Obama draws huge crowds as US vote nears

WASHINGTON: Barack Obama drew massive crowds to some of his final campaign rallies as Americans appeared likely to cap the longest, most expensive
White House campaign ever by electing the Democrat as the first black US president on Tuesday.

Republican John McCain, looking to score the United States' biggest political upset in 60 years, assured supporters Sunday that the race is tightening.

"I've been in a lot of campaigns. I know the momentum is there," McCain said at a rally in Pennsylvania, traditionally a Democratic-leaning state that he must wrest from Obama.

But polls show Obama leading in Pennsylvania and other key states. Nationally, several major polls show Obama with a 7-8 percentage point advantage.

With the economy in turmoil and the approval levels of President George W. Bush, a Republican, at near-record lows, Democrats have high hopes not only of capturing the White House, but also expanding their majorities in both chambers of Congress.

A victory would mark a stunning rise for the 47-year-old Obama, who was little known nationally before being elected as a senator from Illinois four years ago. He began running for president just two years later.

Obama exuded confidence on Sunday. "The last couple of days, I've been just feeling good," he told 80,000 gathered to hear him, and singer Bruce Springsteen, in Cleveland, in the pivotal state of Ohio. "The crowds seem to grow and everybody's got a smile on their face. You start thinking that maybe we might be able to win an election on November 4th."

An earlier rally in Columbus, Ohio, drew an estimated 60,000 people.

Obama has capitalized on anti-Republican sentiment, linking McCain to the unpopular Bush. McCain's campaign has tried to cast Obama as too inexperienced, too liberal and too tainted by associations with unsavory characters.

The electoral map clearly favors Obama. To be elected, a candidate must win at least 270 of the 538 electoral votes distributed to states roughly in proportion to their population. In most cases, the candidate who wins a plurality of votes in a state wins all of that state's electoral votes.

Obama is favored to win all the states Democrats captured in 2004, when Bush defeated Sen. John Kerry. That would give him 251 votes. He is leading or tied in several states won by Bush, giving him several possibilities for reaching the 270 votes, winning a big Bush state like Ohio or Florida, or a combination of smaller ones.

Obama campaign manager David Plouffe said Sunday that the Democrat has expanded the electoral map by aggressively campaigning in traditional Republican states like Virginia, Colorado and Nevada.

"We did not want to wake up on the morning of Nov. 4 waiting for one state. We wanted a lot of different ways to win this election," Plouffe said on Fox television.

McCain has to hold on to as many Bush states as possible and try to capture Pennsylvania. A defeat there, or a loss in Ohio, Florida or Virginia, would make it extremely unlikely he could collect the 270 votes.

Rick Davis, McCain's campaign manager, said on Fox that Pennsylvania will be "the most important state to watch" on Tuesday.

McCain planned to return to Pennsylvania before heading home to Arizona on election day. On Monday, he was targeting states won by Bush: Florida, Virginia, Indiana, New Mexico and Nevada.

Obama on Monday was also targeting Bush states: Florida, North Carolina and Virginia.

McCain's advisers noted that the Arizona senator has come from behind before. A year ago, McCain's campaign appeared all but dead before he rebounded to win the New Hampshire primary and go on to capture the Republican nomination.

McCain held his campaign's final town hall-style event Sunday in New Hampshire. "I come to the people of New Hampshire to ask them to let me go on one more mission," he said.

There are still many uncertainties that could affect Tuesday's outcome, including how many traditionally Democratic voters reject Obama because of his race, whether Obama's candidacy will spark a huge boost in voting by African-Americans and young people, and which side will do the better job getting out the vote.

Republicans on Sunday launched the last stage of its vaunted "72-hour program," when volunteers descend on competitive states for the final stretch. Democrats unleashed their "persuasion army'' of backers scouring their own backyards to encourage people to back Obama in the campaign's waning hours.

More than 10,000 Obama volunteers in Ohio were knocking on doors and were expected to hit their one-millionth home Sunday after a five-day push.

Also adding to the uncertainty is the early voting allowed in some states. About 27 million absentee and early votes were cast in 30 states as of Saturday night, more than ever. Democrats outnumbered Republicans in pre-election day voting in key states.

That has Democrats, and even some Republicans, privately questioning whether McCain can overtake Obama, even if Republicans turn out in droves on Tuesday. Obama may already have too big of a head start in critical states like Nevada and Iowa, which Bush won four years ago.

Obama has had a huge fundraising advantage over McCain. But McCain and the Republican Party dramatically ramped up their spending in the campaign's final days and now are matching Obama ad for ad, if not exceeding him, in key battleground states.

Together, the two presidential candidates have amassed nearly $1 billion, a stratospheric number in a campaign of record-shattering money numbers. Depending on turnout, $1bn means nearly $8 for every presidential vote, compared with $5.50 in 2004.

The campaigns were using the money for a crush of television ads and phone calls targeting voters in swing states.

In a new ad, Obama highlighted Vice President Dick Cheney's support for McCain. The ad features Cheney, an extremely unpopular figure among the Americans, at an event Saturday in Wyoming, saying: "I'm delighted to support John McCain."

The Republican Party, meanwhile, rolled out battleground phone calls that include Hillary Rodham Clinton's criticism of Obama during the Democratic primary. Promoting herself as the candidate with enough experience to take on McCain, she is heard saying: "In the White House, there is no time for speeches and on-the-job training. Sen. McCain will bring a lifetime of experience to the campaign, and Sen. Obama will bring a speech that he gave in 2002."

Clinton fought a tough primary battle against Obama, but is supporting his candidacy and has campaigned for him. A Clinton spokeswoman said she disapproves of the ad.

Pennsylvania Republicans also unveiled a TV ad featuring Obama's former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, declaring "God damn America!" in a sermon.

During the primaries, Obama was kept on the defensive about his relationship with Wright, but McCain said he would not make the pastor an issue in the general election campaign.