POLITICO.COM : Obama campaigns in Virginia and North Carolina, starting Monday October 17 - Two Swing States States that are must-wins next year even if Obama succeeds in recapturing lost ground in more traditional battlegrounds like Ohio and Florida

.

There is nothing more political than being President of the USA. Obama is visiting a "high school and community college, which have already dealt with teacher layoffs and might soon face more".

"Obama’s message to white, working-class independents: Not all government spending is bad — so why not support a president who uses federal cash to keep firefighters, cops and teachers on the job?"

POLITICO.COM
The Obama bus trip: A political guide
By GLENN THRUSH
October 17, 2011


The Obama bus trip: A political guide


Some excerpts :

President Barack Obama’s summer Midwestern bus trek was about reconnecting with disaffected independents, but the North Carolina and Virginia road trip that starts Monday is a more narrowly targeted exercise in 2012 politics.

The three-day bus tour, with stops in rural towns, suburbs and several cities, literally traces an escape route for Obama’s reelection campaign through two states he carried in 2008 that are must-wins next year even if Obama succeeds in recapturing lost ground in more traditional battlegrounds like Ohio and Florida.

White House officials say they selected the speaking sites — high schools, community colleges, a military base — because they exemplify places that would benefit directly from Obama’s $447 billion jobs plan. And deputy press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters on Sunday that talking about the foray in a strictly political context comes from “people in Washington, D.C., who are eager to ascribe a political motive to everything the president does.”

Yet the trip’s itinerary suggests nothing so much as his 2012 game plan plotted onto a map of the Upper South and with the American Jobs Act, which polls well among all but the most conservative voters, as a selling point.

“The main goals for Obama in North Carolina really hold true for Virginina, too,” says Mileah Kromer, assistant director of the Elon University Poll, whose September poll found the president with a 42/51 percent approval/disapproval split in the Tar Heel State.

“First, he needs to make sure black voters, who are the core here, are as motivated as they were last time,” says Kromer. “Second, he needs to reach out to working-class whites, who he’s totally lost. Third, he’s got to generate some kind of enthusiasm among liberals …who are his volunteer and donor base.”

........