GRADING HOLDEN: NOWHERE TO GO BUT UP

An Associated Press story featured last week in this newspaper focused on Gov. Bob Holden's first six months in office and purported to give him a grade.

For readers who missed the story, the grade was B.

The grade is one Holden gave himself -- actually at least "a B for effort up to this point," he told The AP. For those who were on the edges of their seats waiting to be informed what three political science professors would say, they also rendered their verdicts. (Former Democratic U.S. Sen. Tom Eagleton refused to join in the grading exercise.)

Said Ken Warren, a political science professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, to The AP: "Holden hasn't accomplished a lot during his first six months in office."

Said Holden political ally Mark Rushefsky, a professor at Southwest Missouri State University, "The controversies do stand out more, and his successes have probably been more limited."

Then there's Candace Young of Truman State University, who oversees state interns in the Capitol, including Holden's office. Young was reported as saying, "Obviously he's not doing as well as what he would have wanted to and others would have wanted."

Here are our grades:

Deportment: A.

Effort: B-.

Use of state airplane: D.

Executive order on collective bargaining for state employees: F.

Transportation plan proposing largest-ever tax increase in state history: D.

Timeliness in forwarding names of appointees to Senate for confirmation process: F.

Inauguration costing $1.2 million: F.

Holden's discovery of a state budget crisis within weeks of his election, after having spent the previous eight years signing the checks as state treasurer: F.

Tongues are wagging statewide: Do Missourians really think Holden can keep this up for a full four years? Let's hope not.

It is with great sadness that it seems fair to say:

There would appear to be nowhere to go but up from here.