Signs in front yards and stickers on car bumpers are apparently no longer enough -- Barack Obama wants his name emblazoned in huge letters on barns across rural Ohio.
The Democrat's White House campaign said Monday its volunteers were fanning out across the pivotal state -- which handed victory to President George W. Bush in 2004 -- to help supportive farmers paint their barns in his colors.
"This is an important election for all Americans, but for those involved in agriculture the differences between the candidates is (are) huge," Joe Logan, who has a family farm in Kinsman, Ohio, said in an Obama campaign statement.
Logan's barn was shown in a new campaign video undergoing a political makeover in time-lapse photography, emerging with Obama's red, white and blue horizon logo and name in huge lettering on its side.
"We think it's important to show our support for the candidate who listens to farmers and understands what it will take to make rural America prosper," Logan said to mark the launch of "Barns for Obama."
Democratic presidential contenders normally struggle for rural voters, and Obama lagged his primary rival Hillary Clinton badly among communities far from the bright lights of Ohio cities.
But this year, Republican runner John McCain has run afoul of many in the farm lobby with his opposition to ethanol corn subsidies, and Obama says he can repeat his successes among Illinois rural communities further afield.
The Democrat has appointed a "rural vote director," Doug O'Brien, who was formerly assistant director of the Ohio Department of Agriculture, to get out the vote.
