Barack Obama's open letter

Photo: AFP

America has made history by giving a major political party nomination to an African-American, with eighty thousand people attending the ceremony. Barack Obama, the Senator from Illinois, accepted it with gratitude and humility.Emotion was rife, African-Americans were crying from sheer joy generated by this unprecedented event, this experience they never thought would come in their lives.

During the Democratic convention, Hillary, Bill Clinton, Al Gore gave speeches and they were very gracious. Bill Clinton even said that he was also young and inexperienced when he ran for the presidency but people voted in his favour overwhelmingly.

Leaving behind the past differences, Clintons urged the people to vote for Obama and make him the next US president.The eight years Bill Clinton was in office, America was very prosperous but last eight years were a nightmare, Republican President G.W. Bush has taken the country to a perilous position. Never before people all over the world were so interested in American election. They are waiting, holding their breath, to see the results of the election and I think everyone is wishing Barack Obama to win because he seems to possess sound judgement, great wisdom, humility etc.

Barack Obama gave a clarion call to the people to become involved in the process of change which he is advocating and it would become a reality if they help him to win the election. I hope the people of America will not hesitate to vote for Barack Obama. I am surprised by John McCain's VP pick, he selected Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska. It seems unusual. Has McCain done it to attract women voters?

But the women of America are smart. They have seen enough in the last eight years, how the country lost its previous glory.So, we hope the people of America will not repeat the mistake they had committed eight years ago.

US election at-a-glance: 5 Sept

DAY IN A NUTSHELL
As pundits chew over John McCain's acceptance speech from last night, the candidates are on the campaign trail. Mr McCain shows off his new running-mate Sarah Palin in Wisconsin and Michigan, while Democrats Barack Obama and Joe Biden swing through Pennsylvania. The man in charge of an ethics investigation into Sarah Palin announces that his report will now arrive on October 10, three weeks earlier than expected.

KEY QUOTES
"They spent a lot of time trying to run me down…. What they didn't talk about is you. And what you're going through in your lives."Barack Obama gives his take on the Republican convention.

"I guess when you turn out to be profoundly wrong on a vital national security issue, maybe it's comforting to pretend that everyone else was wrong too." Sarah Palin criticises Mr Obama for saying that "the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated".

"Isn't this the most marvellous running mate in the history of this nation?" John McCain on Sarah Palin
"This ain't your father's Republican Party… this is a different Republican party." Joe Biden

"We conservatives have had a good time ridiculing the Obama phenomenon, especially its messianic feel… It turns out that we were dying to have basically the same experience." Paul Mirengoff, Powerline

NUMBER NEWS
An ABC News poll published today suggests that the public are not convinced that Sarah Palin has "the right experience to serve effectively as president".

According to the survey, 50% of respondents think Mrs Palin does not have enough experience, while 42% believe that she does.

When asked to rate Joe Biden's experience, 66% said yes and 21% said no.

However, Mrs Palin's perceived lack of experience has apparently not affected her popularity.
The same ABC poll indicates that 50% of voters hold a favourable view of the Republican vice-presidential hopeful

US rivals to make 9/11 appearance

The US presidential rivals, Barack Obama and John McCain have said they will appear together on the anniversary of the 11 September 2001 attacks.

The senators said they would take part in the commemorations in New York - the site of two of the attacks.
The two candidates said they would put aside politics to honour the memory of the nearly 3,000 people who died.

Hijacked planes were crashed into New York's Twin Towers, the Pentagon in Washington and a field in Pennsylvania.

"All of us came together on 9/11 - not as Democrats or Republicans - but as Americans," the joint statement said.
"In smoke-filled corridors and on the steps of the Capitol; at blood banks and at vigils - we were united as one American family.

"On Thursday, we will put aside politics and come together to renew that unity, to honour the memory of each and every American who died, and to grieve with the families and friends who lost loved ones."
The event at Ground Zero - site of the collapsed Twin Towers of the World Trade Center - will mark the first time Mr McCain and Mr Obama have been together since they were formally nominated as presidential candidates at their parties' just-completed national conventions.

The two agreed not to run television ads critical of each other on Thursday and Mr McCain's campaign team said they would not run any ads.

With the parties' nominating conventions over, the candidates have been gearing up for the last weeks of campaigning up to the 4 November election.

Barack Obama addresses the Democratic convention

Barack Obama has accepted the Democratic Party's historic nomination to run for president of the US in front of a crowd of some 75,000 people.

In an address at the party's national convention in Denver, he promised he would do his best to keep alive the American dream of opportunity for all.

"America, we are better than these last eight years," he told cheering crowds. "We are a better country than this."

Mr Obama is the first African-American to be nominated by a major US party.
In his speech at Denver's Invesco stadium, Mr Obama promised to reverse the economic downturn afflicting the US and restore the nation's standing in the world.

"We are here because we love this country too much to let the next four years look just like the last eight years," he said.

He also attacked the record of the Bush administration and his Republican rival for the presidency, John McCain.
"This moment - this election - is our chance to keep, in the 21st Century, the American promise alive."
Mr Obama criticised Mr McCain as out of touch with the concerns of ordinary Americans and said he had failed to help them on issues such as the economy, health care and education.

He also stressed that he would call for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq, whereas Mr McCain stood "alone in his stubborn refusal to end a misguided war", he said.

"I will restore our moral standing, so that America is once again that last best hope for all who are called to the cause of freedom, who long for lives of peace, who yearn for a better future," he said

He rejected criticism by the McCain campaign that he is a "celebrity", pointing to his family's past financial hardships, and said his rival should stop questioning his patriotism.

In a final rallying call, Mr Obama recalled the message of Martin Luther King, who - 45 years ago to the day - gave his "I have a dream" speech in his historic march on Washington.
"America, we cannot turn back," he said. "We cannot walk alone. At this moment, in this election, we must pledge once more to walk into the future."

Joined on stage by his family and running-mate, Joe Biden, Mr Obama was given a standing ovation by the crowds.

'Not ready'
Earlier in the day, Mr McCain ran a TV advert in which he congratulated Mr Obama on the historic nature - and date - of his nomination, saying it was "truly a good day for America".
The political truce was short-lived, however, with a spokesman for the McCain campaign issuing a statement following Mr Obama's address that dismissed his words as "misleading".

"Tonight, Americans witnessed a misleading speech that was so fundamentally at odds with the meagre record of Barack Obama," spokesman Tucker Bounds said.

"The fact remains, Barack Obama is still not ready to be president."
The BBC's Justin Webb in Denver says that this needed to be a serious speech by Mr Obama and it was.
One feature was that Mr Obama made frequent reference to the future, our correspondent says. The Obama camp knows that Americans are worried about Mr McCain's age and ever so subtly they are making an allusion to it.

Martin Luther King's eldest son, Martin Luther King III, had earlier told the convention that his father's dream lived on in Mr Obama's candidacy.

"He is in the hopes and dreams, the competence and courage, the rightness and readiness of Barack Obama."
Former Vice-President Al Gore also called on the Democrats to "seize this opportunity for change" and elect Mr Obama.

Linking Mr McCain firmly to the policies of President George W Bush, Mr Gore said it was vital that Americans changed course if they wanted to tackle a "self-inflicted economic crisis", protect the rights of every American and halt global warming.

Mr Gore added that the US was "facing a planetary emergency" and that the ties of Mr McCain and the Republicans to big oil firms meant they would not act to end the country's reliance on fossil fuels.

'Open convention'
Mr Gore's address, warmly received by the crowd, followed performances from singers Stevie Wonder, Sheryl Crow and John Legend.

The Obama campaign took the unusual move of holding the closing night speeches in the sports stadium to allow ordinary voters, as well as party delegates, to attend.

Mr Obama's much-anticipated appearance was the highlight of the party's carefully choreographed four-day event.

Questions remain as to whether Mr Obama can cement his standing within his own party, and reach out to those parts of the electorate that are yet to be convinced by him, the BBC's Matthew Price in Denver notes.
He was resoundingly endorsed by ex-President Bill Clinton on Wednesday, which may help consolidate his standing.

Earlier that same day, in a moment of high drama, his defeated rival Hillary Clinton cut short a roll-call vote to endorse Mr Obama's candidacy by acclamation, in a powerful gesture of unity.
The presidential election on 4 November will pit Mr Obama against Mr McCain, who will be nominated next week at his party's convention in St Paul, Minnesota.
Republican officials say Mr McCain has chosen his running-mate, but the person's identity has not yet been announced.
Mr McCain is due to hold a 10,000-strong rally in the swing state of Ohio on Friday, at which it was expected he would present his vice-presidential candidate.