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DENVER—One of the most unlikely characters at the Democratic National Convention might have been Abu Chowdhurj. On a hot afternoon near the heavily guarded gates of the Pepsi Center in downtown Denver, where convention-goers flocked to nightly sessions, Chowdhurj stood wedged between vendors hawking everything from T-shirts to teddy bears emblazoned with Sen. Barack Obama's image.

The middle-aged native of Bangladesh wore a plain suit with an American flag pin, and held up a white bumper sticker with bright red letters: "Rednecks for Obama."

Does Chowdhurj consider himself a redneck? "No, I'm a brown-neck," he told WORLD. But he sympathizes with the rural farmers near the small town where he owns a hotel in Missouri, and banded with a handful to take their political concerns to Denver. They're worried about things like gas prices and a faltering economy, Chowdhurj said, and they wanted to show that "rednecks like Obama too."