After 418* candidates filed on Day 1, the total number of candidates filing on Day 2 was 11.

Former St. Rep. Esther Haywood filed for SD14, meaning that five candidates are running to succeed Rita Days. Those 5 are U-City Mayor Joe Adams, St. Rep. Don Calloway, St. Rep. Maria Chappelle-Nadal, Haywood, and St. Rep. Ted Hoskins.

Libertarian Kevin Parr is running for the second cycle in a row in HD55. Rory Ellinger (D-U City) is running in HD72 to succeed Maria Chappelle-Nadal. Incumbent St. Reps John Diehl (R) of the 87th and Dwight Scharnhorst (R) of the 93rd filed. Former State Rep and 2008 candidate Jan Polizzi filed for the 97th to run to succeed the termed-out Walt Bivins (R). Jeffrey Landwehr (R-Gerald) filed to succeed termed-out Charles Schlottach in the 111th. Democrat Mike Stevenson of Warsaw filed for the 116th to succeed termed-out Rep. Tom Self (R). Democrat Jim West of Joplin filed to succeed termed-out Speaker Ron Richard in the 129th. David Liveoak (R-Neosho) filed in the 131st to succeed Marilyn Ruestman. Republican John J. “Joe” Ratcliff, Jr of Springfield filed to challenge incumbent Rep. Charlie Denison in the 135th.

In the State House, Republicans are currently contesting 113 seats, and Democrats are contesting 112 seats.

(* – The original number was 417. But they list a 418th filing, Republican Bob Brown of Springfield, whose listing as a 7th Congressional District candidate was not listed until today. Brown previously ran for Congress in the 4th district in 2000 and 2002, losing primaries to Jim Noland.)

Unrelated note: Kudos to the Missouri House website for adding Google-added district maps. Here’s the 72nd district. (edit: or I can add the map links to every district mentioned)

That’s your filing review. Might as well add some observations for 2/23 filings or places that could use a random person showing up to file before March 30th.

417 candidates filed today for state and federal offices. 224 Republicans, 170 Democrats, 17 Constitution Party Members, and 6 Libertarians filed. A surprisingly high turnout of Constitution Party candidates (gotta find a way to describe those party members without being too long-worded or vague) and another low turnout for Libertarians on day one. Although 2 Libertarians did file for Lacy Clay’s seat.

14 candidates filed for the US Senate. 3 candidates filed for Auditor. 37 candidates filed for the US House. 39 candidates filed for 17 State Senate seats. 308 candidates filed for 163 State House seats. And 16 candidates filed for Circuit Court spots.

Roy Blunt and Chuck Purgason were joined by 7 other Republicans. These Republicans include Businessman R. L. Proprotnik (who won the first spot on the ballot), unknown James Schmidt, Hector Maldonado (who is in the Army until the end of this month), Kristi Nichols (who poses in front of a flag with some text I can’t read on it), unsuccessful school board candidate Deborah Solomon, small business owner Davis Conway, and Tea Partier Mike Vontz.

Robin Carnahan is being opposed by Francis Vangeli, who is an unknown and has voiced opposition to the Obama/Democratic HCR efforts with a variety of complaints.

Two Constitution Party candidates are dueling for their nomination. Jerry Beck (who ran as a Democrat in previous elections) and contemporary furniture maker Joe Martellaro are filed for that nomination.

Lacy Clay, Todd Akin, Ike Skelton, Jo Ann Emerson, and Blaine Luetkemeyer did not file. And four of those five have primary opponents. Ike Skelton doesn’t have a primary opponent but he has six Republicans running for an their nomination for the 4th.

I have no idea where a random Democrat will emerge first between the 6th District and 9th District. Only a $100 filing fee.

Also worth randomly noting that former Constitution Party candidate Don Griffin is running as a Republican against Sue Allen.

More will be added later on the State House and Senate. Feel free to mention the things that are under the statewide radar.

The fun begins at 8am, and will go on until March 30th. If past patterns come into play, then most of the filers will show up on the first or last days.

People who file today get a random number and the order is drawn out of those filers for the first spot. Then everybody else gets a spot as they show up. (Slightly more fair than the new Jackson County system, where you sign up for a spot on Monday and it’s done in order then. Until the mid-1990s, I believe the statewide system involved having people stand in line for you for a few weeks and no random numbers.)

More information is here.

Betting for who files first should acknowledge who is a legislator (or works in the Capitol).

So post interesting stuff you find here. And the updates will show up in the other 26ish days that filing is open.

Here’s a summary of the call. If you wish to follow along, here’s the audio.

0:00-0:04: Hello, i’m an anonymous person from an area code you don’t recognize with the NRCC hoping you don’t hang up on me, I have an end of year report too, don’t hang up! (paraphrasing, slightly)

0:08: “Ike Skelton has been in Congress for over 33 years” (December 23rd, 2009 minus January 3rd, 1977… uh…)

0:10: “Lost touch with what Missouri workers are going through”

0:15-0:25: “Booo Stimulus!” (obviously didn’t have enough tax cuts for the voodoo economists)

0:25-0:35: “Boo Cap’n’trade!” (pretending that 60 votes exist for that is like pretending that this robocall is a productive use of money)

0:35-0:50: “Call Ike Skelton, and tell him your New Years Resolution is to watch his votes in 2010 to make sure he’s voting for Missouri Workers, not the liberal agenda of the Democrat Party leaders in Washington” (“Sorry Honey, I was going to resolve myself to losing 10 pounds, but this recording told me to keep track of Ike Skelton’s votes, pass the salt”)

Tis the season for campaigning 11 months out. Fa la la la lalalala la. Transcript under fold.

Hello, i’m calling on behalf of the NRCC with an end of year action alert about Congressman Ike Skelton.

Ike Skelton has been in Congress for over 33 years and has lost touch with what Missouri Workers are going through.

Unemployment in Missouri is 9.5% but Ike Skelton spent 2009 helping Liberal Speaker Nancy Pelosi push a massive $787 billion dollar pork-laden spending bill he called a stimulus but that’s not helped the Missouri economy.

To make matters worse, Skelton voted for a liberal cap’n’trade bill that will increase energy costs for Missouri families at the worst time.

Call Ike Skelton at (573) 635-3499, and tell him your New Years Resolution is to watch his votes in 2010 to make sure he’s voting for Missouri Workers, not the liberal agenda of the Democrat Party leaders in Washington.

Paid for by the National Republican Congressional Committee. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee.

Edit: Happy days in Bluntland

Charlie Cook: “I suspect a Republican gain of between four and six seats [in the Senate], predicated on Democrats being unlikely to beat any Republican open-seat Senate candidate or being able to unseat any Republican Senate incumbent.”

Roy Blunt: “Charlie Cook, the respected independent, non-partisan analyst predicts our campaign will win”

If you can’t rely on a prediction made 11 months out, what can you rely on?

———-

Political Fix: “Blunt sees silver lining in poll that gives slight edge to rival”

Blunt’s campaign also showed reason for optimism in the poll’s finding that President Obama had a 47 percent approval rating among the 500 Missourians who participated in the telephone survey.

Which is one of the higher Obama approval ratings from recent polls i’ve seen in Missouri. Keep partying Roy, you’ll figure out better lines to use in your e-mails.

Rasmussen, 12/15/09, 500 likely voters

Robin Carnahan (D) 46%

Roy Blunt (r) 44%

Other 4%

Undecided 6%

Favorable ratings: Robin 51%, Blunt 50%

Job approval ratings*: Nixon 63%, Obama 47%

Health Care legislation: 40% For, 57% Against with a 50/50 split on a “government-sponsored non-profit health insurance option” that drops after a push poll question.

It’s still effectively a draw, 11 months out.

(Edit: * – Rasmussen’s “strongly approve”/”somewhat approve” methodology could be inflating job approval ratings. Although i’m pretty sure that Obama’s job approval rating in Missouri according to Rasmussen is higher than his national job approval rating according to Rasmussen, which is confusing)

The word from Dave Catanese suggests a disappointing or interesting turn of events in the Cynthia Davis saga:

“I plan on being a candidate in 2010, but not for Missouri State Auditor,” Davis said.

Now, let’s see. Cynthia Davis could run for the State Senate against Scott Rupp, (edit: she could run for Congress against Todd Akin, which would be hilarious), she could run for a St. Charles county or municipal office in O’Fallon, or she could run for the U. S. Senate against Roy Blunt and provide us hours of entertainment. As a Kansas City sports fan, I always bet on disappointment, so I’m sure Cynthia is prepping her race for Director of Elections or Collector of Revenue.

Cynthia Davis also bashed Tom Schweich for donating to Claire McCaskill and praising the composition of Obama’s cabinet. Because blind party loyalty is what you want in an auditor.

Meanwhile, Chuck Purgason moves onwards, hitting Roy Blunt on earmarks. No word on when Blunt will just start voting against budgets or not voting, before claiming credit for the earmarks. It’s what Kit Bond would do.

It should tell you what you need to know about the confidence Establishment Republicans have in Vicki Hartzler and Bill Stouffer that they’re considering dumb stunts like this:

An informal list of 17 members the NRCC believes can be convinced to step down, privately called the “Dem Retirement Assault List,” makes clear the party needs Dem incumbents to step aside if they have hopes of taking back the majority. The NRCC has taken pains to attack those lawmakers in recent weeks.

The list includes 14 members whose districts voted for Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) in ’08. McCain won districts held by Reps. Ike Skelton (D-MO) and Bart Gordon (D-TN) with more than 60% of the vote, and districts held by Reps. Rick Boucher (D-VA), Alan Mollohan (D-WV), Marion Berry (D-AR), Nick Rahall (D-WV) and Mike Ross (D-AR) with more than 55%.

Ike Skelton has won by 30% or more in 13 of 17 elections (missing that mark in 1976, 1982, 1990, and 1996). 1996 was the last serious-looking-at-one-point challenge, where Bill Phelps (two-term statewide elected official from the 1970s) lost by 29.9% to Skelton.

Considering the success of NRCC tactics in previous years, there’s not a lot to get scared about here.

What could be so tempting to make a man quit his job in the Missouri General Assembly a year early?

What about “a 9-to-5 job” for a payday lending giant. That’s what Brian Yates is going to do, moving from one field with a bad reputation to a field that deserves a worse reputation.

QC Holdings (“Quik Cash”) appears to have a valuable team member. We’ll keep our eyes open and report back when he becomes a lobbyist for the free market tradition of extreme interest rates. (The United Payday Lenders of Missouri (which QC is a member of) have two lobbyists)

The STL Better Business Bureau said that “Missouri accounted for 30% of QC Holdings’ total branch gross profits last year” and that

“Among the nine contiguous states, only Tennessee has more payday loan locations (1,481) than Missouri (1,275) with the next highest being Kentucky with 785, according to the Division of Finance’s report. The report also shows that the APR allowed by Missouri’s statutes of 1,950% based on a two-week loan of $100 is by far the highest of the nine contiguous states”

When they say Payday, they mean “payday for them”, not you. And if the Republican Legislature actually moves to help people out (which is unlikely), QC can roll out at least one employee who knows his way around the place.

BTW, the Special Election will likely be held on April 6th because Yates resigned too late for a February Special election. Although this is actually a slight financial win for the area since it’ll be held concurrently with Municipal Elections in Lee’s Summit.

An extra two months is good news for taxpayers and for likely Democratic candidate Dave Coffman.

We’ll keep you posted on this story.

Public Policy Polling, 763 voters, 11/13-15/2009, (source)

Of Missouri’s last five elected Governors: John Ashcroft, Mel Carnahan, Bob Holden, Matt Blunt, and Jay Nixon- who do you have the least favorable opinion of?

Ashcroft 21%

Carnahan 19%

Holden 22%

Blunt 29%

Nixon 10%

Now, the poll was a duel between partisans. But amongst Independents, they disliked Holden and Blunt and liked Ashcroft and Carnahan.

Fun note: PPP unintentionally released these poll numbers on Matt Blunt’s 39th birthday. Really.

Update: Rich Chrismer referred to the data as highly misleading, before proclaiming Blunt “Missouri’s third most popular governor”. Didn’t know you could proclaim something to be highly misleading before highly misleading others.

The same state that gave Ashcroft 56.7% and 64.2% went on to give Carnahan 58.7% and 57.2%. Another way to put it, in 1984, Ashcroft won 56.7%, Harriett Woods won 53.8%, and Reagan won 60%, in one of Missouri’s greater ticket splitting years.

40% of Missourians vote Democratic almost every time, 40% of Missourians vote Republican almost every time, and the other 20% elaborately split their tickets.

As for a regional split: Obviously, Ashcroft’s strongest region is around Springfield. Blunt’s worst regions were KC and STL City (where he said “people don’t want to live”) and he won a plurality for least favorite in Springfield. The 660 typifies the partisan split, as 38% said Carnahan was their favorite (a plurality) and 28% said that Carnahan was their least favorite. Which proves that the best way to be the least favorite Governor of a Republican partisan is to steamroll them twice in an election.

No word on if David Spade will be hired to keep Matt Blunt busy next year.