Obama, McCain Race to the Finish Line

Nov. 1, 2008— -- With all eyes on the approaching finish line of the presidential election, the two candidates charted separate strategies for making face-to-face pitches to as many voters in battleground territory as possible.

Democrat Barack Obama, whom most polls show with a sturdy national lead, was to campaign Saturday in Nevada, Colorado and Missouri. Then, in the campaign's final two days, he will attempt to seal the deal in large swing states -- Ohio, Florida, North Carolina and Virginia.

"We are three days away from changing the United States of America," Obama told voters Saturday in Nevada.

Republican John McCain, meanwhile, planned to spend Saturday in Virginia and then travel to Pennsylvania -- a state billed, despite an apparently sizeable Obama lead, as a must-win for the GOP ticket.

The Keystone State has not gone for a Republican presidential candidate for two decades. That voting pattern notwithstanding, the McCain campaign has been pouring money into Pennsylvania and staging upbeat rallies in an effort to clinch the state's 21 electoral votes.

The candidates' running mates are joining the sprint with heavily freighted weekend schedules of their own. Obama's veep pick, Deleware Sen. Joe Biden, was to spend Saturday and Sunday in Indiana, Ohio and Florida, while Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, the governor of Alaska, was scheduled to target Florida, North Carolina, Virginia and Ohio.

In her recent stump speeches, Palin has introduced new criticisms of the Democratic candidate, accusing Obama at a Florida rally Saturday of engaging in "cheap" politics by misrepresenting McCain's stance on Social Security.

"Barack Obama goes around promising a new kind of politics, then he comes here to Florida and tries to exploit the fears and worries about Social Security and Medicare for retirees, and that's the oldest and cheapest kind of politics there is," Palin said.