Activists Pack Swing States In Final Drive to Break Tie

The Boston Globe -- With anxiety mounting over the seemingly deadlocked presidential campaign, activists streamed into the most contested battleground states Sunday for a final 48 hours of door-knocking, leafletting, and pleading, joining President Bush and Senator John F. Kerry in a whirlwind push for last-minute support.

From Florida to Ohio to New Hampshire, partisans on both sides expressed unease as they scoured the political landscape for evidence of momentum in the race, still tight despite $600 million in advertisements and the largest grass-roots effort to mobilize voters in recent memory. Publicly, both candidates claimed the advantage in a flurry of appearances. Bush made appeals to Cuban-American voters in Spanish, Kerry went to church -- twice -- and Vice President Dick Cheney made a long-haul dash to Hawaii to pursue four long-shot Electoral College votes in the traditionally Democratic state.

“All of the world is waiting for this country to find the path,” Kerry told a huge crowd in Manchester, N.H.

Bush, campaigning in front of equally massive audiences in Florida, declared himself “ready for the work ahead.”

A USA Today/CNN/Gallup Poll of likely voters released Sunday night indicated that Bush was leading Kerry nationally, 49 percent to 47 percent. In Pennsylvania, Bush was ahead, 50 percent to 46 percent, while Kerry leads in Ohio by the same margin. Kerry was also ahead in Florida, 49 percent to 46 percent. In Iowa, Bush was leading Kerry, 48 percent to 46 percent, and was ahead in Wisconsin as well, by a wider margin of 52 percent to 44 percent. But Kerry led by that margin in Minnesota.

Battered by political news and advertisements in a race that has churned for nearly a year, voters said they were ready for it to end but expressed trepidation because of the many inconclusive polls.

One Democratic voter, waiting in line to cast an early ballot in Florida, pronounced himself “terrified” at the prospect of Bush winning the state -- and the nation -- a second time. “Four more years of Bush is going to be really bad for this country,” Arnold Cohen of North Miami Beach said.

A Republican standing nearby expressed similar jitters, but for Bush’s performance. “I don’t believe the polls,” said Pinchas Schechter, waving a Bush sign.

On Halloween, the Kerry campaign turned superstitious, heralding the defeat of the Washington Redskins at home -- a harbinger of victory for the challenger in the last 17 presidential contests. And at the Kerry rally in Manchester, supporters cheered by far the loudest to cries of “two more days” a signal of their anticipation of voting day.

“That’s right -- 48 more hours, and we get rid of this guy,” said retired General Tony McPeak, who was Air Force chief of staff under President George H.W. Bush and is now a major Kerry backer.

Kerry sought to draw voters to the polls Tuesday by saying the nation’s hopes are “on the line.” He also tried to tap into the euphoria of the World Series victory of the Boston Red Sox by appearing on stage with the team’s general manager, Theo Epstein, and two of the owners, John Henry and Tom Werner.

“I’m finally now starting to really believe it -- the Red Sox won the World Series. But it’s been four long years, and I still can’t believe George Bush is president,” Epstein said.