By Barb Shelly, Kansas City Star editorial page columnist

Barack Obama is gaining more votes in Missouri's rural counties than John Kerry did in 2004.

This is key. He doesn't have to win the outlying regions, just reduce John McCain's margin.

One of the first counties to report all results was Buchanan, where St. Joseph is located. Obama won Buchanan County by a total of 47 votes. George W. Bush beat Kerry in that county 52 to 47 percent, a total of 2,013 votes.

LaClede County in south central Missouri has also reported all its precincts. McCain won with a whopping 66 percent of the votes to 32 percent for Obama. But that's less whopping a total than four years ago, when Bush gained 71 percent of the votes.

This is only two counties. But if the trend holds, and the turnout is big in and around Kansas City and St. Louis, as expected, Missouri will vote Democratic for the first time since 1996.