Firsthand Experience On the Labor Day Weekend Festival Circuit

I've attended 2 parades in 2 days (marching with the K of C in one of them) in North-Central Ohio, and from what I'm hearing, Gov. Palin is playing very well in this part of Ohio.


UPDATE
See also these reports at The Corner:
How Will Palin Play? (The View from Ohio)

Last night I attended a 50th wedding anniversary party in Austintown, Ohio, just outside of Youngstown. This is Reagan Democrat terrirtory — working class, church-going, union member types. Given this, it was interesting to hear what people had to say about Sarah Palin — and it was almost uniformly positive, very positive. I heard people explain that they were inspired by her life story and career, and that having her on the ticket made the race exciting. Said another — who had never voted Republican until he pulled the lever for Bush in 2004, but was now committed to McCain — "she's just like us." I'm well aware that those with whom I spoke may not be representative, but it was interesting nonetheless.

Report From The Battleground

Just wanted to give you an update from Central/SE Ohio. I just got back from our party's headquarters in [REDACTED] County... As the party's volunteer Executive Director (we are all volunteers from our Chairman on down), I sometimes try to spend a couple of hours on Sunday afternoons following up on phone calls and other mundane party business. I picked Sundays because I can bring in my daughter with me and it's usually quiet. Not today. The voicemail was full with people ready to volunteer and we had numerous people stopping in to see if we had any signs with Palin's name on them yet.

This county has been lukewarm about McCain at best. Romney had an excellent volunteer organization in the county and many evangelicals liked Huckabee. It hasn't helped that the county (which was a critical exurban ring county for Bush in 04) has been almost completely ignored by the McCain campaign. There has been literally zero grassroots prep by the campaign and they've made critical mistakes (like putting in elected officials as county chairmen) that the Bush campaign avoided. This pick, however, has electrified the base. I hope that others are seeing the same thing in their counties...

Luntz & Palin

... Here in Ohio and with my family in Indiana, she does seem to be playing well though. All the middle age secretaries in our office watched her speech on Friday. Needless to say, their interest was sparked.

How Palin Is Playing - Another Report from Ohio

We spent the afternoon at the Canfield Fair today, and found more anecdotal evidence that the Palin pick is playing well...