Obama And The Iowans

Reid Forgrave: Ask Jan Bauer why she's driving 17-plus hours across the country and staying in a Washington, D.C., hotel room she booked a week before the November election, just to be one of 4 million people hoping to glimpse the new president on Inauguration Day.

Ask her this, and the 51-year-old Ames woman will say what you expect:

That she feels Barack Obama exudes hope in a way no politician has since Bobby Kennedy. That she's been an Obama supporter since the improbable beginning and wants to see the end of the road. That our country is shifting eras, like when Franklin D. Roosevelt navigated us through the Great Depression or when Ronald Reagan changed our dark mood – "gave people back our patriotism," as Bauer puts it.

Then the chairwoman of the Story County Democrats will do something you don't expect: She will weep.