Are they the oldest senatorial delegation in history?
McCASKILL has been twice elected Missouri’s state auditor, in 1998 and 2002. Prior to that, she served in the state legislature and county government. In 2004 she challenged Gov. Bob Holden, a fellow Democrat, in the primary and won, 52-45 percent. It was the first time in state history that a governor was denied renomination in a primary. In the general election that year, she narrowly lost to Republican Matt Blunt. Democrats have won only one Senate race in Missouri in the past quarter-century, and that was when the late Mel Carnahan, who had perished not long before in a plane crash, ousted GOP incumbent John Ashcroft in 2000. Jim Talent defeated Carnahan’s widow, who had been appointed to the seat, in 2002 . If anything, the state has become even more Republican since then. But the national anti-GOP mood and the falling job ratings for Gov. Blunt have given McCaskill a boost. What will determine this race are the rural voters. McCaskill will carry St. Louis and Kansas City; the que
