(H/T: Say Anything) having St. Louis for the 2012 Democratic convention, on the rationale that having the convention in Missouri would be the equivalent of painting a big electoral target on her back for all those awful, awful Tea Partiers. Which is… interesting. First off, I’m pretty sure that Missouri Republicans – which had a decent-to-good run last year (cemented control of the state legislature, held off Caranhan in the Senate, kicked Ike Skelton to the curb) don’t really need the excuse of a national convention to focus their attention on Senator McCaskill.

Second, at last look Sen. McCaskill is looking at an average 43.2%/46% approval/disapproval rating right now… which is, well, awful.  But it’s still better than Gov. Perdue’s, which is currently at 36.6%/47.2%.  For that matter, North Carolina Republicans are cheerfully aware that all they need is a win in 2012 to take full control of the state government (they flipped control of the state legislature in 2010): so if McCaskill’s (alleged) argument that the DNC’s a lightning rod is correct, shouldn’t she have taken the hit for Team Jackass?  After all, Jay Nixon’s popular enough, and that’ll probably be a help for McCaskell next year…

Moe Lane (crosspost)