Thousands turn out for Obama in Iowa today

MOUNT VERNON, Iowa — Retired Iowa lawmaker Ro Foege watched in awe Wednesday as thousands of Barack Obama supporters, college students and voters of all ages waited outside a gymnasium for the president’s arrival.

Foege has lived in Mount Vernon for more than three decades, but he said the town of 4,500 outside Cedar Rapids had never seen anything like the scene at a Cornell College gymnasium where the president was to speak. Students camped out overnight and made T-shirts commemorating the visit, the first by a sitting president in the school’s 159-year history, a college spokesman said.

Teams of Obama volunteers handed out absentee ballot applications and gave instructions on how to vote early a few blocks away after the event. Foege got up early to put Obama campaign signs along Highway 1, and he marveled at how many downtown businesses — the gift shop, the boutique clothing store — hung giant pictures of the president in their windows.

“I can’t remember anything bigger or more important for Mount Vernon,” said Foege, a Democrat who retired from the Iowa House in 2008. “There’s a lot of excitement and a lot of enthusiasm, and it’s not just college students. It’s a nice variety of people coming to our little town.”

http://qctimes.com/news/local/government-and-politics/elections/obama-in-iowa-romney-s-economic-plan-a-sketchy-deal/article_809c1ab4-1881-11e2-bd27-0019bb2963f4.html