Kinder ahead in polls for Lt. Gov.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) -- For two weeks, Peter Kinder was a Republican candidate for governor. He started lining up support from donors, businesses and grassroots organizers.

Then Kinder abruptly reversed course, deciding to seek re-election as lieutenant governor.

Now Kinder finds himself the only of Missouri's incumbent executive officeholders facing a Nov. 4 re-election challenge from a well-financed opponent. His rival: Democratic state Rep. Sam Page, a physician making an issue of health care coverage.

Kinder and Page have engaged in a testy debate, accusing each other of shielding records from public scrutiny, slashing health care and twisting the truth. Often, it's been Kinder on the attack -- a somewhat unusual circumstance for an incumbent.

"I suit up with a chin strap on tight and I come to play," Kinder explained in an interview.

Through 12 years in the state Senate, Kinder earned a reputation as a bulldog. But as a lawmaker and lieutenant governor, he also has bridged party and regional differences to occasionally work with political opponents.

Last week, for example, Kinder received praise from the Service Employees International Union for helping persuade the administration to pay more than $4 million in back pay to probation and parole officers who won a lawsuit against the state. The twist: the SEIU state council had endorsed Page.

When Republican Gov. Matt Blunt unexpectedly announced in January that he would not seek re-election, Kinder was the first to enter the race. But after U.S. Rep. Kenny Hulshof and Treasurer Sarah Steelman also did so, Kinder surprised Republicans by announcing he would instead run for a second lieutenant governor's term. He said he changed course for the good of the party.

A poll released Monday showed Kinder ahead of Page 51 percent to 35 percent, with 2 percent for others and 12 percent undecided. The telephone poll of 800 likely voters was conducted Sept. 15-18, by Research 2000 for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and television station KMOV and had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

Page insists his own internal polling shows a much closer race. As of early September, Page trailed Kinder in cash on hand $926,047 to $644,449 -- a notable gap but still enough money to mount a formidable campaign.

Page, 43, was born in Kansas City and moved in grade school with his mom to the small southern Missouri town of Van Buren after his parents divorced. Page became his high school class president and valedictorian and went on a curator's academic scholarship to the University of Missouri-Kansas City, where he was elected president of the student government.

While in medical school there, Page met his wife, Jennifer Horrell, another medical school student who worked as a Kansas City Chiefs cheerleader. They settled in Creve Couer, where he served on the city council from 1999-2002 and then won election to the state House.

He got into local politics because of opposition to a proposed retail and apartment complex on property that Page pushed to use as a park.

During the lieutenant governor's campaign, Page has continued to work one day a week as an anesthesiologist. Page touts his medical background as a chief qualification, because the lieutenant governor serves as the official advocate for seniors and on a council for veterans -- groups of people who typically have health care concerns.

"I went to medical school to help people and I ran for office for the same reason -- to try to help people," Page said. "I am deeply disturbed about the dire state of government under Peter Kinder and Matt Blunt. We need to change priorities; access to health care needs to be a priority."

Although the lieutenant governor has no direct power over the matter, Page says he would advocate to reverse the Republican-led 2005 Medicaid cuts that reduced or eliminated health care benefits to thousands of low-income Missourians.

Kinder, as many Republicans, defends the cuts as a budgetary necessity -- though he had no direct role in making them. Kinder has picked apart Page's voting record to suggest he, too, backed various health care cuts by supporting amendments that would have taken money from one area and put it in another.

During a recent debate, they also differed on other policy areas.

Page backed a proposed sales tax increase for veterans services; Kinder said he opposed tax increases. Kinder backed state financial aid benefiting a new St. Louis Cardinals stadium and a potential development that could include a soccer stadium for the Kansas City Wizards; Page said he opposes subsidies for sports stadiums.

Kinder, 54, of Cape Girardeau, cites his support for urban economic development projects along with his advocacy for the union-represented probation and parole workers as evidence that he's willing to work with those who are not typically allies.

"This is another example of my risking my career to reach across the ordinary urban-rural divide in our state -- as an outstater myself -- to try to say we've got to do something about the blighted inner city," Kinder said.

Kinder also has a medical background in his family. His late father, James Kinder, became a pediatrician by age 23. Peter Kinder, however, went into the fields of law, news and politics -- working on then-U.S. Bill Emerson's staff in Washington, as an attorney for Drury Industries and as an associate publisher of the Southeast Missourian newspaper.

A fan of history, Kinder made history himself when Republicans won the Senate majority in 2001 and he became the first GOP Senate president pro tem in 53 years.

As lieutenant governor, Kinder has served as acting governor on more than 100 days when Blunt has been gone -- an experience Kinder says would give him an edge if the lieutenant governor had to permanently take over the top spot.

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On the Net:

Kinder: http://teamkinder.com

Page: http://www.sampage.com/index2.asp