Obama, ex-rivals to stump in Florida
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Barack Obama plans a full-court press on Florida, the scene of Democratic presidential nightmares, with the help of former rivals Hillary Clinton and Bill Richardson.
Obama, his wife, Michelle, Clinton, and Richardson will crisscross the state today, tomorrow, and Wednesday to encourage voters to cast ballots early, his campaign announced yesterday. That could be one way to avoid the long lines and other problems on Election Day that became a central part of the meltdown in 2000 that many Democrats believe cost Al Gore the White House.
Democrats have decisively won the fight to register new voters in Florida, as early voting starts today, extending their enrollment lead by almost 350,000 voters since January and nearly 200,000 in the past 10 weeks, according to new data released yesterday.
As of the Oct. 6 registration deadline, Democrats led Republicans by 657,775 voters, or 5.8 percent of the state's more than 11.2 million voters, according to figures posted by the state's Division of Elections on its website.
Florida voters had requested more than 1.6 million absentee ballots, with registered Republicans requesting about 220,000 more ballots than Democrats, according to numbers compiled by both political parties.
Florida is among several battleground states where voters can go to the polls well in advance of Nov. 4.
In Georgia, Iowa, North Carolina, and Ohio, voters in heavily Democratic areas are requesting and submitting ballots in large numbers. In Florida, Republicans hold an edge, while in Indiana, absentee voting has been split among Republican and Democratic areas.
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"I will keep small business taxes where they are, help them keep their costs low, and let them spend their earnings to create more jobs," McCain said at a rally at Otterbein College.
Joe Wurzelbacher, the Holland, Ohio, plumber, was in New York making the media rounds with his family, but McCain has been evoking his spirit after making him the focal point in final presidential debate between McCain and Barack Obama.
While some analyses showed Wurzelbacher faring better under Obama's plan than McCain's, the Arizona Republican has lashed out at Obama for saying that while his policies may force some workers to pay higher taxes, they were designed to "spread the wealth around" by targeting only families making over $250,000 annually.
"Senator Obama is more interested in controlling who gets your piece of the pie than he is in growing the pie," said McCain, who drew cheers when he proclaimed he was campaigning "on behalf of Joe the plumber and Rose the teacher and Phil the bricklayer and Wendy the waitress."
Obama, in North Carolina, said he is the one worried about "the cops and firefighters who keep us safe . . . the waitresses who work double shifts, the cashiers at
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