New poll ranks Missouri GOP candidates

KANSAS CITY, Mo - A new poll shows a local candidate for Missouri governor leads the Republican primary campaign.

Also Wednesday, his opponent started an "air-war" with TV and radio commercials.

Both Republican candidates need to build a lot of name recognition to take on the incumbent, Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon.

The race was blown wide open a few months ago when the presumed front-runner, Lt. Governor Peter Kinder, decided not to run due to personal problems.

That was after news broke about his friendship with a stripper.

So his fraternity brother, Dave Spence , a St. Louis businessman, decided to run.

Tuesday, commercials started to saturate the state.

Part of the ad said, "As governor, I'll worry about making sure you and your neighbors have good jobs."

Spence has the money for a lot of ads.

He gave his campaign $2 million dollars from his personal fortune.

In a phone interview, Spence said, "In any adventure I've done, I've put in money first and had skin in the game. And I can't expect people to follow me unless I'm willing to invest in myself and invest in Missouri, which I did."

The other Republican candidate has been running since last January. In the year since then, Bill Randles has put 46,000 miles on his truck. It's his campaign office when he's not at his Kansas City home.

Randles has raised only about $60,000 for his campaign, that includes about twenty grand of his own money.

He's been a small town preacher, a big-shot lawyer, and campaigns against big government.

Randles said the problem is "...swelling government and bureaucracy, suffocating our ability to do anything. Government intruding into every aspect of our lives."

Randle's wife Bev, also an attorney, manages his campaign.

Despite the low-budget operation, Randles came out ahead of Spence, 15 percent to 12 percent in a new poll by Public Policy Polling.

But 73 percent of Republicans are undecided.

Both remain basically unknown.

"Money does not decide elections. These self funding candidates have not fared well over the last cycle," said Randles.

But money pays for ads on the air, and as Spence buys TV time, Randles plans to keep hitting the road.

The same poll also shows the Republican side of the Missouri senate race is heating up.

Candidate Sarah Steelman still leads with 32 percent. Todd Akin follows with 23 percent.

John Brunner stands at 18 percent.

But since the last poll in September, both Steelman and Akin's numbers dropped while Brunner gained 12 points.

The winner takes on Democratic incumbent Claire McCaskill.

In the GOP primary for Lt. Governor, Peter Kinder wants to keep his job and leads the poll with 37 percent.

The pollster said that's weak for an incumbent.

But Kinder is still far ahead of opponent Brad Lager and Mike Carter, as well as potential candidate Luann Ridgeway.