In Final Stretch, Pitches Show Stark Contrasts

"I have been through tough times like this before, and the American people can trust me -- based on my record and results -- to take strong action to end this crisis, restore jobs and bring security to Americans," McCain said. "I will never be the one who sits on the sidelines waiting for things to get better."

In the speech, he condemned talk by congressional Democrats of another economic stimulus package, calling it a "spending spree" by the "dangerous threesome" of Obama, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.). It is a theme Republicans plan to press hard in the closing days.

Obama's speech had been planned for days, and senior campaign adviser David Axelrod said it would serve as the basis for the Democrat's appeal until the end of the campaign.

Told that the themes sounded similar to Obama's campaign announcement 21 months ago, Axelrod replied: "I think consistency is a good thing."

Obama's message centered on change -- he mentioned the watchword of his candidacy 18 times in Canton and used "hope" half as many times -- and he told his partisans that their work will pay off soon.

"Pittsburgh, I've got two words for you: One week," he told supporters at a hockey arena that is home to the Pittsburgh Penguins. "We are one week away from bringing change to America."

Obama's speech amounted to a 30-minute compilation of the themes he has accentuated throughout the long campaign: reaching out to disaffected voters, a call for personal responsibility and an acknowledgment that government should not try to solve "all our problems."

Obama's remarks were studiously nonpartisan -- on the rare occasions when he mentioned Democrats and Republicans, it was only to dismiss the importance of those labels. He is loath to acknowledge McCain's point that Obama's election would give Democrats control of the White House and both chambers of Congress, a prospect not likely to appeal to independents.

Instead of partisan appeals, Obama returned to the themes that fueled his surprising campaign.

"Hope! That's what kept some of our parents and grandparents going when times were tough," Obama said to cheers and applause. "What led them to say, "Maybe I can't go to college, but if I save a little bit each week my child can go to college; maybe I can't have my own business, but if I work really hard my child can open one of her own."

Obama said one of the Bush administration's great failures was to squander the country's goodwill and sense of community.

"That's what's been lost these last eight years -- our sense of common purpose, our sense of higher purpose. And that's what we need to restore right now."

He added: "The question in this election is not 'Are you better off than you were four years ago?' We all know the answer to that. The real question is, 'Will this country be better off four years from now?' " Although the economy is the focus of his speeches, some of the greatest applause came for the issue that first propelled his candidacy.

"It is time to stop spending $10 billion a month in Iraq while the Iraqi government sits on a huge surplus," Obama said. "As president, I will end this war by asking the Iraqi government to step up, and finally finish the fight against bin Laden and the al-Qaeda terrorists who attacked us on 9/11."

Obama at times seemed to vacillate between preparing the crowd for his presidency -- "It's not going to be easy, it's not going to be quick" to turn things around, he said -- and worrying about overconfidence among his supporters.

"Don't believe for a second this election is over," Obama told the crowd in Pittsburgh. "Don't think for a minute that power will concede anything. We have to work like our future depends on it in this last week, because it does."

Shear was traveling with the McCain campaign.