All to play for as first votes cast in race for White House

CANDIDATES for the United States presidency are locked into a tight race on both sides of the political divide as Iowa prepares to vote tomorrow in the all- important first caucus of 2008's election battle.

Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Mike Huckabee hold narrow leads over their main rivals, according to an opinion poll by Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby.

Mrs Clinton has a stable four-point margin over Barack Obama, by 30 per cent to 26 per cent, in the Democratic race. John Edwards is on 25 per cent.

But in another poll, for the Des Moines Register,

Mr Obama is on 32 per cent, up from 28 per cent in the paper's previous poll in November,

while Mrs Clinton holds steady at 25 per cent and Mr Edwards is on 24 per cent.

In the Republican race, Mike Huckabee has maintained his lead over Mitt Romney, by 32 per cent to 26 per cent, according to the Des Moines Register poll.

In the Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby survey, Mr Huckabee's lead over Mr Romney has widened to four points – 29 per cent compared with 25 per cent.

Iowa is the first test in the state-by-state fight to choose the candidates for the November presidential election, and about 7 per cent of Democrats and 6 per cent of Republicans remain undecided after months of heavy campaigning

Mrs Clinton, Mr Obama and Mr Edwards have been battling for the top Democratic spot for months.The former first lady, who would be the first female president, leads among women and older voters, who are most likely to turn out for a caucus. But Mr Edwards remains the top second choice of Democrats, a potentially significant factor given the requirement that a candidate must have 15 per cent support in each precinct to be viable or their supporters can switch to another candidate.

Since 1976, when Jimmy Carter took the Democrats' Iowa nomination, 11 of the 13 eventual party nominees have won either Iowa or New Hampshire – the next state to vote – or both.

Among Republicans, Mr Huckabee has solidified his lead while under attack over his record on immigration, taxes and crime while he was the governor of Arkansas.

In the Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby poll, John McCain remains a distant third on 12 per cent, with Fred Thompson gaining two points to climb to 10 per cent.

The rise by Mr Huckabee, a Baptist minister, has been fuelled by his support among religious and social conservatives. But Mr Thompson has cut into his backing among Iowans who say they are "born-again" Christians and "very" conservative.

Mr McCain has cut into Mr Romney's support among moderates and independents. The former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, who has focused on states that will vote in February's "super Tuesday" and largely bypassed Iowa, is at 8 per cent.

For those who are campaigning in Iowa, it has been a busy holiday period.

After a full day of campaigning, Mr Obama ended his New Year's Eve just before midnight in Ames speaking to about 1,000 cheering people packed into a hall at Iowa State University.

He told the crowd about the latest Des Moines Register poll. "We might just pull this thing off Iowa, who would have thunk it?" he said to wild cheers from the crowd waving Obama signs.

The Clinton campaign is appealing to women attending their first political nominating caucus, while the Obama campaign seeks new young voters.

Tracy Osborn, a political science expert at the University of Iowa, said "It's a smart angle by both of those campaigns. Barack Obama could bring in minority voters and younger voters and Hillary Clinton is likely to bring in women voters, and typically those are groups that don't participate in a caucus."

With an eye to women, Mrs Clinton has again reminded voters that she is a mother and a daughter, and she is advocating support for people who care for others, such as elderly parents or a disabled spouse.

Mark Daley, her Iowa communications director, said they had identified women in each of the state's 1,784 political precincts who voted in general elections but had not participated in a caucus. Those women were targeted with direct mail, telephone calls and online advertising.

One woman at a campaign event in Keokuk said she planned to participate in her first caucus and back Mrs Clinton. But Annie Pennington, 33, admitted: "I'm pretty nervous."

Mr Obama has stuck doggedly to the campaign pitch that has made him the most serious black presidential candidate in history. "You can't afford to settle for the same old politics," he told a crowd in Perry.

His aides stress their man's strength in the states that vote after Iowa, and against Republicans in the autumn campaign. But, like everything else in the race for the White House, all of that remains to be recalculated after Iowa votes tomorrow.

Clinton insists she is best placed to win back presidency
HILLARY CLINTON
HILLARY Clinton has raced through the past few days before Iowa's high-stakes caucuses, urging activists to look past the primaries and back her because she can win in November.

Mrs Clinton and Ted Strickland, the Ohio governor, were out on the stump in vote-rich eastern Iowa making the case that the former first lady is best able to win back the White House and is ready to tackle the job once she does.

She said the backing she was getting from political leaders such as Strickland had meaning. "They are not on a political suicide mission," Mrs Clinton said. "They are professionals, they are assessing each and every one of us and they are concluding, number one, I would be the best president and, two, I am the Democrat most likely to be elected."

Much of Mrs Clinton's claim of experience lies in her eight years as first lady during husband Bill Clinton's presidency, and she makes the case to activists that they were better off during her husband's tenure, and rejects the argument that she was asking voters to turn back the clock.

Since the assassination of former Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto, Mrs Clinton has woven into her stump speech the argument that she is the most experienced Democrat to deal with a troubled and dangerous world.

The former first lady also said she was better suited to tackle special interests in Washington than rival John Edwards, a former North Carolina senator who has made that issue the centrepiece of his campaign.

"It's easy to talk about taking on special interests," Mrs Clinton said. "I've taken on the oil companies. It's something you don't have to do by yelling and screaming. Save your energy. Get the job done."

How Iowa's voting system works

What is a caucus?
A party meeting at the precinct level at which citizens express their candidate preferences and pick delegates to their county conventions. It is the lowest level of party politics. These meetings, held in each of the state's nearly 1,800 precincts, typically draw anywhere from a handful of people in rural areas to hundreds in suburban areas.

Who takes part?
Anyone old enough to vote in November's election and who is a member of the party is eligible, but traditionally only a small number of Iowans show up. This year, up to 150,000 are expected to participate in the Democratic caucuses, while about 90,000 are likely to vote in the Republican contest.

What happens at a caucus?
Participants, led by a chairman or chairwoman, indicate their preferences for their party's nomination, pick delegates to county conventions and discuss party business, including party platforms.

What happens next?
Delegates chosen at the caucuses go to the county convention later in the year. There, the field is narrowed and delegates are chosen for the district convention. This happens again at district meetings and again at the state convention, where delegates to the party's national convention are picked.

Why are the numbers different?
The Republicans essentially hold a straw poll – a head count – at their precinct caucuses, reporting real numbers. One head, one vote. The Democrats use a mathematical formula to determine support for a candidate in percentages. A candidate must have the support of 15 per cent of those present at any meeting to remain "viable."

ANGER AT UNDUE INFLUENCE OF TWO SMALL STATES
ALL eyes may be on the first two key races in Iowa and New Hampshire, but many of them are rolling. Despite efforts to evict the two states from the front of the presidential calendar, both managed to hang on for another election cycle that begins with the Iowa caucuses tomorrow and the New Hampshire primary on Tuesday. As a year of media attention reaches its crescendo, voters in other states are saying enough is enough.

According to a poll, just over half of all voters said New Hampshire and Iowa have an extraordinary amount of influence over who wins the two parties' nominations.

A slew of US states pushed hard to move their primaries and caucuses to an earlier date – efforts aimed at giving them greater influence in the process. But Iowa and New Hampshire retained their lead spots.

Both states have been criticised as unrepresentative of the country, given their size and lack of racial diversity. Iowa – population three million – is 95 per cent white; New Hampshire – population 1.3 million – is 96 per cent white. Democrats tried to inject more diversity into the process by adding early contests in Nevada and South Carolina, but Iowa and New Hampshire moved even earlier.

MITT ROMNEY
REPUBLICAN candidate Mitt Romney has lately seized a campaign theme from the Democrats: the promise to bring change to Washington.

During a bus tour across Iowa, Mr Romney – who would be the first Mormon president if he won the White House, said: "If ever there's been a time we needed change in Washington, it's now."

In the 2008 presidential race, Republican candidates must be more nuanced when they denounce Washington in the wake of the Bush administration. Republicans controlled Congress for much of that time, and successfully blocked many Democratic initiatives this year after they lost control in the 2006 mid-term elections.

Mr Romney is careful not to criticise George Bush, whose approval ratings are considerably higher among Republicans than they are among the population at large.

BARACK OBAMA
BARACK Obama has spent much of the past few days courting undecided Iowa voters with an argument that he has the political skills to win the presidential election but none of the baggage carried by Democratic rivals Hillary Clinton and John Edwards.

"We are less likely to win an election that starts off with half the country not wanting to vote for that candidate," he told about 300 people at a high school. "We are less likely, also, to win an election with somebody who had one set of positions four years ago and has almost entirely different positions four years later."

Mr Obama argued that his "politics of addition" would attract independents and even some Republicans in November. He rejected arguments that he was too nice or too inexperienced to fight special interests in Washington.

JOHN McCAIN
JOHN McCAIN is trailing his two main Republican rivals in Iowa by some distance.

He is the only candidate from either party to say he does not support federal subsidies for biofuels – an unpopular position in an agricultural state such as Iowa.

He has concentrated to a greater degree on the more sophisticated New Hampshire vote, stressing his foreign policy credentials.

"I know (President Pervez] Musharraf. I know these people, I've been there many times. I know how to handle this situation, and that's because I have the experience and the knowledge, the background and judgment," he says.

Though mentioning no names, Mr McCain drew a contrast with his chief rival in New Hampshire, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, who lacks foreign policy experience.

MIKE HUCKABEE
MIKE HUCKABEE wants his supporters to know that he's one of them and can relate to their everyday concerns. A consistent theme of the rising Republican presidential contender is his humble Arkansas roots, which he frequently invokes on the campaign trail in Iowa.

He often notes he is the first male in his family to finish high school, that his mother grew up with "dirt floors and outdoor toilets" and that his father held down two jobs to support the family.

But some of his attempts to cultivate an image of being humble and above the fray have looked to some like old politics in a new package.

On Monday, he told a packed news conference he had decided at the last minute not to run a scathing ad countering rival Mitt Romney's attacks on his record. He then proceeded to show reporters the ad, which took issue with Mr Romney on a range of issues, from fiscal policy to abortion, and accused him of being dishonest.

The ordained Baptist preacher has tried to show himself to be a regular guy, by going on a pheasant shoot in the fields of Iowa, jogging, and getting his hair cut in downtown Des Moines.

JOHN EDWARDS
AFTER months of being seemingly stuck in third place in the Democratic race, John Edwards has climbed into a virtual tie in recent surveys and has drawn large, enthusiastic crowds in Iowa.

The former senator, restrained from using his personal fortune by his decision to accept public campaign financing, has raised far less money and runs a smaller organisation in Iowa than his chief rivals. No matter, he says. The presidential nomination contests are so compressed this time – "bam, bam, bam" – that strong early showings should be rewarded nationally, and a nominee produced in short order. "The message will get heard," he has said. "If you win the Iowa caucuses, you are going to be heard very loudly and clearly in these other places."

Edwards also claims to have put a "terrific" organisation on the ground in New Hampshire.