John Thune sounded very content Tuesday afternoon as he explained to me why he wasn’t running for president.

Thune said he just didn’t feel the time was right. He said he wants to keep working in the Senate. The idea of striving to raise hundreds of millions of dollars while traveling across the country and competing with numerous other Republicans who want the nation’s top job just didn’t appeal to him.

In 1975, Minnesota Sen. Walter Mondale, a Democrat, said he didn’t have the “fire in the belly” to run for president in 1976. Mondale also said he didn’t want to spend two years of his life in Holiday Inns.

I asked Thune, a Republican, if he felt the same way as Mondale. While he didn’t discuss the condition of the blaze in his belly, he did admit he wasn’t thrilled by the idea of flying around the country and staying in hotels.

Thune said he genuinely enjoys the Senate and likes working for the people of South Dakota. He was just elected to a second term in the Senate without opposition and at 50, has a long political career ahead of him if he wants it.

Thune is a conservative and Mondale a liberal. But it’s worth noting that after bowing out of the 1976 presidential race, Mondale accepted Jimmy Carter’s offer to run as his VP candidate and he served four years in that office. Will Thune emulate his Midwest neighbor  next year?

And Mondale got over his aversion to a presidential run. He was the Democratic nominee in 1984 and was crushed by President Reagan. Thune certainly doesn’t want to follow that path, but he may decide to run for the White House down the road.

Here’s Mondale reflecting on his career:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kg5hVQYQto0

And here’s Thune talking about how the GOP can win in 2012:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNaiOGSzeBM&feature=related