Never Underestimate the Draw of Free Food ... and the Bars

As the candidates and their families wound up their last-minute campaigning and settled down to watch the results come in for today’s primaries in Ohio, Texas, Vermont and Rhode Island, FOX News rolled into Athens, Ohio and set up camp in Baker Center, Ohio University’s student center.

Go on and take a moment to let the irony of television's most conservative news network choosing to broadcasting from one of the most liberal campuses, and towns, in the Midwest soak in.

FOX News and Palestra.com are hosting a results watch party tonight for OU students. There’s a modest audience in attendance, with people filtering in and out while DJs played some nostalgic 90s tracks. Palestra is conducting interviews with students and streaming them live on FOX’s Web site. They’re also raffling off iPod Touch’s – I suspect this is why most of these students showed up. That and the free food.

Never underestimate the power of free food to lure college students anywhere.

But don’t underestimate us just yet. We’re not quite that shallow. OU has always been a very politically active campus. And this primary season things are no different, as students of all stripes have been campaigning hard for their chosen candidates for months.

Judging from campus activity, OU is following the national trend of the youth vote swinging for Obama. OU is very much an Obama campus.

However, the Ron Paul supporters were the ones to get things started last night. A group of them waving signs and cheering gathered in front of the College Gate to rally for their candidate. They also covered OU’s graffiti wall in pro-Paul messages.

The Hillblazers have also made their mark, however, especially in the past week when they brought in Chelsea Clinton to speak. Even John McCain was being shown some love today when some supporters gathered across the street from Baker Center earlier in the day.

Enterprising students have also gone to great lengths to make sure that their peers know where they need to go to cast their vote.

Tonight, however, the big story is the Democratic race. Clinton and Obama supporters have staked out territory at two of Athens’ numerous bars to watch the results come in. According to CNN, Clinton is posting a large lead in Ohio – but nothing’s official yet.

It could be a long night. And FOX will only be here in Baker until 10 p.m. Luckily for Clinton and Obama supporters, the bars won’t close until 2 a.m.