MARTINSVILLE — Sen. Barack Obama, campaigning with former Gov. Mark R. Warner, came to Virginia’s most economically beleaguered city yesterday to say he will work to keep jobs from moving overseas.

Aiming to pick off a swing state and perhaps pick up a vice-presidential running mate, Barack Obama this morning opens a two-day swing across Virginia that includes a stop tomorrow in suburban Richmond.

The candidate with the carefully coiffed reputation for straight talk finally delivered some Saturday in the hospitable environs of Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church, and in the process took one of two necessary steps to win the voting affections of conservatives en route to Pennsylvania Avenue.

John McCain, like Bob Dole before him, is a Republican senator seeking to win the presidency in spite of himself.

For some Virginians, the presidential battle began Tuesday night at a music club on Broad Street in Richmond.

Check your pots for chickens. If no cluckers are found, it is only because the Straight Talk Express has not yet rumbled onto Pennsylvania Avenue and deposited its contents, an Arizona senator foremost among them, on the White House lawn.