LAKEVILLE, Minnesota (AFP) — Republican John McCain Friday called on his supporters to stop hurling abuse at Barack Obama at his rallies, saying he admired and respected his Democratic White House rival.
"We want to fight, and I will fight, but we will be respectful. I admire Senator Obama and his accomplishments and I will respect him," McCain told a Minnesota rally, as a new Newsweek poll gave his rival a 11-point lead nationally.
"I want everyone to be respectful and let's make sure we are, because that is the way that politics should be conducted in America," McCain said.
Crowds at the rallies of McCain and his running mate Sarah Palin have become increasing inflammatory shouting out "terrorist" and "liar" when Obama is mentioned. At one Florida rally, someone even shouted "kill him."
The US Secret Service said it was investigating the alleged death threat. "We take every threat very seriously. Every time we receive or are reported information like that, we follow up," said Secret Service spokesman Ed Donovan.
Obama has also rebuked McCain for preaching a politics of "anger and division."
"In the last couple of days we have seen a barrage of nasty insinuations and attacks and I am sure we will see much more over the next 25 days," he said at a rally in Ohio.
"It's easy to rile up a crowd by stoking anger and division. But that is not what we need now in the United States, the times are too serious."
For the first time in a Newsweek poll, Obama was Friday given a double digit lead, with 52 percent to 41 percent for McCain, with voters saying the economy was their top concern.
The last poll by the magazine a month ago, before the economic crisis began to bit, had the two men tied on 46 percent.
And a separate poll by Fox News suggested that accusations by Palin that the Chicago senator was "palling around with terrorists" had failed to make much impression on voters.
On Friday McCain told the rally in Lakeville, Minnesota: "I want to be president ... but I have to tell you that he is a decent person and a person you don't have to be scared of."
But his comments went against the tone of two new ads launched by the McCain campaign targeting Obama.
One ad accused Obama of lying about his links to Vietnam War era radical William Ayers, a member of the radical Weather Underground Group, whom Obama met in his formative years in Chicago politics.
"When convenient, he worked with terrorist Bill Ayers," the ad script said. "When discovered, he lied. Obama. Blind ambition. Bad judgment."
Then later in the day, the McCain campaign took aim at Obama's links with a non-profit housing counselling group called Acorn, which on Friday was at the center of a storm amid investigations into alleged voter fraud.
The ad ends with the words: "Barack Obama. Bad judgment. Blind ambition. Too risky for America."
Speaking at a boisterous Republican rally in La Crosse, McCain conceded he is the "underdog" in the race.
But with 25 days to go before Americans go to the polls in a hotly contested presidential election, he vowed to come up from behind.
"How many times, my friends, have the pundits written off the McCain campaign?" he told the cheering crowd. "We're going to fool 'em again, my friend!"
Meanwhile, Alaskan lawmakers were reviewing the findings of the probe into the alleged abuse of powers by Palin.
The inquiry has been probing allegations that Palin abused her office by sacking a public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan, for his failure to dismiss a state trooper who was her former brother-in-law.
The 14 council members were to vote on whether to publish the lengthy report online, possibly later Friday, officials told AFP.
The results of the inquiry will come under scrutiny for the impact they may have on the presidential race, particularly since Palin has sought to cast herself as a corruption fighter.
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