Jarding, Mudcat on Obama's Visit to Virginia

First, here's Steve Jarding in the Washington Post:

"To go to a Southern state right off the bat and lay down a marker is very smart politics for Barack Obama," said Steve Jarding, a Democratic strategist who orchestrated the 2006 victory of Sen. James Webb (D-Va.). "Obama has made a statement to voters in some of these potential swing areas and the South that, 'I am going to bring my message here and I am not going to be intimidated by past voting patterns.' "

I couldn't agree more with my friend Steve Jarding on this one; Barack Obama made a brilliant move by making those stops in southwestern and northern Virginia yesterday. As Tim Craig correctly notes in his Washington Post article this morning, "With Obama hoping to shake up voting patterns across the country, it looks increasingly as if Virginia will be a center of his strategy for amassing the 270 electoral votes he will need to defeat Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the presumptive GOP nominee."

That's right, my fellow Virginians: our Commonwealth is now officially IN PLAY for '08!

Now, here's "Mudcat" on CNN:

David "Mudcat" Saunders, a Roanoke-based strategist who has advised politicians on how to reach out to rural voters, said southwest Virginia is "a logical place" for Obama to start because he will need to appeal to those voters in other crucial battleground states as well.

"If Virginia truly is in play, it's a practical move for him because he can get the western Pennsylvania bunch, the southeast Ohio bunch," Saunders said. "It's the same region. It's the same bunch of people; they just live in different states."

He added, "These are the people around the country who decide the president of the United States, and they are neglected. The Republicans take them for granted, and the Democrats don't try to come get 'em. God bless Barack Obama for trying to go get 'em."

You're right, Mudcat: with Barack Obama as our nominee, and with Howard Dean's 50-state strategy firmly in place, Democrats aren't writing off rural areas -- or ANY areas -- this year. As well it should be for the party of the working people, just as Steve and you wrote in "Foxes in the Henhouse." Yes, it's most certainly time to "Run 'em Out!" :)

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