By Meredith Buel

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Large crowds of supporters are cheering Barack Obama as polls show the Illinois senator is poised to win a significant victory in Tuesday’s New Hampshire Democratic primary. It would be Obama’s second come-from-behind triumph in a week over New York Senator Hillary Clinton, who displayed rare emotion as she campaigned on the eve of the election. VOA correspondent Meredith Buel has details on the Democratic candidates running in the primary in this report from Bedford, New Hampshire.

Barack Obama in Lebanon, New Hampshire, 07 Jan 2008

Overflow crowds of supporters welcomed Barack Obama at campaign stops throughout New Hampshire with public opinion surveys predicting he will win a decisive victory in Tuesday’s primary.

Several recent polls show Obama leading Hillary Clinton by a double-digit margin less than a week after the one-time front runner came in a disappointing third in the Iowa caucuses.

At a rally in Lebanon, New Hampshire, Obama urged his supporters not to be overconfident.

“I know we had a nice boost over the last couple of days, but elections are funny things,” said Obama. “You actually have to wait until people have voted and counted the votes before you know what is happening.”

About 45 percent of New Hampshire’s voters are independent and can participate in either the Republican or Democratic primaries.

Obama appealed directly to the independents on the eve of the election.

“We have you now in our sights,” he said. “We are coming after you and coming after you hard.”

Obama told the crowd gathered at a local high school that he would improve the country’s health care, change Iraq war policy and improve the nation’s education system.

But it is Obama’s message of hope that resonates with New Hampshire voters like Jared Matos.

“I like the speech about hope,” said Matos. “When he was talking about hope and his family and how he did not really get raised by money, he got raised by hope and love.”

Polls show Obama, who is campaigning to be the first black man elected as America’s president, is succeeding in identifying himself as the Democratic candidate most likely to bring significant change to policies in Washington.

African-American voter Herb Fajors says race is not the reason people are supporting Obama.

“No, they are going to vote for him because they believe in him,” said Fajors. “I did not vote for Jesse Jackson because I really did not believe in him. But I believe in Obama because he is speaking to everybody. He is just not speaking to blacks, he is speaking to everybody.”

Senator Clinton, who was the frontrunner for months here in New Hampshire, grew uncharacteristically emotional as she described her reasons for seeking the presidency at a New Hampshire coffee shop.

“I have so many opportunities from this country,” said Hillary Clinton. “I just don’t want to see us fall backwards. This is very personal for me. It is not just political, it is not just public. I see what is happening and we have to reverse it. Some people think elections are a game. They think it is like who is up or who is down. It is about our country. It is about our kids’ futures and it is really about all of us together.”

Clinton vowed to carry on with her campaign whatever the results of the primary here.

Former North Carolina Senator John Edwards is currently trailing Obama and Clinton.

Acknowledging he is the underdog, Edwards is trying to convince voters he will fight for them.

“We can not have a president or a nominee that represents the status quo,” said Edwards. “On the change front, we need a change candidate who is willing to fight for the middle class, fight for jobs and takes that fight personally.

After the New Hampshire primary, other states hold primaries and caucuses in the coming weeks. The state-by-state presidential nominating process culminates with the Democratic and Republican parties’ national conventions in August and September, which set the stage for the general election in November.

By Robert Schroeder

 

WASHINGTON  Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama grabbed a wide lead over rival Sen. Hillary Clinton in polls taken just ahead of Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary, with Sen. John McCain edging out Mitt Romney on the Republican side.

 

Just a day before the critical, first-in-the-nation primary, Obama was pulling in 39% of the vote in a new Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby poll, versus Clinton’s 29%. Former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards finished third with 19% of the vote. In a separate USA Today/Gallup poll, Obama took a 13 percentage-point advantage over Clinton.

 

Meanwhile, the Reuters poll shows Arizona Sen. McCain with a five-point lead over ex-Massachusetts Gov. Romney, leading the former governor 34% to 29%. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who won the Iowa Republican caucus, dropped back to third place in the poll, at 10%. He was one percentage point ahead of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. McCain is also leading Romney by 4% in the USA Today poll.

 

Both the Republican and Democratic presidential contenders spent Saturday in fierce debates with each other in New Hampshire as they sought to convince voters there to choose them.

 

Romney and McCain clashed over the role of drug companies in the U.S. health-care system. McCain criticized the sector, while Romney replied: “Don’t turn the pharmaceutical companies into the big, bad guys.”

 

The Republican candidates also disagreed significantly over how to deal with millions of illegal immigrants living in the U.S. Giuliani said he would focus on illegal immigrants who have committed crimes, while Romney said there should be no special pathway to permanent residency or citizenship for illegals.

 

Clinton and Obama argued over their own health-care proposals, with Clinton charging Obama with inconsistency on the issue. Obama doesn’t believe a mandate for buying health insurance is necessary. The cost of insurance is what keeps people from buying it, he said.

By Rory O’Connor

Should Big Media decide for the rest of us who is – and more importantly who is not – a viable candidate for president? It’s bad enough that thus far the reporting of this year’s quadrennial presidential pursuit has been even more insubstantial than ever, focused on the horse race, the fundraising, the polls, the pundits, the haircuts and assorted other bits of silliness — anything other than actual issues of concern to voters and importance to the world. Now we find Big Media, (specifically its Fox/ABC News wing,) determined to narrow the field of presidential candidates before any of us, other than a handful of white people in Iowa, even get a chance to vote!

Both television networks plan to winnow out presidential candidates they deem unacceptable and prevent them from participating in important debates to be held this weekend — just before the crucial New Hampshire primary. Fox has invited just five of the seven remaining Republican candidates to a forum with Chris Wallace scheduled for Sunday in the Granite State — only two days before the nation’s first presidential primary. Although Rudy Giuliani, Mike Huckabee, John McCain, Mitt Romney and even the barely breathing Fred Thompson were all invited, two current candidates, both current Members of Congress, were not – Duncan Hunter and Ron Paul.

The Fox excuse? “Space is limited” in the “souped-up bus” that is serving as a mobile studio. As a result, Fox executives say that, for space reasons, they decided only to invite those candidates who had received double-digit support in recent polls. Forget the fact that Ron Paul actually is ahead of Thompson (6 percent to 4 percent) among all New Hampshire voters in the most recent Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll, or that the two were tied with the support of 4 percent of likely voters… Forget as well the fact that Paul recently shattered the record for online fundraising in a single day, raising nearly $6 million in 24 hours - a little more than a month after he amazed the pollsters, pundits and political professionals by hauling in $4.3 million during the same time span. (Not bad considering that on the day that John Kerry accepted the 2004 Democratic nomination, he raised $5.7 million on the Internet – the biggest online fundraising day on record until the supposedly non-viable Ron Paul surpassed it.) But consider at least these facts: in just the last three months, Paul collected more than $19.5 million, bringing his total for the year to more than $25 million. More than 130,000 contributors gave to Paul during the fourth quarter, including more than 107,000 new donors.

“This is exciting. It’s crazy. I can’t imagine any other Republican raising this kind of money this quarter. This means Ron Paul’s message is really resonating with people,” Jim Forsythe, who leads Paul’s New Hampshire MeetUp group, told the Washington Post.

But Big Media doesn’t seem as impressed - at least now. Remember just a few months ago, however, when how much money a candidate was able to raise was the Big Media imprimatur of viability? Now that Ron Paul has vaulted near the top of the fundraisers, it seems the bar is being moved, and is set a little higher for him. Could it be instead that his stance on the issues is the real barrier to letting American voters see and hear him debate on Fox News just before the crucial first presidential primary takes place? After all, it’s no secret that Paul’s outspoken opposition to the Iraq war, to mention just one ‘deviant’ policy position, is what really sets him apart from all the other Republican candidates.

Paul’s spokesman Jesse Benton says the campaign has been trying to reach Fox News representatives to get an explanation for the decision, but calls have not been returned. (Meanwhile Rudy Guiliani has appeared so often on the Fox News channel - run by his close friend Roger Ailes - that it’s rumored he’s having a private line installed in the Control Room there.) Is Fox prejudiced against Paul because of his perceived lack of viability - or his policy stances? “There very well might be some bias,” Benton told the AP. “Ron brings up some topics that aren’t very popular with Fox News, as in fiscal responsibility and withdrawing from the war in Iraq… that does leave us scratching our heads a little bit about whether it was deliberate. Based on metrics, I don’t see how you can possibly exclude Dr. Paul.”

Based on metrics, you can’t… And if the small size of the mobile studio is really the issue, I’ll gladly chip in to help rent a larger space if necessary. But if Ron Paul isn’t added back into the debate, I’ll also gladly join his supporters, who have begun calling for a boycott of Fox advertisers. After all, whatever happened to “We Report, You Decide?”

For their part, ABC executives say they will decide who gets to show up for their back-to-back, primetime Republican and Democratic debates Saturday in New Hampshire - but only after the results of Thursday’s Iowa caucus are known. To participate in the ABC debates, Republican and Democratic candidates must either place first through fourth in Iowa, poll 5 percent or higher in one of the last four major New Hampshire surveys, or poll 5 percent or higher in one of the last four major national surveys.

ABC News anchorman Charles Gibson defended the network’s decision to determine who was a viable candidate before any actual voters – except for Iowa caucus-goers – even had a chance to cast a ballot, and contended that the new ‘viability’ criteria were still inclusive. “You will have had a year’s politicking,” Gibson told the Associated Press. “You will have had, I think by count, about 641 debates. You will have had national polls and state polls and one state’s vote. I think that’s pretty indicative.”

Sorry, Charlie - but nobody asked what you think. Once every four years, you’re supposed to ask us what we think. You report, remember. We decide, right? Right??