Barack Obama and John McCain are embarking on a frenzied, multi-state blitz over the final days of the election campaign as the Republican candidate claimed the polls are tightening in his favour.
His campaign manager, Rick Davis, told reporters during a conference call on Thursday: ”We’re still fighting; we’re still behind; we still think we’ve got plenty of time to close the gap enough to make this election competitive and win it.”
The McCain team drew comfort from some polls showing Obama’s lead over the last month had started to shrink, albeit marginally. ”There’s no question there’s a closing in this campaign,” Davis said.
RealClearPolitics, a poll-monitoring website, showed Obama averaging 50% nationwide to McCain’s 43%. But the race is tight in battleground states such as Florida, where Obama has just a 3% lead.
Davis claimed McCain was ”coming back” among suburban males and Hispanics, a view conceded by Democratic workers on the ground, who contrast the huge turnout for Obama among African-Americans with a more ambivalent response among Hispanics.
In spite of Davis’s optimism, the momentum still appears to be with Obama. Viewing figures for his 30-minute political broadcast on Wednesday, for which he paid three networks an estimated $1-million each, show about one in five US households tuned in. That is high for a political broadcast, but fewer than for the presidential debates, all three of which attracted more than 30% of viewers.
At a rally in Sarasota, Florida, on Thursday Obama warned supporters: ”Don’t believe for a second this election is over. Don’t think for a minute that power concedes. We have to work like our future depends on it in this last week, because it does.”
A poll released on Thursday by the University of Texas showed that 23% of Texans identified the Democrat, whose Christian faith has been widely publicised, as a Muslim. Given that Texas is solidly Republican, that will not cause Obama any concern.
Potentially more alarming for Obama is a detailed analysis in the Orlando Sentinel of early voting in Florida. While it shows a huge turnout among African-Americans, young voters on whom Obama is placing high hopes have yet to vote. Although the young have registered to vote in high numbers, only 15% of those under 35 have voted so far, the worst-performing demographic group in the analysis.
If this trend were to be repeated on election day throughout the US, Obama’s vote would be seriously dented. – guardian.co.uk