Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton slugged out a neck-and-neck Democratic feud and John McCain sought a chokehold on the Republican race on Super Tuesday, a coast-to-coast White House nominating clash unique in United States history.
New Yorkers kicked off the 24-state nationwide primary bonanza before dawn, with a huge turnout expected, especially among energised Democrats, before last polls close in California on Tuesday night (4am GMT on Wednesday).
Senator Clinton (60) voice husky from fatigue, vowed to fight on, even through polling day, as opinion surveys picked up a surge by Obama, the 46-year-old senator vying to deny her a return to the White House.
”There are a lot of people who worry that the president just doesn’t pay attention,” Clinton told CNN on Tuesday.
”I want them to know that I get it and I’ll be there for them if they’re willing to go out and vote for me today [Tuesday].”
Obama, quoting civil rights icon Martin Luther King about ”the fierce urgency of now”, glowed with energy as he rocked boisterous campaign rallies on Monday in battlegrounds New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts.
”I might be skinny, but I’m tough. I come from Chicago, and we know how to play politics,” he said, steeling himself for a bout that some experts believe could drag on until the Democratic convention in August.
After a clutch of single-state contests, Super Tuesday embraces millions of voters from across racial, religious, social and income barriers, in states as diverse as liberal Massachusetts and parched Arizona in the south-west.
It is the toughest test yet in the most expensive, intense, prolonged and unpredictable White House race, which will see Democrats eventually break a deadlock and pick the first black or woman presidential nominee.
But barring a major surprise, Clinton or Obama are tipped to emerge from Tuesday’s vote still locked in a virtual dead-heat.
‘So much baggage’
The first voter to emerge from one New York City polling station said he had voted for Obama.
”For so many reasons. I think Hillary has so much baggage, I want a black president whose middle name is Hussein and he seems like a great guy,” said Stuart Bernstein (47), a literary agent.
But two Hispanic women said they had plumped for Clinton, who they saw as a safe pair of hands and a friend of Latino and other immigrant groups.
”She has experience. We like her. She can be a good president,” said Elena Zingaretti, a 66-year-old Colombian-born domestic worker.
Clinton went into the clash after pocketing wins in contests in New Hampshire and Nevada, while Obama took the lead-off Iowa caucuses and thumped her in the South Carolina primary.
Super Tuesday states allocate more than half the Democratic delegates and almost half of Republican delegates at party conventions in August and September, which formally nominate candidates for November’s general election.
There are Democratic contests in 22 states, Republican match-ups in 21 states and 19 states are holding nominating clashes for both parties.
The former first lady was to vote early on Tuesday in her home state of New York, while Obama was returning to his patch in Chicago to watch results roll in.
The cliffhanger Democratic race contrasted with signs that McCain, a Vietnam War hero, would all but settle the Republican nominating fight on Tuesday to complete one of the most staggering comebacks in recent US political history.
”I’m guardedly optimistic,” the Arizona senator told reporters in Massachusetts, the home state of his top rival, Mitt Romney, who hoped late polls showing him moving in California would stall McCain’s momentum.
A USA Today national poll gave McCain a 42% to 24% lead over Romney, with former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee on 18%.
A clutch of polls on Monday showed the Democratic race a virtual dead-heat.
Clinton clung to a 45 to 44 point lead in a USA Today/Gallup national poll. A CBS/New York Times poll had the race deadlocked at 41%.
Democrats are also hosting two additional primaries starting on Tuesday: one in American Samoa and one for ”Democrats abroad”. Voting for expat Democrats is taking place across the world until February 12, as well as online.
In Jakarta, where Obama spent part of his youth, Democrats handed him a win over Clinton in the first result announced, party officials said. — AFP
