Democrats deny Obama giving up on Georgia

Barack Obama’s campaign says recent reports hinting that the Democratic presidential hopeful has pulled the plug on its Georgia campaign are woefully uninformed.

In the past few days both The New York Times and The Associated Press have questioned Obama’s commitment to the state given the campaign’s decision to end television advertising here.

While the campaign will not discuss specifics of its advertising strategy, national Obama campaign manager David Plouffe told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution during the Democratic National Convention in August that it had pulled advertising from most states during the Republican convention but would be back on the air in those states eventually.

Georgia state Sen. David Adelman (D-Atlanta), a member of Obama’s national finance team and his Georgia leadership team, said Friday there is an ebb and flow to campaigns, and not everything must be done at the same time.

“We have a strategy to win Georgia,” Adelman said. “It might not be the same plan to win Ohio, but we have a plan to win Georgia.”

The Obama campaign has more than 75 paid staff in Georgia, opened another office in the state Saturday — it already has dozens — and has spent more than $2 million on television advertising.

That, Adelman said, is not a sign of a campaign that is pulling back.

As the race between Obama and Republican nominee John McCain has tightened, both campaigns have sought to hone and adjust strategy.

Obama’s vow to compete in all 50 states always had a hint of hyperbole to it, but the campaign has put considerable resources into traditionally Republican states such as Georgia.

Plouffe also acknowledged Georgia was a tougher challenge for the Democrat than others, such as North Carolina and Virginia.

The payoff has yet to be seen in the polls. McCain maintains an average lead of 6.3 percentage points, according to the Web site RealClearPolitics.com, which tracks polling data. The most recent Georgia poll is nearly than a month old.