DETROIT, United States (AFP) — Republican White House hopeful Mitt Romney touted his business background as a balm in turbulent times Wednesday as worries about the stuttering US economy moved to the foreground of the presidential contest.
In the unpredictable Democratic battle, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama came together for a face-to-face debate in gambling paradise Las Vegas, after carefully smoothing over a bitter race dispute.
Fresh from a Republican primary victory in down-and-out Michigan that revived his flagging campaign, Romney revamped his economic renewal message for the national stage, saying "the key is to be able to rebuild the economy."
"I would say it's in a fragile state and needs a steady hand at the tiller," the multi-millionaire Mormon businessman and former Massachusetts governor told CNN in a predawn interview, when asked about the "state of America."
"You don't want to see America fall into a severe recession at a time when we have so many other challenges," he said.
"I spent my life in the private sector. I travelled around the world doing business. I understand why businesses and jobs come and go and I will use all that I learned to try to strengthen our economy."
Romney's victory in Michigan Tuesday brought fresh life to a candidacy that had flopped since the presidential nominating race began two weeks ago in Iowa, even though he had led the opinion polls before voting began in earnest.
"Tonight marks the beginning of a comeback, a comeback for America," Romney told cheering supporters after his win late Tuesday, which left the Republican presidential nomination race wide open.
Romney, who was born in Michigan, beat his nearest rival, Senator John McCain, by 39 percent to 30 percent, with ex Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee coming in third with 16 percent of votes.
But with three different Republican winners in the three main nominating contests held so far in the roller-coaster White House race ahead of the November elections, everything was still left to play for.
"I think we've shown them we don't mind a fight. We don't mind a fight, and we're in it," McCain, a Vietnam war veteran who spent five and a half years as a prisoner of war, told supporters.
Huckabee noted that he had won Iowa, McCain had won New Hampshire, and now Romney carried Michigan, but he vowed to triumph in the next key contest of South Carolina on Saturday.
After that all eyes will turn to Super Tuesday on February 5 when more than 20 states will vote for their choice for White House candidate.
Huckabee, an ordained Baptist minister with a potent populist economic message, accused his two rivals of coming late to his understanding that "there's a world of hurt out there in America."
After two second place finishes that raised questions about the sustainability of his campaign, Romney used his campaign here to hark back to the rust-belt's distant car-making glory days when his father George governed Michigan in the 1960s.
"I'm going to fight to help Michigan, and I will not rest until it's come back," Romney said in a rare show of emotion at an election-day rally in Grand Rapids.
His victory broke McCain's momentum -- eight years after the senator carried the Republican primary over future victor George W. Bush.
McCain had rejected Romney's charges that he was writing off the economic prospects of Michigan, which has the nation's highest jobless rate of 7.4 percent, as its auto industry reels from an onslaught of foreign competition.
But Romney proclaimed that "tonight is a victory of optimism over Washington-style pessimism" even as he slammed Clinton and Obama as taking their inspiration from the "Europe of old, big government, big brother, big taxes."
Democratic candidates had bypassed their Michigan primary, rendering it largely meaningless, after the party's state organization defied national rules by advancing its contest ahead of Super Tuesday.
The Democrats were looking past Michigan to Saturday's caucuses in Nevada, the first heavily Hispanic state to vote in the 2008 marathon, and dueling over competing economic stimulus packages amid growing recession fears.
"Senator Obama and I agree completely that neither race nor gender should be a part of this campaign," Clinton said at the opening of their debate, ahead of the January 26 Democratic primary in South Carolina, which has a large black minority.
"We are right now in a defining moment in our history. We have a nation at war, our planet is in peril," said Obama. "We can't solve these challenges unless we can come together as a people."
Racial politics exploded into the open after Clinton last week made remarks taken as belittling civil rights hero Martin Luther King, and her campaign was also accused of bringing up African-American Obama's teenaged drug use.
Despite snow flurries, party officials reported a steady stream of voters in the state of 10 million people.
Some 1.46 million people cast votes, less than 20 percent of eligible voters, compared to 1.4 million in the last competitive primaries in 2000.
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