RUST COMMENTARY: THERE MUST BE A WAY TO BRIDGE THE WIDENING GAP BETWEEN ABORTIONS AND ADOPTIONS

ADOPTIONS: There aren't enough babies around to meet the demand. For one thing, fewer unmarried mothers are relinquishing their newborns. Last year about 30,000 healthy infants were made available for adoption in the U.S., and there were another 10,000 adoptions of foreign babies. But there are two million couples in this country who want to adopt. -- Kiplinger

Surely we should try to bridge the gap between the ever-increasing abortion numbers and those who generally cannot conceive and cry for a child of their own.

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Desegregation payments to St. Louis and Kansas City in current fiscal year 1997 total $262 million. Disappointedly, those urban schools rate the lowest as to student education achievements.

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St. Louis Business Journal listed its top 50 St. Louis dealmakers in last week's issue. One of them was Cape native (who still has many relatives here) BILL SEABAUGH, 40 years old and partner at the Bryan Cave law firm.

The Business Journal commented: William Seabaugh is among the rising stars at Bryan Cave who have worked on many of the key corporate deals in St. Louis.

Seabaugh aided Ralcorp Holdings Inc. in its pending $570 million sale of its Chex brand cereal business to General Mills. He also has been on the team that handles the legal work for Emerson Electric Co.'s acquisitions, as well as the team that helped Furniture Brands Inc., the former Interco, acquire Thomasville Furniture Co.

Among his more memorable transactions was his role in working with the Kiel Center Partners in their acquisition of the controlling interest held by Mike Shanahan. "The dynamics of the negotiations and its significance to the St. Louis sports scene, together with the concurrent negotiation with the National Hockey League, make it one of the more unusual transaction that I have handled," he said.

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Another hometown success living in St. Louis ... CARL LEHNE (and family) paid tribute to his mother and father's 65th wedding anniversary last weekend with a message in our Saturday newspaper.

Carl worked as a key developer with the PANTHEON GROUP, which carried out some of St. Louis' largest redevelopment projects.

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With all of the third-party candidates on the ballot this year ... educating the public on how to vote a SPLIT TICKET or for their candidates of choice is a challenge ... and especially for JO ANN EMERSON who is running in TWO elections. She is in the congressional election on the independent ticket, which is easily found on the punch card in Cape County, but a little more effort is required in those paper-ballot counties where you blacken in the oval.

Emerson is also running in the special election as the Republican nominee in a separate area of the ballot.

The safest way to vote for her or the Natural Law, Libertarian, U.S. Taxpayers or Reform Party candidates is to find their names and blacken or punch in at that place.

Also to vote a split party ticket the instructions say You may blacken (or punch) the oval next to the name of the straight party choice and then blacken (or punch) the oval next to the candidate or candidates of your choice in any OTHER party.

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VOTER CONFUSION: A "democracy will only survive with an informed electorate."

On Sept. 29, the Washington Post published a weekend poll that is nothing short of astonishing because of what it says about voter knowledge.

Twenty-five percent of voters did not know the name of Bill Clinton's running mate. An even more shocking 40 percent could not name Jack Kemp as Bob Dole's VP! No wonder Bill Clinton has apparently been able to confuse voters about where exactly he stands on key issues.

About four in 10 voters think Clinton is the candidate in favor of vouchers for parents to send their children to religious schools. Forty-three percent of those planning to vote for Clinton believe he is in favor of a constitutional amendment to balance the federal budget. Thirty-nine percent think Clinton wants a constitutional amendment to allow prayer in school.

Of course, all three of these positions describe Bob Dole's views, not Clinton's. It is tragic that the public is this confused. Part of the blame for this ignorance is a declining education system. In addition, Clinton has intentionally sown confusion. Finally the Dole/Kemp campaign has to take responsibility for not hitting conservative themes daily so that the public sees the differences -- Washington Update.

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The St. Louis Post-Dispatch is known for an independent and liberal-leaning editorial page that rarely fails to endorse Democratic candidates. For instance, in Sunday's editions the newspaper endorsed President Bill Clinton for re-election, and its endorsements for congressional elections in both Missouri and Illinois a few weeks ago in every single case recommended the Democratic candidates. All this makes more noteworthy the Post endorsement, published in Monday's editions, in the race for Missouri secretary of state.

After discussing the problems arising over how Bekki Cook handled the question of filing for the 8th District congressional seat upon the death of Rep. Bill Emerson, the Post editorial had this to say of Cook:

"She either had failed to identify the shortcomings that led to the confusion or failed to call it to the attention of the Legislature, which could have remedied the problem while it worked on other changes to election laws.

"Nor did Ms. Cook distinguish herself in her handling of petitions on a constitutional amendment on term limits. First she ruled the petitions were not sufficient to get the issue on the ballot; 10 days later she reversed herself.

"These mistakes apparently are born primarily of inexperience or inattention, not a desire to manipulate the system. But they show Ms. Cook has not mastered the demands of her office."

Of Republican nominee JOHN HANCOCK, the Post concludes: "Overall, he is the best candidate running for secretary of state, as he was four years ago. Missourians should elect John Hancock."

~Gary Rust is the president of Rust Communications, which owns the Southeast Missourian and other newspapers.