Hot Contender: If looks count, Sarah Steelman may be your next governor

In the room full of dark suits, Hulshof's faded-copper hair and round, boyish spectacles are easy to spot. Tossing his head back in laughter, he stands just beyond a gauntlet of kids who are itching to put campaign stickers on anyone who wanders past. Later, Hulshof will give a rousing speech full of poignant imagery: his cotton-farmer father's weathered hands, his uncle Francis exchanging salutes with the first President Bush, and a young war veteran saluting Reagan's casket with an amputated arm.

Steelman goes on to talk about her record: "I am proud to be pro-life," she says, reminding the audience that as a state senator in 1999 she cast the deciding vote to ban "partial-birth" abortion. The bullet-point draws applause, but the extra attention only seems to make her more nervous. Steelman recovers her poise once she's back in familiar rhetorical territory: "It is the governor's job to fight and work hard for the people of this state. I'm committed to doing that with all my strength."

Later, Steelman says she lost her place in the script, and she regrets using one. "I'm embarrassed that I did so poorly that night." She says she performs better with few notes. "We've had a running discussion about that in the campaign."

Steelman is shy, and even in a one-on-one setting, she lets others do the talking. "It's hard for me to talk about the things I've done. David gets on me for it," she says. During the pre-dinner mingling in St. Charles, Steelman gets an assist from Willliam "Buddy" Hardin, a local activist and friend of her consultant, Jeff Roe. Hardin, a barrel-chested man whose suit lapels are covered with stickers, introduces her to several people. Steelman greets each of her new acquaintances with a long, earnest handshake. "She's not your traditional, kiss-a-baby, look-how-great-I-am politician," Hardin says.

Hardin acknowledges Hulshof's popularity, but asserts, "An informed primary voter has to look at electibility. A female candidate has some advantage, at least getting the door open for a closer look."

With her petite figure and chiseled features, Steelman has never wanted for attention. "She's an attractive candidate — physically," says Scott Alford, a Republican committeeman who lives in Steelman's rural part of the state. Alford is often amused to watch one local supporter's response to her presence. "Every time he sees her, he goes up, 'I gotta get my hug.'"

Flotron, the former senator, first met Steelman when she was a legislative intern. He says he didn't give much thought to her future in politics. "Understand that I'm male, and she's overwhelmingly attractive," he explains.

One anonymous commentator on the political blog PubDef labeled her a MILF. The commentary doesn't stop at such locker-room-style assessments. Several blog followers can't resist resurrecting an old Jefferson City rumor about her dalliances with fellow senators. Says Steelman: "It's just rumor-blogging. People will say anything and make stuff up."

Contrary to the image of Steelman as the capitol flirt, her friends and colleagues say she's a dutiful mother. As a senator, she skipped social functions to watch her sons play sports. (Sam, 21, and Joe, 19, are now away at college.) Reached at home one evening in March, Steelman says her after-hours routine began at her parents' home to help her mother, who has Lou Gehrig's disease. Then she stopped at the grocery store in Rolla and had just finished making dinner for Michael and David. Steelman planned to skip dinner herself; she wanted to squeeze in a workout.

"I used to be amazed at how she could do it," says Ken Jacob, a former Democratic senator whose office was next door to Steelman's for several years. Jacob is one of the few politicians who knew Steelman before her marriage in 1985. In graduate school at the University of Missouri-Columbia, they ended up in the same class on a primitive form of computer programming.

"I do recall being totally stuck and needing that class for graduation," Jacob says. "We were on the same team. Sarah saved me. She's deceptively smart. I think sometimes people don't give her the credit she deserves."

Steelman's consultant, Jeff Roe, boasts on his firm's Web site that he turned five Senate and thirteen House seats in northwest Missouri from blue to red. Should a Republican adopt a slogan associated with the Black Panthers? Roe didn't think it was a good idea. Steelman didn't listen. "I liked it," she says. "I'm the one running."

She says the slogan defines her career, which began in 1998 with a run for Senate against a sixteen-year incumbent. Democrat Mike Lybyer was chairman of the appropriations committee, and he had endorsements from the Missouri Chamber of Commerce and members of the Missouri Farm Bureau.