Conductor's comment way off line

A train conductor has been suspended without pay for telling his passengers that they should vote against US Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry.

Conductor Leslie Farr, who is also a Republican congressional candidate, was on a Kansas City-to-St. Louis Amtrak passenger train that was delayed to allow Kerry's campaign train to leave St Louis and head to a Jefferson City rally.

Farr used the train's public address system to tell passengers they would be delayed because of Kerry's train and then quipped that they should vote accordingly in November. He said: "In retrospect, I was wrong for making a political comment."