Americans Turn Out in Droves to Vote
story.news.yahoo.com Politics - AP
By RON FOURNIER, AP Political Writer
WASHINGTON - President Bush (news - web sites) and challenger
John Kerry (news - web sites) fought to the wire in their long, bitter race
for the White House on Tuesday as Americans turned out in droves to
choose between their embattled wartime president and a Democrat who
vigorously questioned the invasion of Iraq (news - web sites).
"I've given it my all," the Republican said
after voting at a Crawford, Texas, firehouse.
Kerry, a four-term Massachusetts senator,
got teary-eyed as he thanked his staff for a
campaign's worth of work. "We made the
case for change," he said before voting at
the Massachusetts Statehouse.
Alongside the first presidential election
since the Sept. 11 attacks, control of
Congress was at stake as Bush's fellow
Republicans sought to extend their hold on
the House and Senate. A full roster of
propositions and local offices filled ballots
nationwide.
Pre-election surveys indicated the
presidential race could be as close as 2000,
when Bush lost the popular vote to
Democrat Al Gore (news - web sites) but
won the Electoral College (news - web sites)
count and the presidency after a ruling by
the Supreme Court gave him Florida. The
incumbent hoped to avoid the fate of his
father - former President George H.W.
Bush, who was bounced by voters in 1992
after waging war against Iraq and overseeing
an ailing economy.
Officials predicted a turnout of 117.5 million
to 121 million people, the most ever and
rivaling the 1960 election in the percentage
of eligible voters going to the polls. Voters
welcomed an end to the longest, most
expensive election on record.
"It's the only way to make the ads stop,"
Amanda Karel, 25, said as she waited to
vote at a banquet hall in Columbus, Ohio.
Legions of lawyers and election-rights activists watched for signs of voter
fraud or disenfranchisement. Complaints cropped up across the country,
but voting seemed to be going smoothly overall.
Voters appeared to be most concerned about terrorism, the economy
and moral values, according to exit polls conducted for The Associated
Press by Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International. The two
candidate qualities that voters cited most often were strong leadership
and bringing about needed change.
With strategies molded by polls throughout the campaign, Kerry
promised voters a new direction while Bush played up the risks of
change.
Bush, 58, never more popular than the weeks after the terrorist strikes
three years ago, constantly reminded voters of those days and cast
himself as a strong, steady leader in an era of unease. He called Kerry
indecisive and argued that Iraq was part of a global battle against terror.
"The people know where I stand," he said Tuesday. "The people know I
know how to lead."
Kerry, 60, a decorated Vietnam War veteran, questioned Bush's Sept.
11 response and often accused him of rushing into the "wrong war at the
wrong time" in Iraq. He said the president refused to recognize problems
at home and abroad, much less fix them.
On Tuesday, he criticized Bush on a spate of domestic issues plus Iraq,
and said whoever was elected would face a long list of problems.
"I'm not pretending to anybody that it's a bed of roses," Kerry said.
With nearly 1 million jobs lost in Bush's term, pre-election surveys
showed voters favoring Kerry over Bush on the economy and a majority
believing the country was on the wrong track. Barely half approved of the
president's job performance.
But most Americans also expected another terrorist strike, and they
trusted Bush over Kerry to protect the country. No wartime president has
lost on Election Day, though Presidents Truman and Johnson, both
Democrats, opted against seeking re-election while fighting unpopular
wars.
Turnout was the great unknown. Spending more
money than ever to target voters, Democrats enlisted
an army of paid organizers while Republicans issued
marching orders by e-mail to legions of volunteers in
the small towns and the farthest suburbs of
battleground states.
Vying for 270 Electoral College votes, the candidates'
playing field extended as far as two dozen states but
focused on fewer than 10, primarily in the Midwest and
Florida.
Despite spending caps, the candidates and their allies
spent a combined $600 million on television ads, more
than twice the total in 2000,
The legal fees piled up, too. Both sides braced for
recounts and other court challenges.
Democrats nurtured faint hopes of winning back the
Senate, where Republicans held a 51-48 advantage.
Only nine of 34 Senate races on the ballot appeared
competitive, seven of them in states where Kerry had
not seriously contested Bush.
In South Dakota, all eyes were on the race between
the Senate's top Democrat, Tom Daschle, and
Republican rival John Thune.
All 435 House seats are up for election, but Democrats
had little hope of a takeover. Republicans hold 227
seats, Democrats 205, with one Democratic-leaning
independent and two vacancies in Republican-held
seats.
Eleven gubernatorial contests were being decided
Tuesday, along with 5,800 legislative seats in 44
states.
Among the notable ballot measures was one in
California to devote $3 billion for stem cell research.
Several states had propositions that would ban gay
marriage.
___
The war on terror aside, there were fresh reminders of
the election's stakes. Eighty-year-old Chief Justice
William H. Rehnquist, cornerstone of a conservative
Supreme Court, disclosed Monday he was undergoing
radiation and chemotherapy for his thyroid cancer, a
sign that he had a potentially grave form of the
disease.
While neither candidate offered a specific exit strategy
for Iraq, Kerry asserted that the election of a new
president alone would persuade allies to take a greater
share of the costs and sacrifices born by the United
States.
The Democrats said he hoped to start withdrawing
troops from Iraq in the first months of his presidency.
Bush said such talk only encouraged terrorists.
The weapons of mass destruction Bush said were in
Iraq were never found and more than 1,000 Americans
have died in the conflict - 976 of them since he
declared an end to combat operations May 1, 2003.
Kerry voted against the Persian Gulf War (news - web
sites) waged by Bush's father. He voted in favor of the
2002 resolution authorizing war in Iraq. On the stump,
Bush called Kerry's a record of political expedience.
Bush blamed the Sept. 11 attacks for the sluggish
economy and said his tax cuts put the nation on the
road to recovery. Kerry noted that Bush was the first
president in eight decades to end his term with net job
losses.
Unabashedly conservative, Bush said he shared with
voters the values of faith and family. Kerry said his
faith and activities - hockey and hunting - put him in
the mainstream, too.
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