JIM TALENT ANNOUNCES RUN FOR CARNAHAN SEAT

The following piece by David Scott was published by the Associated Press on Wednesday, October 10, 2001.

ST. LOUIS -- Former Rep. Jim Talent announced his candidacy for the U.S.
Senate Tuesday with a strict declaration that he is running for the
office and not against its current holder, Democrat Jean Carnahan.

"It's up to the voters to judge Mrs. Carnahan's record, assuming she is
my opponent," Talent, 44, said, standing alongside his wife and three
young children at a news conference. "Obviously, there are differences
between us. I think I have the views and the experience to move the
system in Washington in the direction of the common sense, conservative
values of this state.

"I think I can do that better than anybody and I'm going to ask the
voters to consider whether that is the case." 

Last year, Talent left his safe 2nd District seat after serving four
terms to run for governor, losing to Democrat Bob Holden by 21,000
votes, a margin of less than 1 percent of the vote. If he wants to
return to office, political observers suggest he rethink his decision
not to directly challenge Mrs. Carnahan, who has yet to formally
announce her own intent to seek election but is raising money for a
race. 

"It is a losing strategy," said Saint Louis University political
scientist Ken Warren, a longtime political observer in the state. "It
will not win the respect of the voters." 

Mrs. Carnahan was appointed after her husband, former Gov. Mel Carnahan,
was killed in a plane crash three weeks before the election last
November. Despite his death, Mel Carnahan defeated incumbent Republican
John Ashcroft, now attorney general. 

Focused, says Carnahan 

"I'm just really focused on what I'm doing here right now," Mrs.
Carnahan said when asked about her plans in an interview Tuesday with
The Associated Press. "I don't think people want us think about politics
right now. I think they want us to come together and concentrate on the
thing at hand. 

"And frankly, I don't want to think about it." 

Talent might feel it would be difficult to run against the Carnahan
name, Warren said, because of what happened to Mel Carnahan.
"But that's over, life goes on," Warren said. "She is a bonafide senator
and a bonafide Senate candidate. You can't run for the U.S. Senate and
not run against a candidate." 

Talent acknowledged some differences with Mrs. Carnahan he planned to
address, including her vote against Ashcroft's appointment as attorney
general. 

Still, the difficulty facing Talent in running against Carnahan is
evident. 

"She lost her son; she lost her husband, and just recently lightening
struck her house and the whole thing was consumed. There's still a great
deal of sympathy for her out there," said Rick Hardy, a political
scientist at the University of Missouri. "Is Jim going to be running
against her or against the ghost of Mel Carnahan? I think it's going to
be a little bit of both. He's going to have a tough time trying to
figure out which one to run against." 

State tour planned

Talent's announcement that he would run -- "otherwise known as the worst
kept secret in Missouri," he quipped -- was to be followed with a
campaign visit to Joplin, the first of several "Talk with Talent" stops
across the state. A spokesman said he will also travel to Washington
this week to "reintroduce" himself. 

Despite his loss to Holden, on the same election day that President Bush
handily beat Vice President Gore in Missouri, he doesn't plan to change
much in his second statewide campaign. 

"I'm surprised you a haven't already noticed: I'm wearing a white shirt
instead of a blue shirt at the announcement," Talent joked with
reporters on Tuesday. 

"The fundamentals pretty much stay the same," he said. "I hope each time
I run that I do it better. The more times you do something, the better
you should be able to do it. We're going to run it basically the same." 

Different campaign 

If that's the case, voters can expect a dramatic difference between this
Senate campaign and the often bitter 2000 campaign between Mel Carnahan
and Ashcroft, two longtime rivals. 

Talent pledged to keep his run civil and focused on the issues,
something that characterized his race against Holden. The governor,
speaking in Jefferson City Tuesday, echoed Talent's hope for a civil
campaign. 

"The thing that I was always gratified about my race with the
congressman for governor is that both of us stayed on the discussion of
issues and I expect him be at the same level in this campaign," Holden
said. 

The Carnahan-Talent race should be one of the nation's most watched, and
Talent said he expected both national parties to make it a "top-tier"
race. Democrats control the Senate 50-49-1 and the Missouri race is one
of several that could affect that balance.