Associated Press, Jan 2nd

DES MOINES, Iowa - Barack Obama, Hillary Rodham Clinton and John Edwards closed out a long, grueling Iowa caucus campaign Wednesday night with statewide television appeals, each seeking an early triumph in the race for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination. Leading Republicans exchanged routine unpleasantries on a final day of campaigning.

“You just don’t know what is going to happen,” confessed Mitt Romney, unwilling to forecast success over Republican rival Mike Huckabee in Thursday’s first contest of the race for the White House.

“This country is ready for a leader who will bring us together,” Obama said in a two-minute commercial televised at the dinner hour. A first-term Illinois senator seeking to become the nation’s first black president, he added, “That’s the only way we’re going to win this election. And that’s how we’ll actually fix health care, make college affordable, become energy independent and end this war.”

Clinton, seeking to become America’s first female president, reached out with a campaign-closing commercial broadcast of her own. “If you stand with me for one night, I will stand up for you every day as your president,” she said. “I’ll work my heart out to bring the country we love the new beginning it needs and I will be ready to start on Day One.”  Click here to read more from the Associated Press.  Also, Please vote for your favorite in our poll!

Posted on Wednesday, January 2nd, 2008 at 6:19 pm in National News.