Granite Gal?
Sarah Palin will visit NH this week for the first time since she was chosen to round out the GOP ticket. She is expected to stump in Laconia tomorrow, while husband Todd Palin will appear in Berlin, a struggling one-time mill town, and Littleton.
Barack Obama and John McCain are in a tight contest in the battleground, which was the only state to flip for Democrat John Kerry in 2004. Though state polls are close, McCain perhaps has a sentimental advantage; he won the Granite State's first-in-the-nation primary in 2000 and 2008 -- the only non incumbent to triumph in two contests. But Obama has political trend on his side; only 27% of NH voters approve of the job President Bush has done, according to a University of New Hampshire Survey Center poll released earlier this month.
Still, after a stunning victory in the Iowa caucuses, Obama lost the NH primary to Hillary Clinton, and the Democratic nominee hasn't been working the state intensely. He has visited once since locking arms with Hillary Clinton in Unity, NH, in June; he stopped in Dover, Concord and Manchester, 9/12-13. Obama has sent surrogates, however, including Joe Biden, who has visited twice since joining the Democratic ticket, and Michelle Obama.
McCain has stumped in the state four times since becoming his party's nominee, appearing in Exeter in March, Nashua in June, Rochester in July and Loudon last month.
NH offers four electoral votes, a modest kitty that might provide less urgent appeal to a Democratic candidate who is looking to turn blue bigger states: VA, CO, NC, IN and IA, among them. An Obama spokesman told On Call that Obama has courted NH intensely over the 20-month campaign and that his prior frequent visits there have allowed him to campaign extensively in traditionally 'red' states.
Palin and her husband will stump tomorrow in working class pockets of the state, where voters can expect to hear her talk about taxes (a favorite foe in this income tax haven, like Alaska) and guns. As a social conservative, however, she's hardly a perfect match for swing voters in the "Live Free or Die" state, where residents take pride in its Libertarian bent.
Obama is, of course, surging in national and battleground polls, but should the race tighten again over the next three weeks, he might be wise to turn his attention to the Granite State. Ask Al Gore.
(JENNIFER SKALKA)
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