An Illinois law that caps awards in medical liability cases will come up for review by the state Supreme Court this week.

One year ago, Cook County Circuit Court Judge Diane Larsen ruled in Lebron v. Gottlieb Memorial Hospital that it was unconstitutional to limit or cap non-economic damages. Now the case is headed to the state's highest court.

The state Legislature approved the 2005 law in response to excessive medical malpractice lawsuits. At the time the bill was being considered, a number of physicians testified that they had either left the state or disbanded their practices due to runaway malpractice insurance charges. Physicians and surgeons in certain specialty fields have been difficult to find in many parts of the state. At one time, there were no neurosurgeons south of Springfield.

The liability reform law placed a $500,000 limit on non-economic damages due from physicians and $1 million from hospitals. These non-economic damages are often described as "pain and suffering" awards.

Plaintiffs are not limited in the amount of awards to cover economic damages such as medical expenses or lost wages.

Illinois Supreme Court justices rejected an earlier tort reform attempt as unconstitutional. This law is written differently, and it will be interesting to see whether the high court rejects this one as well or treats it as a new and different effort.

Missouri retained its status as a red state in terms of national politics, but only by the smallest of margins.

John McCain ended up with nearly a 5,800-vote margin over Barack Obama in the Show-Me state. That ends Missouri’s status as a presidential bellwether going back to the 1920s.

In statewide races the results were mixed with voters electing Democrat Jay Nixon as governor and Republican incumbent Peter Kinder as lieutenant governor. That should make for some interesting working relationships between Nixon’s staff and Kinder’s staff.

The 9th District congressional race was just as tightly contested with Republican Blaine Luetkemeyer winning his race over Democrat Judy Baker. He got 50 percent of the vote. She got 47.5 percent. There was a third party candidate, Libertarian Tamara Millay, who received 2.5 percent of the vote.

Interestingly, Millay got 8,100 votes. Baker lost to Luetkemeyer by 8,104 votes so she cannot blame her loss on Millay.

 Missouri has been back and forth in recent election cycles. Former Gov. Bob Holden, a Democrat, won that office in 2000 and the late Gov. Mel Carnahan, a Democrat who died in a plane crash days before the election, was elected to the U.S. Senate. His widow, Jean Carnahan was appointed to the office.

But when Mrs. Carnahan tried to win the seat on her own in 2002, she was beaten by former U.S. Rep. Jim Talent, a Republican who had lost to Holden two years earlier.

Talent lost his own re-election bid in 2006 when Democrat Claire McCaskill stepped up as a challenger in a big year for Democrats in Congress. McCaskill had lost her 2004 gubernatorial bid against Republican Matt Blunt.

There may not be much to make of all this, except that Missourians are almost evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats. Also — losing one high-profile election campaign does not seem to hurt a candidate’s chances in the next election cycle.

Missouri's likely voters have kept pollsters guessing whether they will support John McCain or Barack Obama.

I disagree with those political observers who say we'll know the outcome on Tuesday. It will, in my opinion, be Wednesday before the outcome is known. It could take longer than that if provisional ballots and other factors complicate the process.

The polls available on RealClearPolitics.com have been shifting back and forth between Obama and McCain. The newest results are within the margin of error.

The national vote is not so close. Obama leads in states where the combined electoral votes are sufficient to give him victory.

Usually the voters who support the likely loser get discouraged and their numbers decline. In this case, that may not happen because there are several other high profile races in Missouri such as the gubernatorial campaign and two hot U.S. House races.

If that keeps conservative voters committed to vote, the state could well go for McCain. As the underdog, he could be expected to win more of those rare undecided voters. (The rule of thumb shows underdogs get an average of two/thirds of the last minute deciders.)

When the poll numbers are within a percentage point or two, as they are in Missouri, that could make the difference.