Porter Shreve

 
In the days before the Indiana and North Carolina primaries, the Op-Ed page asked writers from each state to report on the race. Here are their final dispatches.

West Lafayette, Ind.

O N the stretch of I-65 between here and Chicago, a billboard proclaims “Jesus is real” on one side and, on the other, “Hell is real.” I moved here from North Carolina, so I’m used to roadside proselytizing. But since January of last year the Indiana Bureau of Motor Vehicles has been issuing red, white and blue “In God We Trust” license plates and by now, it seems, they’re on every third car.

I saw several of these plates over the weekend as I tagged along with one of my graduate students who has been registering voters and maintaining a lively pro-Barack Obama blog. I followed him from one split-level ranch house to the next, where he knocked on doors, talked about the gas tax and handed out campaign fliers. People were friendly, even Republicans who informed us that another group of Obama canvassers had stopped by the day before. The plan, according to campaign headquarters, was to hit each door three times, and on primary day to offer people rides to polling places.

It had been a rough week for Senator Obama; in the wake of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s latest comments, he’d lost his lead in most of the polls here and the race was tightening in North Carolina. But based on the 55 households we visited, Democrats supported Mr. Obama by a wide margin. My student said a lot of churchgoers are comfortable with the idea that you don’t have to go along with everything your pastor says, and he remained confident that his candidate would eke out a victory.

But another Indiana writer I spoke to thought the Wright affair would make all the difference. “Race is going to swing the race,” he predicted. “Folks have been handed the cover issue and now don’t have to say ‘I’m not voting for Obama because he’s black,’ but instead, ‘I’m not voting for him because he listened to a black preacher.’”

I talked to the father of another student, a family dairy farmer in north-central Indiana. He supports Mr. Obama, whom he feels “has the common person’s needs more to heart.” Still, he thinks Hillary Clinton will win the primary today.

“And what about November?” I asked. “Any chance this red state will go blue?”

No, he lamented: “Even Jesus would have a tough go as a Democrat in Indiana.”