HERE'S A MIDSUMMER CHECKUP ON THE MOST HOTLY CONTESTED POLITICAL RACES IN MISSOURI

Midsummer. The sweet corn and peaches are in, the tomatoes are fabulous and an uncharacteristic break in the stifling heat has us all thanking God for small favors. (The global-warming crowd, call your office.) As this writer packs for a week in Philly at the GOP national convention, herewith a few ruminations on the state of the 2000 campaign.

A recent Kansas City Star poll done by the Mason-Dixon polling firm is interesting on several levels.

Presidential race: Their first-day headline week before last told of Texas Gov. George W. Bush surging to a 48-37 Show-Me State lead. The same poll had Bush in a dead-heat two-point lead last February. Even more troublesome for Vice President Gore is polling showing him to be behind in West Virginia, which has gone Republican just twice in the last 50 years. In Minnesota, which hasn't gone Republican since 1972, the race is even.

Missouri U.S. Senate race: The same Star poll had this one within the five-point margin of error, with Sen. John Ashcroft ahead, 47-43. It'll be a barn-burner down to November. The statewide rollout this week of Ashcroft radio ads tagging the governor as "Tax-Man Carnahan" display the under-appreciated virtue of being highly amusing. They are sure to get the famous Carnahan temper rising. Carnahan has had Ashcroft under brutal air attack for weeks in the St. Louis market on Social Security and Medicare. Republicans responded with a pile-driving TV response. It is interesting that all this TV ad buying runs in the low-viewership summer months when we're enjoying the outdoors.

Expect lots more haymakers from both sides in perhaps the nation's top Senate race outside New York. Respected independent political expert Stu Rothenberg wrote last year in Roll Call, the Capitol Hill newspaper: "Let me put it this way. Carnahan clearly despises Ashcroft. In fact, I don't think I've ever interviewed a candidate who had more contempt for his opponent than Carnahan expressed when I met him recently." Anyone who's met John Ashcroft on the basketball or tennis court knows they don't come more fiercely competitive than he.

Missouri governor's race: The same Star poll delivered a surprise: A five-point, within-the-margin-of-error lead for GOP nominee U.S. Rep. Jim Talent of St. Louis County over State Treasurer Bob Holden. It's possible to read too much into this. The big factor is that neither candidate is sufficiently well-known for this result to mean much, with the "undecided/don't know" category about 25 percent. Party pros tell me that in other sophisticated polling, this same category approaches 50 percent. With those who haven't tuned in yet and are unaware at such high levels, such a poll isn't quite meaningless, but is the next thing to it.

The Talent high command knows this, but nonetheless breathed a sigh of relief. Holden, who unlike Talent has twice won statewide races, had just plunked down a half-million for TV ads running statewide, and still independent polling showed him behind. Talent's media campaign to date has consisted of a $45,000 radio ad buy that almost no one heard. Talent won the overwhelming endorsement of the Farm Bureau (representing nearly 90,000 families), but Holden can claim an impressive 10,000 donors and about seven hometowns, from Birch Tree to Springfield to St. Louis. With an edge in cash on hand, slight advantage, Holden. If Jim Talent is to be the first governor elected from St. Louis since 1940, it'll be the old-fashioned way.

~Peter Kinder is assistant to the president of Rust Communications and a state senator from Cape Girardeau.