WASHINGTON (AFP) — Barack Obama was to move his campaign to the industrial Midwest Sunday as the Democratic nominee and his Republican rival, John McCain, tore into one another over the reeling US economy.
Obama was to speak at a rally in Detroit one day after the US Senate approved 25 billion dollars in loan guarantees for the financially strapped US auto industry.
The bill, which passed the House of Representatives on Wednesday, contains the first loan guarantees for US carmakers since Congress approved a similar 675 million dollar measure for Chrysler in 1980.
On Saturday, Obama went after Republican nominee McCain at a rally in North Carolina, saying he had come across in the first of three debate clashes Friday as out of touch on the economic and national security perils facing America.
McCain spent most of the day Saturday holed up in his campaign office and apartment outside Washington making a flurry of calls designed to help seal a 700 billion dollar finance industry bailout before markets open on Monday.
But he fired off an acerbic critique of Obama's debate performance, ripping his rival over his economic policy and attitude to the war in Iraq, in a speech by satellite to the Sportsmen's Alliance, a hunting and shooting lobby group.
"It was clear that Senator Obama still sees the financial crisis in America as a national problem to be exploited first and solved later," he said.
"This is a moment of great testing, when the future of our economy is on the line."
McCain's comments served as a riposte to Obama's own assessment of the debate, just five weeks before election day on November 4.
"From taxes to health care to the war in Iraq -- you heard John McCain make the case for more of the same policies that got us into this mess," Obama told a rally in North Carolina.
"But just as important as what we heard from John McCain was what we didn't hear," Obama said at a rally in Greensboro, North Carolina.
"The truth is, through 90 minutes of debating, John McCain had a lot to say about me, but he had nothing to say about you. He didn't even say the words 'middle class' -- not once."
McCain flew directly back to Washington after the debate at the University of Mississippi to throw himself back into the search for a deal in Congress on a Wall Street bailout before the financial markets open on Monday.
He spoke to President George W. Bush, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, and Federal Reserve Chief Ben Bernanke, as well as top Republican members of Congress, his campaign chief said.
McCain had faced intense fire from Democrats who blamed the collapse of an apparent deal on the bailout last week on McCain's decision to rush back to Washington in what they branded a publicity stunt.
"He can effectively do what he needs to do by phone," said McCain's senior advisor Mark Salter.
"He is calling members of both sides, people in the administration ... helping out as he can," Salter said.
But the Obama campaign immediately sent out a statement questioning McCain's strategy.
"If this is the case, why did Senator McCain suspend his campaign?" said Obama spokesman Tommy Vietor.
The Obama campaign also pointed out that McCain stayed cloistered in Washington, with his campaign on hold, while the Illinois senator spoke to 20,000 people in North Carolina.
Neither McCain 72, nor Obama, 47, landed a decisive blow in the debate at the University of Mississippi or committed a major gaffe, a verdict that benefits Obama given his slim lead in the polls.
An instant telephone poll by CNN and Opinion Research Corp. after the debate scored a decisive win for Obama among 524 debate watchers. Asked who did the better job, 51 percent said Obama and 38 percent said McCain.
The Democrat had a yawning lead of 58-37 percent on handling the economy, and a narrower edge of 52-47 percent on the Iraq war, the pollsters said.
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