For decades now, Democratic candidates running in Ohio - from president to mayor - have turned to one man for help, the one man who is probably the most popular Democrat in the Buckeye State - former senator and astronaut John Glenn.
This week, the Obama campaign will begin airing a 30-second TV spot in Ohio featuring the 90-year-old Glenn, who served in the Senate from 1974 through 1998. He was a popular senator, but what makes Glenn an icon in Ohio is that Glenn - who grew up in the tiny eastern Ohio village of New Concord - was one of the original Mercury astronauts and the first American to orbit the earth.
In the ad, Glenn draws on his Ohio roots to make the case for Obama.
"Growing up in Ohio, you learn to size up a person by his character; and that's why I am supporting Barack Obama,'' Glenn said. Obama, Glenn says in the ad, "means what he says; and that's the Ohio way."
Earlier, Glenn had done a radio ad for Obama that ran mostly on radio stations in small rural counties in Ohio.
You can see the Glenn TV ad here.
