Obama begins in Virginia, just what I was hoping he would do. This is smart, very smart.

From The Washington Post:

Illinois Sen. Barack Obama chose Virginia as the starting point of his general election campaign yesterday, sending a clear signal to voters and Republicans that he plans to compete hard in a state that past Democratic presidential candidates largely ignored.

With Obama hoping to shake up voting patterns across the country, it looks increasingly as if Virginia will be a center of his strategy for amassing the 270 electoral votes he will need to defeat Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the presumptive GOP nominee.

"To go to a Southern state right off the bat and lay down a marker is very smart politics for Barack Obama," said Steve Jarding, a Democratic strategist who orchestrated the 2006 victory of Sen. James Webb (D-Va.). "Obama has made a statement to voters in some of these potential swing areas and the South that, 'I am going to bring my message here and I am not going to be intimidated by past voting patterns.'"
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A 5-25-08 post noted:

For the first time in decades, Virginia is shaping up as a presidential battleground as advisers to Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama lay plans to compete in the fall for the state's 13 electoral votes.

Virginia has supported a Democratic presidential candidate only once since 1948 -- Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964 -- but the recent string of Democratic victories has Republicans vowing to redouble their efforts in the state this year.
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As might be obvious from my catching up on my posts, I have been out of town a couple of days. My mother-in-law, a Republican, asked if Obama would carry Georgia.

I told her the margin would be much narrower than in 2004, but that he would not unless he put Nunn on as V.P., in which case he most definitely would.

But, I added, I will tell you one state that he will carry, and you won't believe this. What, she asked. Virginia, I responded.

In truth, my real feelings about Obama carrying Georgia were expressed to a close friend at a party last night who asked me what I thought about his being this area's coordinator for Obama. He had just been asked either Thurday or Friday. Of course I said do it by all means, and then told him that I thought that it is at least possible that Obama can carry Georgia. Not likely, but very possible. But even feeling this is is a big contrast with the past.