Gun-toting Blackwell heading to Strickland Country

Early Thursday morning, after tonight's Ken Blackwell-Ted Strickland debate at the University of Cincinnati is but a pleasant memory, Blackwell will board a bus in Cincinnati for a three-day tour of southern and southeast Ohio, smack dab in the heart of Strickland's present and former congressional districts.

Joining him on the 13-stop tour will be Larry Pratt, president of Gun Owners of America. Apparently, Pratt and Blackwell will be toting rifles, as the three-day trip ends Saturday afternoon with a "Cowboy Shoot" at the Tusco Rifle Club on Midvale Mine Road in Dennison, a little town in Tuscarawas County.

For the unarmed among you, a "cowboy shoot" is a shooting contest where the contestants compete with single-action pistols, pistol-calibre rifles or double-barrel shotguns. The targets are usually big metal plates.

No actual cowboys will be shot.

It's probably about time Blackwell got down to this part of the world, trailing badly in the polls and running out of clock. the area of southern and eastern Ohio he'll cover in the three-day trip is the least densely populated area of the state, but it is one that has been essential for Republican candidates running for statewide office since the days of former governor Jim Rhodes - whose home county of Jackson will get a visit from Blackwell Friday.

Given the fact that Strickland has persauded those conservative voters to elect him in six of the last seven congressional elections, Blackwell certainly needs to have some face time there, cowboy shoot or no cowboy shoot.