PRESIDENTIAL RACE Bush to focus on terrorism in New Jersey appearance

John Kerry is outlining his plan to avoid another flu vaccine shortage.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- George W. Bush is telling voters in New Jersey -- a state that hasn't backed a Republican presidential candidate since 1988 -- that his battle plan for fighting terrorists is better than Democrat John Kerry's.
With a little more than two weeks before Election Day, the president is campaigning today in New Jersey, a state in the shadow of the Manhattan skyline that was scarred by terrorists on Sept. 11, 2001.
Nearly 700 New Jersey residents died when hijacked airplanes flew into the World Trade Center's twin towers, and polls show national security and terrorism are the top campaign issues among voters in the state.
First ballots
Florida voters get to cast their ballots for president beginning today, and Sen. Kerry planned to spend all day asking for their votes.
"You have got to start voting tomorrow," Kerry told thousands of Floridians in Pembroke Pines on Sunday. "And you've got to get your friends to go out and vote starting tomorrow."
Early voting also occurs today in Texas, Colorado and Arkansas. Other key states this year have already begun in-person voting, including Wisconsin, Iowa, Nevada, Ohio, New Mexico, Pennsylvania and Michigan.
While asking for votes in Florida, Kerry also planned to lay out his prescription for avoiding another flu vaccine shortage like the one this season.
Kerry wants manufacturers to report vaccine supplies to public health officials, encourage the donation and public buyback of surplus vaccines, establish a reserve of the inoculations and encourage more drug makers to produce the vaccine.
Florida, the 2000 battleground that decided the election by 537 votes, remains a battleground this year.
Early voting was introduced in Florida after the prolonged 2000 ballot count. Rep. Kendrick Meek, chairman of Kerry's Florida election effort, said the extra time should help the state find and solve similar problems that might arise.
"If I have a problem, I will have 15 days to resolve the issue vs. two hours on Election Day," Meek said.
Tight race
In New Jersey, voters' worry about another terrorist attack is a key reason why Bush and Kerry are locked in a tight race for the state's 15 electoral votes.
"From a lot of places in New Jersey you could see the towers," Karl Rove, Bush's chief political adviser, told reporters at a weekend campaign rally in West Palm Beach, Fla.
"A lot of people in New Jersey, a lot of communities in New Jersey felt personally the sting of 9/11. I think that has made them more sensitive -- as we get close to the end -- about the question of who will make America safer."
You can't see downtown Manhattan from Marlton, a city in southern New Jersey where Bush will speak, but it's within the Philadelphia media market and Pennsylvania is a state where the candidates are competing head-to-head too.
Kerry adviser Joe Lockhart said New Jersey is an interesting place for the president to campaign because its two senators and former Gov. Thomas Kean, chairman of the bipartisan Sept. 11 commission, have complained that Bush hasn't done enough to push the panel's recommendations into law.
Lockhart said widows of the attacks plan to express their concern today about Bush's strategy in winning the war on terror.
Spending bill
Before heading to New Jersey, Bush was meeting at the White House with members of the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic teams and signing a bill giving the Department of Homeland Security about $33 billion for the budget year that began Oct. 1.
The bill is nearly $900 million more than Bush requested of Congress. It includes $1.1 billion in grants to states based on population, $400 million more than he wanted.
But its $875 million for cities considered attractive targets for terrorists is nearly $600 million below Bush's request.
In addition, it provides $3.6 billion for police and other emergency responders -- about $500 million less than last year's total.
The bill signing dovetails with Bush's New Jersey terrorism speech in which campaign officials said he would again mock Kerry's comments on terrorism in a New York Times Magazine article Oct. 10.
"We have to get back to the place we were, where terrorists are not the focus of our lives, but they're a nuisance," the Massachusetts senator said.
To appear as the tougher candidate on terrorism, Bush has been telling supporters at rallies that he couldn't disagree more. "Our goal is not to reduce terror to some acceptable level of nuisance," he said. "Our goal is to defeat terror by staying on the offensive."