Obama Watch: Ohio

Posted by Jeff Zeleny at 12:47 pm CDT

This afternoon, the Ohio Democratic Party announced that Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) will be the featured speaker at the state's biggest fundraising dinner of the year.

Add it to the list.

So far this year, in addition to campaigning for other Democrats from coast-to-coast, the junior Illinois senator has headlined Demomcratic dinners in Connecticut and Minnesota. Nebraska and West Virginia are on the upcoming list.

But it is the Ohio dinner, scheduled for June 3 at Vets Memorial auditorium in Columbus, which could be the most interesting. There is no state that Democrats are more hungry to win than Ohio, from the governor's race to the U.S. Senate race to a half-dozen Congressional races.

Earlier this year, when Obama was quietly in Ohio raising money for his Hopefund political action committee, Ohio Democratic chairman Chris Redfern said he struck up a conversation with Obama and invited him to be the big-name speaker for the party's dinner. Obama, not surprisingly, agreed.

At the Democratic National Committee's spring meeting in New Orleans last weekend, several state party officials said they, too, had tried to get Obama to attend their dinners. Next to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), they said, Obama is the biggest draw to sell tickets.

But several party leaders, who asked for anonymity so they would not offend Obama, said their wishes were not fulfilled. He has turned down -- or not gotten back to -- a handulf of requests.

It may be tempting to jump to the conclusion that Obama chose the always-politically-critical Ohio to advance a future political agenda of his own, but don't forget that he also accepted an invitation to headline the Nebraska dinner on May 6. And Democrats in the Cornhusker state are a limited bunch.