Things just keeping worse for Blanche Lincoln, Arkansas' senior U.S. senator.

Stanley Reed, a Marianna cotton farmer and all around good guy, has announced his candidacy for Lincoln's Senate seat. Lincoln, of course, has managed to irritate a lot of Arkansans lately because of her politicking during the health care debate.

That's not the safest practice in the world as she's up for reelection next year. So far, eight Republicans have announced their candidacies for Lincoln's seat and a couple of Democrats have mentioned they'd like to challenger her in the primaries, too.

Of the Republican challengers, Gilbert Baker of Conway is the current front runner. Reed's announcement is intriguing because he's generally well liked here in Arkansas among those of us who know him. He's the former head of the Arkansas Farm Bureau and former chairman of the University of Arkansas System Board of Trustees -- two very visible organizations in this state.

Next year's Senate election will be a fun one to watch in Arkansas.

Frankly, I always liked Lincoln well enough. Reed contributed to her last campaign and that's not a surprise -- she had fans among both Democrats and Republicans in this state until she got in the middle of the health care debate (apparently, it's not realistic for people to respect a Democrat to act like a Republican -- imagine that).

She's much preferable to Mark Pryor, our junior senator. He epitomizes the phrase "empty suit" and has pretty well managed to complete ignore his constituents. Sadly, he can't be tossed out of the Senate until 2014.