Obama, McCain solidify campaign themes

With less than three weeks to go before the polls, the trajectory of the presidential campaign was apparent Friday in the candidates8217; schedules. Republican John McCain was defending Florida, which every GOP White House occupant in modern times has won, but where McCain trails in recent polls. And Democrat Barack Obama was campaigning in Virginia, which has gone Republican for decades. Both candidates pursued themes they have accented since Wednesday8217;s final debate.

For Obama, that meant tying the Arizona senator to an unpopular President Bush. 8220;Sen. McCain doesn8217;t look like President Bush; he doesn8217;t have that Texas accent like President Bush. And I don8217;t blame Sen. McCain for all of President Bush8217;s mistakes,8221; Obama said, addressing more than 8,000 people at the Roanoke Civic Center. 8220;After all, he8217;s only voted with George Bush 90 of the time.8221; For McCain, it meant trying to cast the Illinois senator as a tax-and-spend Democrat who should not be trusted to guide the nation out of its economic straits. 8220;Senator Obama claims that he wants to give a tax break to the middle class, but not only did he vote for higher taxes on the middle class in the Senate, his plan gives away your tax dollars to those who don8217;t pay taxes,8221; McCain told about 6,000 supporters at Florida International University in Miami. 8220;That8217;s not a tax cut, that8217;s welfare,8221; he declared as the crowd booed loudly. While McCain was trying to shore up his standing in Florida, Obama was making his seventh trip to southwest Virginia, a Republican stronghold, in the first of several days to be spent in states that voted for Bush. Every Virginia poll this month has shown Obama ahead in the state. The two campaigns together spent 3 million advertising here the first week of October.

But Obama faces a challenge among the working-class whites of Appalachia and in the military-dependent areas. Automated telephone calls have sought to link Obama to 1960s radical William Ayers, and the state GOP chairman compared him to Osama bin Laden.

On Friday, Obama sought to open a new line of distinction with McCain. On the stump and in a new television ad running in key electoral states, he accused McCain of planning to finance his healthcare plan by cutting 882 billion out of Medicare, and of voting against protecting the federal health program for the elderly 40 times while in Congress.