JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) -- Not long ago, Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt seemed to begin almost all of his public events by highlighting the economy.Since he took office in January 2005, Blunt would say, Missourians have created nearly 76,000, 87,000 or 95,000 jobs -- whatever the number was for that day.
But when Blunt held his first Capitol news conference in quite some time last week, there was no rosy economic introduction. To the contrary, he ended up answering questions about Missouri's recent job loses and its highest unemployment rate in 17 years.
"Obviously, I'm very concerned by it," said Blunt, who is not seeking re-election. "I'm not pleased with the high unemployment number or where we've been on job creation really over the past 12 months."
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