Barack Obama campaigned on the Ohio State University campus in Columbus today at St. John's Arena. Here are some pictures (warning, lots of them!).
It was a bitter cold morning, with wind chill below zero. This is around 7:15am, with doors opening at 8:30:
People aren't wearing Obama blue below--a group promoting "clean coal" (americaspower.org) was passing out blue t-shirts advertising "abundant, affordable, clean coal." These made good improvised scarves:
The coal group was also passing out free Tim Horton's coffee, so it can be said that the coal industry was helping to keep people from freezing at least.
These two are recruiting "faith captains" for the Faith Outreach Team, which is evidently aimed at delivering the Obama message into churches, synagogues & mosques. The image of Obama is on one of their "church fans":
Miss Ohio sang the national anthem:
Study while you wait:
Heisman Trophy winner Eddie George:
Mayor Mike Coleman:
Obama entered the hall nearly two hours after the scheduled 10:00am start time (delay in Cleveland):
This culture evidently greets its leaders by holding up glowing ceremonial objects of some kind:
Jumper:
Obama wave:
He gave more or less his standard stump speech, well received. Perhaps the biggest crowd reaction was when he launched into criticism of the Bush Administration, and particularly criticism of John McCain. He said that he honors McCain's service & that he is an American hero, but he is looking backward. Obama added a new theme to his stump speech at this point, as he related that McCain, who had evidently watched last night's debate (or his staff), this morning sent a barb toward Obama: "I have news for Sen. Obama, al Qaeda is in Iraq."
This was in reaction to Obama's statement last night, responding to Russert's hypothetical question, that he would take action if after withdrawing from Iraq, al Qaeda would have a resurgence there. Obama mocked McCain, saying that he could read the newspapers too, but (paraphrasing) "I have news for Sen. McCain--al Qaeda wasn't in Iraq until George Bush started a war there." That brought the house down.