A celebrity spokesperson is needed to take on the heartbreaking problem of finding dates for trackers. Washington Post reporter, Ben Terris, has exposed a national tragedy in the week’s most important story: Tracking the trackers: What it’s like to have the most mind-numbing job in a campaign.

Will these young people find love? Will they be able to pass their genes along to future generations? Will members of the other gender (or their own if that is their preference) bed them and cohabit with them behind white picket fences or whatever is the future equivalent?

Let the sympathy flow as we follow Mr. Terris’s touching saga. Notice the sadness in the eyes of the onlooker below as she anticipates the empty life to follow.

“Political tracker Joe Gallant of the Democratic super PAC American Bridge records Republican Senate candidate Ed Gillespie and campaign staffers on Oct. 9 as they board an elevator at George Mason University in Arlington, Va. (J. Lawler Duggan/For The Washington Post)”

“Hundreds of (mostly younger) men and women, armed with little more than a portable camera, have the awkward job of spending every waking hour filming politicians from the other side of the political aisle. Their hope: catch those people saying something dumb, offensive or off-message so it can then be used against them.”

“Today, no one is more responsible for the growth in the industry than American Bridge, a Democratic super PAC that employs 44 trackers in 41 states. The group has an annual budget approaching $18 million, and its trackers have gone to more than 10,000 events, traveled almost 760,000 miles and logged more than 6,600 hours of footage.”

Imagine the sorrow of these 44 left alone in bars at closing time. How do they describe their ignominious jobs on their résumés?  Their Facebook pages? Their Twitter profiles?

What, you may ask, is the cause of this terrible tragedy that surely requires attention-getting, perky, colored ribbons on World Series uniforms and NFL accouterments for the remainder of the season? (Lavender might be nice.)

For the answer, we turn to OpenSecrets.Org and an insightful summary by David Joachim of the New York Times.

“$4 Billion in Election Spending? That’s a Lot of Candy Corn.”

“Every campaign season breaks spending records. So it’s hardly a surprise that the midterms are shaping up to be the most expensive ever – more than $4 billion spent on congressional races, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.”

“That number can be hard to fathom. So by way of comparison:

• It’s bigger than the annual economic output of 35 countries.
• You’d have to add the market value of the Boston Red Sox ($1.5 billion), San Francisco Giants ($2 billion) and Kansas City Royals ($500 million) to reach that figure.
• It’s roughly the annual budget of the Army Corps of Engineers, one of the biggest public construction operations in the world, with more than 35,000 employees.”

“As vicious and annoying as campaign ads can be, the billions give a jolt, however small, to the economy, providing thousands of jobs in consulting, advertising and other fields.”

“Besides, Americans will spend nearly twice that amount this year on Halloween costumes, decorations and candy.”

Surely, in light of these expenditures, a few dollars can be spared to assure the future happiness of those who serve our political needs.

Call 1-800-TRACKER. Operators are standing by.