economy one bit.

Democrats blame the current economic mess on the President's tax cut and the reemergence of federal budget deficits. But even if you accept the questionable proposition that balanced budgets are always good, now is hardly the time for fiscal austerity.

Look, the economy is flacid because there aren't nearly enough buyers to soak up all the goods and services it's capable of producing. Low interest rates are having almost no effect because they're just pushing this wet economic noodle.

The only real way to revive the economy is to get more money into the pockets of average working people. After all, they'll spend it. And the fastest way to get more money into their pockets is to cut their payroll taxes, and thereby instantly fatten their paychecks.

So listen up, Democrat and Republican politicians: The way to jump-start the economy is a payroll-tax cut. That's what you should be advocating.

You heard it here: Free advice on how to win your election from someone who didn't even make it through the primaries.