Obama pushes middle class, Romney focuses on economy

Toledo, OHIO - Hürriyet Daily News

US President Obama walks on stage to deliver a speech at a rally in Virginia. The tie between Obama and Romney has not yet been broken, polls show. EPA photo

With just a day left to election day, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney intensified their campaigns in a last ditch effort to garner more votes from undecided groups, as the latest polls show that the race is still very tight in four battleground states.

The last messages Obama delivered during successive rallies in mid-western Ohio, Iowa and elsewhere focused on the change he started in 2008, and how to respond to the needs and expectations of middle class Americans. Romney, on the other hand, continued to criticize Obama’s handling of the economy, underlining that the U.S. needed a president who understood business, in an obvious reference to himself as a successful businessman.

Each man has visited up to four battleground states every day since Friday, with Obama focusing on Ohio and Iowa, and Romney focusing on Ohio and Florida. Both scheduled multiple stops in Ohio, where they plan to hold massive closing rallies with the participation of stars like Bruce Springsteen and Stevie Wonder.

Recent polls show the tie between Obama and Romney has not yet been broken in Ohio, Colorado, Florida or Virginia, whose final decisions will decide who becomes the next president.

The closing arguments of both leaders are not hugely different to the main messages of their campaigns. However, Obama has reappeared as the leader appealing for “change” in the U.S., this time emphasizing education, an issue thought to be critically important for the middle class and women.

“So, let me tell you about change over the next four years. Change is a country where every young American has a shot at a good education,” he addressed a crowd gathered to hear him in Lima, Ohio.

“Don’t tell me the students who can’t afford college should just borrow money from their parents. That was not an option for me; it probably wasn’t an option for a whole lot of you,” he added, openly challenging Republicans’ suggestion. Cutting increases in tuition fees by half over the next 10 years, recruiting 100,000 math and science teachers, and training 2 million Americans in community colleges are other promises that Obama is making.

Apart from education, continuing health reform and eliminating tax cuts for top income earners
are among the messages that would help Obama to reach out to the middle class. That would also help him reassure the endorsement of women’s groups, who are much more interested in education, health and other social issues than men. The president won 56-43 in women votes against his rival John McCain in 2008.

Romney: Business is my job

Republican politicians’ gaffes on “legitimate rape” or old-fashioned masculine approaches on issues of abortion and access to contraception also help Obama to reach out women –both black and white - with polls showing that 39 percent of women in 12 battleground states see abortion as the top issue concerning their body and health.

Obama’s other support groups, Afro-Americans and Hispanics, will also vote in full for the president.
Romney, on the other hand, is trying to promote the best thing he knows: doing business. He is seeking to drum Obama’s perceived inability in business into the heads of the electorate by arguing that the president failed to fulfill his promises to create a sufficient number of jobs and could not generate a growing economy to make the America the world’s strongest country again. Romney thus describes himself as the most appropriate candidate to run the economy, given his background in business.

Mocking Obama’s plan to establish a Secretary of Business, the Republican nominee says the U.S. does no need a secretary of business but rather a president who understands business.

That is perhaps the best reason why the CEOs of a number of companies are sending out letters encouraging their workers to support Romney in the election, which they say is not only for the advantage of the company but also for the workers and, at the end of the day, for America.