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The number of uninsured Americans climbed to 41.2 million, or nearly 15 percent of the population last year. Experts blame the 3.5 percent increase on the slowing economy and the effects of the terrorist attacks. Plus, the cost of health care and health insurance has shot up….The nation's economic slowdown fueled an increase in the poverty rate in most states last year, with the greatest jumps in Utah and South Carolina….Sen. Wayne Allard (R-CO) "sponsored two bills requiring private Social Security accounts for all workers -- measures critics say contradict his recent pronouncements against privatizing the federal retirement program," the Denver Post reports…."Investors will soon be getting their third-quarter financial statements showing a sharp drop in retirement wealth, and some Republican Party strategists fear they could lose House and Senate races in November if stocks decline further this month," the Washington Times re-ports…."Some absentee voters in rural northwest Missouri are choosing between Republican Jean Carnahan and Democrat Jim Talent in a U.S. Senate race," the AP reports. "Oops! Make that DEMOCRAT Jean Carnahan and REPUBLICAN Jim Talent. The party affiliation of the two Senate candidates was reversed on thousands of ballots printed for Holt County."….Sen. Tim Johnson leads Cong. Thune in the SD Senate race by 3 points...A Marist Institute poll has Carl McCall (D) trailing New York Gov. George Pataki (R) "by about 15 points, a backslide from an 11-point difference in another poll last week," the New York Daily News reports. The Albany Times-Union notes, amazingly, that Pataki leads McCall "even in heavily Democratic New York City, where he is ahead 6 points."…..Virginia Democrats may move up their presidential primary date to as early as February 3, 2004 -- the same day as South Carolina, and right after
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