Campaign '08

Candidates Race To Woo Last-Minute Votes In Iowa

DES MOINES, Iowa (CBS News) ― On the eve of the Iowa caucuses, candidates from both parties made their closing pitches to the voters who could play an influential role in determining the Democratic and Republican nominees.

While the three leading Democrats criss-crossed the state and made televised appeals, the Republican contest included two candidates - Mike Huckabee and John McCain - whose appearances were notable for not taking place in Iowa at all.

Hillary Rodham Clinton is asking Iowans to "take the first step" toward changing the direction of the country by voting for her at the caucuses.

"After all the town meetings, the pie and coffee, it all comes down to this: Who is ready to be president and ready to start solving the big challenges we face on Day One," Clinton says in the two-minute appeal to be broadcast during Wednesday evening news programs.

John Edwards will rely on the words of laid-off Maytag worker Doug Bishop, who offers a one-minute testimonial that recalls Edwards' pledge to Bishop's son four years ago that "I'm going to keep fighting for your daddy's job, I promise you that."

Barack Obama, like Clinton, purchased two-minute time slots across the state, for an ad that will air during news broadcasts. Also, in an e-mail to Iowa supporters Tuesday, Obama state director Paul Tewes cast the Illinois senator as the Democratic candidate who can attract independents and Republicans. The campaign did not immediately make a copy of the TV ad available.

In Clinton's ad, the New York senator recounts her months of stumping through Iowa, saying "the stories you have shared will always stay with me." Iowa, first among the states to vote on nominees for president, holds its caucuses Thursday night.

Simple and spare in production, her campaign tries to create the aura of an Oval Office address with the ad. In a close-up shot, Clinton is seated with what appear to be a window and table topped with flowers in a vase in the background.

"I'm not running for president to put Band-Aids on our problems. I'm running to solve them," she said, as she has many times at campaign events.

Clinton adds a human touch to deflect criticism suggesting she is cold and calculating.

"You have welcomed me into your hearts and your homes. And I thank you," she says. "Parents juggling jobs to pay for college for their kids. Soldiers' families praying for a safe return. All the men and women across the state who have whispered their health care problems to me - bills they can't pay, parents they can't afford to care for, insurance companies who refuse to help."

Most surveys show Clinton, Obama and Edwards in a close and fluid three-way contest. Those surveys also have identified a large group of activists who have yet to settle on a candidate or who say they could still change their minds.

Clinton and Obama are visiting five cities each in Iowa today,

Edwards makes his last appeal to Iowa voters, not with his own words, but those of Bishop, a working class father. By using Maytag as a foil, the ad touches an emotional nerve in Iowa. Maytag's washer and dryer factory was once the pride of Newton, Iowa, until it closed its doors in October. For Edwards, the plant represents a symbol for his populist rhetoric - one that criticizes corporations, foreign trade deals and special interests.

"I want a guy that's going to sit down and look a 7-year-old kid in the eye and tell him, 'I'm going to fight for your dad's job,"' Bishop says, as he introduces Edwards to an Iowa crowd. "That's what I want. I'm going to do my best to make sure that my children aren't the first generation of Americans that I can't look them in the eye and say, 'You're going to have a better life than I had."'

Edwards supplemented his television spot with a full-page ad in the Des Moines Register that included a written message from Bishop and a lengthy essay from Edwards.

He is also in the middle of a 36-hour marathon of campaigning, one that has already forced him and his staff to change buses twice - the first bus broke down, and the second didn't have enough workspace for staff, CBS News' Aaron Lewis reports.

At a stop in Mt. Pleasant, Edwards sounded a skeptical note when asked about the possible impact of Dennis Kucinich's instructions that his supporters caucus for Obama at sites where they fail to reach a viability threshold.

"It's very hard to tell Iowa caucus-goers what to do," he said. "I think they'll make up their own minds."

Edwards' wife, Elizabeth, also spoke up at the event, dismissing a radio ad from Obama - while also offering a surprise defense of Clinton's health care plan, Lewis reports.

"It's just complete untruth," she said. "I'll speak on behalf of Senator Clinton as well. Both Senator Clinton's and John Edwards's health care plans cover one hundred percent of Americans and Senator Obama's does not."The Republican race is largely a two-man contest between Mitt Romney and Huckabee. Recent polls have shown the two nearly tied, with McCain and Fred Thompson vying for a distant third place.

Instead of spending the day in Iowa, Huckabee flew out to Los Angeles to appear on the first episode of NBC's "The Tonight Show" since the Writers' Guild launched a strike in December.

At a stop in Bettendorf, Romney took a shot at Huckabee, suggesting his caucus-eve priorities are misplaced, CBS News' Scott Conroy reports.

"Frankly my focus is on the caucuses here in Iowa," Romney said at a press conference at a middle school here, as he was flanked by about 50 mostly younger supporters. "I think Mike is more concerned about the caucus in Los Angeles."

Huckabee and his aides have defended the decision, saying many Iowans watch the show. However, the former Arkansas governor appeared caught off guard when informed that the writers' union hadn't reached any sort of agreement with The Tonight Show's producers.

"My understanding is that there was a special arrangement made for the late-night shows, and the writers have made this agreement to let the late night shows to come back on, so I don't anticipate that it's crossing a picket line," Huckabee told reporters traveling with him Wednesday from Fort Dodge to Mason City.

Told he was mistaken and that writers had cleared only Letterman's show, Huckabee protested: "But my understanding is there's a sort of dispensation given to the late-night shows, is that right?"

Told again that he was wrong, Huckabee murmured, "Hmmm," and, "Oh," before answering another question.

John McCain, despite the fact that polls show he could finish a surprising third in Iowa, spent the day in New Hampshire, where a winter storm forced him to scale back his plans and meet with a small group, many of whom praised his service in the U.S. Navy.

Polls in New Hampshire, which holds primaries on Jan. 8, show McCain and Romney in a dead heat. Though he was in Iowa, Romney clearly had the Arizona senator on his mind, CBS' Conroy reports, taking time to criticize McCain's record.

"I think he was just wrong to vote against the Bush tax cuts twice," Romney said of McCain in his opening remarks to reporters. "He continues to defend that vote. He continues to believe it was the right thing to vote 'no' on the Bush tax cuts, despite the fact that the Bush tax cuts helped working families, helped people meet their obligations."

(© 2008 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)