Obama pursues aggressive Southern strategy

WASHINGTON, June 30 (UPI) -- Aides say likely U.S. presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama is aggressively courting voters in the U.S. South, a region long considered hostile to Democrats.

Ever since the region consistently began electing Republican candidates 40 years ago, the Democratic Party has debated how much effort it should put into trying to sway white Southern voters. But now, even though its candidate is black, the campaign of Obama, D-Ill., is launching an major effort there by scheduling appearances is North Carolina and Virginia and by making ad buys other Southern states, The New York Times reported Monday.

"If you go in and look at the number of unregistered voters in demographic groups that are important to Barack's candidacy -- younger voters, African-American voters -- the potential (in the South) is just incredible," Obama deputy campaign manager Steve Hildebrand told the newspaper.

Recent Democratic presidential nominees have typically gotten about nine out of 10 of the votes of Southern blacks but since 1968 have been unable to get anywhere approaching a majority of white voters in the region.

Obama's camp hopes to change that by signing up unregistered voters, the Times reported, adding that the strategy relies on significantly increasing black registration and turnout.