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Opinion: Even a trailing Barack Obama needs to eat sometimes

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SCRANTON, Pa. -- Candidates put up with a lot of indignities in a campaign, almost anything for a vote. Of course, no one made them run, but even while they’re eating in public the media or public hovers for a chance to ask questions or snap that ugly photo of their mouth open with cole slaw hanging out.

Which is why many candidates don’t eat in public, but prefer the fare back in their hotel room or a quick snack in the Secret Service SUV en route to the next stop.

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As Sen. Hillary Clinton was preparing to campaign here today, Sen. Barack Obama was meeting with voters at a diner and apparently pretty hungry.

He was preparing to down a late breakfast at the Glider Diner when a reporter caught him in one place and asked a foreign policy question. ‘Why can’t I just eat my waffle?’ he said.

On the day before the important Pennsylvania primary, the Obama campaign, behind in the latest state polls, chose to work the populous Philadelphia and Pittsburgh areas, avoiding the middle so-called ‘T’ section of the state dominated by rural and more conservative Democrats, who may be feeling bitter about Obama’s recent bitter smalltown remark.

At the diner, Obama also listened to a trumpet solo from a high school student. A waitress said the 17-year-old had been waiting outside the diner for several hours before Obama arrived.

On the other side of the diner, two high school seniors had skipped school to meet Obama and got him to sign passes saying ‘Excuse Colin!’ and ‘Excuse Joey!’

--John McCormick

John McCormick writes for the Swamp of the Chicago Tribune’s Washington bureau.

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