Strickland will campaign for Obama

Gov. Ted StricklandZANESVILLE -- Gov. Ted Strickland will campaign for U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) in Ohio, according Obama Ohio campaign manager Aaron Pickrell. Pickrell managed Strickland's 2006 gubernatorial effort and started with the Obama campaign this week.

In an interview with PolitickerOH.com, Pickrell said he expects Strickland, U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Lorain) and Michelle Obama to campaign for Obama in the southeast and across the state. Pickrell said supporters haven't been on the march yet because this is only Obama's second visit to the state, but he expects them to begin campaigning for Obama soon.

"I think we'll see a lot of him, a lot of Mrs. Obama, a lot of Sherrod Brown and Ted Strickland, and members of the Congressional delegation working for the ticket," Pickrell said.

Pickrell explained the two ways for Democrats to campaign statewide in Ohio. The first is the "Strickland Strategy," which is to campaign in all parts of the state. The second is relying on big victories in urban areas and trying to keep the margins of defeat close in rural areas, a strategy used by U.S. Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) in his 2004 presidential campaign.

"One is to focus on mainly urban areas, hopefully to ramp up turnout enough there and then don't lose as bad in other areas," Pickrell said, noting that it did not work for Kerry who won only 16 counties in 2004. "We're not going to just focus on urban areas -- if we were running that more traditional route, we would have gone to Cleveland today. But instead we're going to do all the urban areas and then go into the rural areas as often as we can too."

Pickrell said it's much more difficult to do a larger campaign with a presidential candidate who must campaign in dozens of states, not just Ohio, but that the wider campaign is necessary.

"The God's honest truth is that it's harder to campaign like this. You have fly to Columbus, drive for an hour, drive back. It's much easier to pop into a city, do an event and pop out. We're running a very aggressive statewide effort," Pickrell said.

The Zanesville appearance was Obama's second stop in Ohio in two weeks, a demonstrable message to the press that Obama isn't writing off the state.

ALSO on PolitickerOH.com:

• As Obama pushes faith-based initiative, he vows return to SE Ohio
• A closer look at Zanesville, site of Obama visit

CLARIFICATION: An earlier version of this article mischaracterized the campaign strategy of Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland, which is to campaign in all parts of the state, and not just relying on big wins in urban areas, as was previously stated.