Barack Obama came to Chillicothe!
It was great that on Friday October 10, Barack Obama made a campaign stop in Chillicothe, Ohio. Below is the speech that Barrack Obama gave on the current stage of America, and his hopes for the future. We hope that all of you that have lost your jobs and lost your savings in the stock market will get out on November 4th and VOTE OBAMA!
"We meet at a moment of great uncertainty for America. In recent weeks, we've seen a growing financial crisis that's threatening not only banks and businesses, but your economic security, as well. It's getting harder and harder to get a loan for that new car or that startup-business or that college you've dreamed of attending. And yesterday, millions of Americans lost more of their investments and hard-earned retirement savings as the stock market took another significant plunge.
We need action now. The Treasury Department must move as quickly as possible to implement the rescue plan that passed Congress so we can ease this credit crisis that's preventing businesses and consumers from getting loans. And we also must recognize that this is not just an American problem. In this global economy, financial markets have no boundaries. So the current crisis demands a global response. This weekend, finance ministers from the world's major economies will meet in Washington. They must take coordinated steps to restore confidence and to maintain our financial markets and institutions.
There are many causes of this crisis, and it's very important that we respond using all the tools that we have. It's encouraging that Treasury is considering dramatic steps to provide more capital to our financial institutions so they have money to lend. This is not a time for ideology - it's a time for common sense and a politics of pragmatism. The test of an idea must not be whether it is liberal or conservative - the test should be whether it works for the American people. That's what we should all be focused on in the days and weeks ahead.
Barack Obama’s Family is from South Central Ohio
Genealogists researching the family of Barack Obama's mother have discovered that a number of relatives emigrated from Ireland in the 19th century and settled on land in several southern Ohio counties.
In rural Pickaway County, word has spread that the presidential candidate has plenty of distant relatives living throughout southern Ohio.
Records show that ancestors of Obama's mother, Stanley Ann Dunham, staked land in Ross, Fayette and Pickaway counties in the 1800s.
Family historian Roger Kearney came across the Obama relationship when reading an article that said the Democratic presidential nominee is a descendant of an Irish immigrant named Fulmoth Kearney.
He recently visited the Fayette County grave of Phebe Kearney, Obama's great-great-great-great-grandmother.
Blue-collar vote could give Ohio to Obama
Condon Jr. - U-T WASHINGTON BUREAU
CHILLICOTHE, Ohio – For DeAnna Wiley, reading her local paper is almost unbearably sad these days. A Realtor, she pointed to three full pages in the Chillicothe Gazette detailing the foreclosures in her hometown.
“It is just so scary to see that happening in a small town,” Wiley said. “Some of them I know, and it's real tough.”
Eight months ago, Wiley joined many of her neighbors in giving Hillary Rodham Clinton a big win in the Ohio Democratic presidential primary because she thought the New York senator spoke most clearly to working-class people and offered the best policies for bad economic times.
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In the congressional district that snakes from near Columbus, an hour's drive north, to near Canton and covers much of southeastern Ohio, Clinton beat Barack Obama by a staggering 31 points.
Today, those white, working-class voters are a key to Obama's chances to take this must-win state, without which no Republican has ever won the presidency. In large part because of the financial meltdown on Wall Street, the Illinois senator now seems poised to take Ohio. Strategists in both parties privately believe Obama currently enjoys as much as a six-point lead in the battle for Ohio's 20 electoral votes.
Wiley may turn out to be one of those former Clinton voters to back Obama. But right now she describes herself as “totally undecided,” even after she joined the crowd watching the senator give a speech Friday at the courthouse a few blocks from her office.
Wiley, the wife of a foreman on a paving crew, worries that Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the Republican nominee, would tax her husband's health benefits. And she criticizes him for “trying to change the subject” from the economy. But she's also bothered by some of what she calls Obama's “life choices,” such as his now-severed association with his longtime minister, the controversial Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
Mostly, though, Wiley said she's looking for something she hasn't seen in either candidate when they're discussing the economy. “We need decisiveness. We need somebody to lead,” she said.
The economy is Topic A, B and C in Chillicothe and everywhere else in Ohio. Everybody is worried about the stability of their banks and investments. And locally, the big Kenworth truck factory has laid off workers and reduced shifts. There are also concerns about jobs at the Glatfelter paper company, and a big consumer electronics company moved 500 jobs to China.
Campaigns pay attention to Ohio because it's a crucial swing state that usually picks the national winner. And they pay attention to Chillicothe because, in recent elections, it has almost exactly matched the vote in the state at large.
Chillicothe's Democratic mayor, Joseph Sulzer, was a big Clinton supporter in the primary and recognized the problems pulling her backers into the Obama camp. Concerned, he called Obama's headquarters in Chicago last week to beg for a visit by the candidate to seal the deal.
Sulzer's entreaties were answered, resulting in Obama's visit at the rally outside the Ross County Courthouse along with Gov. Ted Strickland, another former Clinton supporter enormously popular in Chillicothe.
“That is going to sway a lot of voters,” the mayor said. “That's how we are in Appalachia. You have to come and ask for our votes or don't expect anything.”
Sulzer said the reluctance in Chillicothe to vote for Obama could be blamed on a combination of some voters' hesitation to vote for an African-American and others not yet feeling they really know Obama. But he said both issues were addressed by bringing Obama to town to campaign.
Tom Burke, 65, who opened his popular Cross Keys Tavern on Main Street 35 years ago, said Obama's race is a big factor for many locals. “There is a very heavy 'Bubba factor' here,” he said.
But Burke is hearing lots of talk at his bar about the financial woes of Wall Street and believes the growing anxiety will help Obama, who, according to polls, is viewed as stronger on the economy than McCain.
One of those feeling the anxiety is Bob Stewart, longtime owner of Bob's Bootery on Paint Street. An independent, he hasn't voted for a Democrat for president since 1964 but said he hasn't ruled out voting for Obama.
“People are feeling very insecure,” Stewart said. “I lost a hell of a lot of money in the stock market. It's getting scary. I'll have to delay my retirement, and I'll be 71 in December.”
Stewart said he wishes McCain “would talk the issues instead of throwing all the garbage out.” But concerning Obama, he worries about “some of the associations he's had in the past,” specifically mentioning 1960s radical William Ayers, one of the founders of the Weather Underground, which was responsible for bombings in protest of the Vietnam War.
While Obama, 47, was a child at that time, he has worked on school projects and charitable boards in Chicago with Ayers, now a university professor who was named citizen of the year in Chicago in 1997. Ayers gave a house party when Obama was running for the Illinois state Senate.
Dottie Fay, who easily made the switch from Clinton to Obama after the primary, isn't troubled by such associations. Instead, the retired labor-relations consultant is irked by reluctant Clinton backers.
“For Hillary, I did phone calls, wrote letters, did canvassing, did volunteers, bought food, went door to door – anything they needed me to do,” said Fay, 61. Now, she's exasperated that some Clinton supporters are staying on the sidelines. “To put it bluntly, any Hillary supporter that can't make that switch, if they are women they need to put on their big-girl panties and get over it,” she said.
But there's evidence that Clinton backers are getting over it, said Peter Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute, which has shown a recent surge by Obama in Ohio.
“It is pretty clear that the Hillary voters have come home in droves,” he said.
Brown attributed the shift to concern about the economy, which he said is particularly palpable in Ohio.
“A month ago, John McCain was ahead nationally. Today, he is in danger of losing in a landslide,” Brown said. “It's not all because of the Wall Street meltdown, but it is very, very heavily because of that.”
