"It's not your typical neighborly, folksy Midwestern campaign."

I love the Midwestern knack for understatement:

[E]ven some Keyes fans acknowledge voters have been slow to embrace Keyes' lecturing style of speaking and his strong accusations - that Obama supports infanticide, for instance, or that he is a socialist who rejects basic American freedoms.

"It's not your typical neighborly, folksy Midwestern campaign. It can be off-putting at first blush," said Joe Wiegand, executive director of the Family Taxpayers Network, a group that helped organize a weekend Keyes fund-raiser with some of the state's most outspoken conservative activists. "I've personally become more comfortable with it, and I think other Illinoisans have as well."

***

Keyes said the people who think he is not talking about jobs, education and similar issues must not be paying attention. He said he has discussed them "persuasively and in detail."

Is "off-putting" is how downstaters say "f#cking repulsive"?

From The State Journal-Register