Feature, Feb 19 – Hawaii will award 20 delegates in the first time their caucuses will count in the Presidential nominating process. As his home state, Barack Obama's sister has been campaigning for him there while Chelsea Clinton traveled to paradise to campaign for her mother. But the candidates themselves stayed in the mainland, where more delegates are at stake. Wisconsin voters will award 74 delegates, and like Hawaii, these voters are surprised to see how much their vote really matters this year.

Conventional wisdom last Fall was that Wisconsin's presidential primary would be mostly symbolic, all the delegates would be sewed up by the leading Republican and Democratic contenders weeks earlier on Super Tuesday. But events have played out differently, and now Wisconsin is viewed as a key battleground by both sides.

Wisconsin's Governor Jim Doyle, an Obama supporter, summed it up in a press conference early last week:

"Once again our State's gonna be in a position to play a very pivotal role, we're very proud of our primary and the history of it in Wisconsin it goes back a long way, but it was here where Kennedy won a very decisive victory over Humphrey, ah, it's where Eugene McCarthy knocked Lyndon Johnson out of the race, it's where Jimmy Carter showed that he could win in the North, we have a long history of very very competitive primaries and we're really looking forward to this one."

In Wisconsin's largest political rally since John Kerry was joined by rockstar Bruce Springsteen in two thousand and four, Barack Obama addressed a capacity crowd of nearly twenty-thousand in the Kohl Center sports arena in Madison:

"Where better to affirm our ideals than here in Wisconsin – where a century ago the Progressive movement was born. [cheers] It was rooted in the principle that the voices of the people can speak louder than special interests. That citizens can be connected to their Government and to one-and-other. And that all of us share a common destiny [pause] an American dream."

Hilary Clinton's campaign was active in the State as well, with visits from first daughter Chelsea Clinton, and a large rally featuring Bill Clinton at the Stock Pavilion (where Harry Truman had spoken during his campaign sixty years earlier) The former President seemed to see the Wisconsin primary as part of a final effort to close the delegate gap:

"We are now making a contest, we're doing the best we can…in this last week in Wisconsin she'll be here for two-and-a-half days before the end of the campaign. We are running hard in Texas and Ohio and she is leading in the polls in both States. And in Pennsylvania [applause] But we need your help."

Hilary Clinton herself chose to focus more effort on the eastern portion of the State. John McCain also hugged the eastern, more industrial part of the State, Mike Huckabee, on the other hand ranged widely across the State, telling a crowd in a Madison hotel that he hoped Wisconsin's conservative voters would add the State to his list of victories:

"Well ladies and gentleman, I hope that next Tuesday you will make a very loud noise with your vote, I'm counting on it [audience: "be assured"] but I'm counting on you going out and making sure that other conservatives like you in Wisconsin, people that absolutely are convinced that we've got to take a stand for the principles of the party and not just the party in name only. I'm asking you to get those voters out there and let's let the voice of Wisconsin be heard loud and clear so that in the future, the States that vote before you won't make your decision for you."

Huckabee, who has won nearly as many States as Clinton, is far behind his rival John McCain in delegates. But Huckabee told reporters in several Wisconsin appearances last week that he could still win and that the press should stop telling everyone that the race was over.

Voter turnout in Tuesday's primary may be somewhat suppressed by snow and ice storms and frigid temperatures, but many are also worrying that some counties have not printed enough ballots for what will certainly be an unexpectedly important primary contest.