In the final stretch of a presidential campaign, geography is strategy. So what have we learned so far from Obama’s final swing?

He delivered his closing arguments in Ohio, where the race either remains tight or, per the new LA Times/Bloomberg poll, there is now a 9-point gap in his favor. Then he moved to Pennsylvania, which the Obama campaign sees as McCain’s futile attempt to steal a blue state. Polls there give the Democrat a lead ranging from 7 to 13 points.

Then the real prize: two stops in Virginia on Tuesday. First in Harrisonburg, in a packed gym at James Madison University, where there were 8,000 inside and another 12,000 outside (some of them banging on the doors,chanting ‘Let Us In!’). Then on to Norfolk, at the baseball field at Harbor Park. Obama’s guest for the flight between the two towns: Virginia Governor Tim Kaine, one of his earliest endorsers and one of the leading contenders for the veep position that Joe Biden was handed.

Back at Obama headquarters in Chicago, Virginia is the state to watch next Tuesday night. “Where did we go the first day after becoming the nominee?” asked one senior Obama aide. “Virginia. We always believed Virginia was key to this. Remarkably, our opponent didn’t take Virginia seriously until about two weeks ago. He lives there and his campaign headquarters are there.”

The current polls put Obama ahead in Virginia by between 2 and 11 points. If the Obama campaign is correct, we could find out the direction of election night soon after 7:00pm, when polls close in the Old Dominion. If it’s a squeaker in Virginia, then much of the polling data will look spectacularly wrong.

Barack Obama's opening lines weren’t exactly vetted by his policy team, especially those working on climate change.

Then again, the event wasn’t fully vetted by his advance team either. Whose idea was it to hold an outdoor rally in Chester, Pennsylvania, on a cold October morning in the driving rain?

“A little bit of rain never hurt anyone, although I got to say, I saw Ed Rendell backstage and his teeth were chattering,” Obama began,referring to the Pennsylvania governor. “This is an unbelievable crowd for this kind of weather. If we see this kind of dedication on Election Day, there is no way that we’re not going to bring change to America.

“By the way, I notice that a couple of you have signs saying Stop Global Warming. This is probably not the weather to hold up those signs. I’m not a fan of global warming either, but it’s a little chilly today.”

Given the miserable weather, you’d think Tuesday morning would be a good time to curtail the candidate’s speech. Wrong! With just seven days to go, the Obama campaign is driving its message every single day. Come rain or more rain.

Launching into a riff on McCain’s tax plans, Obama once again tied his rival to President Bush. “John McCain has ridden shotgun as George Bush has driven our economy toward a cliff, and now he wants to take the wheel and step on the gas,” he said.

Clocking in just shy of 30 minutes, Obama delivered a full speech with Prompters, and the rain seemed to have no impact on the electric power lines to his lights or sound system. It only seemed to affect his wardrobe; after the event, the candidate returned to his hotel to change into dry clothes for some local TV interviews. His press corps stayed under a tent in a muddy quad in the center of Widener University.

The size of the crowd? 9,000 devoted and drenched fans. 

Heading into the final week of the campaign, every second of a candidate’s schedule counts. That’s why it seems a little strange that John McCain has been spending so much time driving lately. On Sunday, he spent more than two hours driving from event to event in Ohio. Yesterday, his commute time added up to more than three hours, including an hour drive from his campaign plane in Allentown, Pa., to an event in Pottsville, and then another hour from Pottsville to Hershey, where he’s holding a joint rally with Sarah Palin this morning. It’s not that driving is anything new to McCain. Back in the primaries, McCain spent a lot of time driving through Florida and South Carolina on his Straight Talk Express, but he was often multitasking, talking to reporters. In Florida last week, he spent a leg of his bus tour between Daytona Beach and Sarasota doing interviews with local reporters. But the past few days, it’s been only McCain and his advisers on the bus. Campaign aides argue the drives are necessary since not all campaign stops are close to an airport where his plane can land. But is it a good idea for a candidate to spend so much time commuting from stop to stop with so little time left on the clock before Election Day?