Kerry: 'I'll fight for jobs'

Also to be in town today to stir minority voters is the Rev. Jesse Jackson.
VINDICATOR STAFF REPORT
WARREN -- John Kerry spoke in one of the most Democratic cities in the key battleground state of Ohio, pledging to be a champion of the middle class and seeking to persuade undecided voters to support his bid for the presidency.
"You have no idea how beautiful you look up here in Warren," the Democratic presidential nominee said at a rally Saturday night in Warren's Courthouse Square, which was opened by actor and singer Jon Bon Jovi. A sea of blue and white signs proclaiming "3 More Days to a Fresh Start" greeted Kerry.
"Three days from now, you and the rest of America get to make the most fundamental choice, and it's a blessing -- because you get to hold George W. Bush accountable for the last four years, and you get to send this country in the right direction," Kerry said. "This is the choice of a lifetime."
Economic policies
He lambasted Bush's economic policies and their impact on working families. "I will be a president who fights as hard for your jobs as hard as I fight for my own. We are going to make that difference," he said.
"I ask anybody undecided to stop and think about this: George W. Bush is the first president in 70 years to lose jobs on his watch," he noted.
Kerry also pledged a more effective strategic war on terror. "I will make America safer," he said.
Bon Jovi performed "Living on a Prayer" and "Dead or Alive," signed autographs and held up a Kerry sign before leaving the stage.
Paul Sracic, a political science professor at Youngstown State University, said it's hard to measure the effect of a rally -- but it doesn't hurt the candidate. "The idea is to get people at the rally fired up. After it's over, they tell their friends and family about the event and urge them to support the candidate," he said.
Attendance
The estimated attendance at the rally was 15,000. "This is the greatest scene I've ever seen in my entire life," said U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan of Niles, D-17th, who introduced space pioneer and former U.S. Sen. John Glenn to the energized crowd before Kerry's speech. Retired Admiral William Crowe, who served on the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Ronald Reagan, introduced Kerry.
Glenn lambasted President Bush's domestic and foreign policies. "I think the people are beginning to shift. And I'm not gonna predict a landslide, but I'm gonna predict a victory next Tuesday," Glenn said.
The crowd figure will be compared with two previous events.
The more recent of the two was Wednesday, when President Bush attracted about 15,000 people to the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport for a rally.
The other was Oct. 4, 2000, when Al Gore, the Democratic presidential nominee that year, held a rally in the city's Courthouse Square. Attendance reports for that event vary between 10,000 and 20,000 people.
That was Gore's last visit to Ohio during that campaign year. His campaign abandoned the state, believing the Democrat couldn't win it, and focused on Florida. Even so, Gore kept it close in Ohio, losing by 3.6 percent to Bush.
Kerry, the junior senator from Massachusetts, and Bush have criss-crossed Ohio, particularly during the past few months. Ohio is viewed as one of a handful of key battleground states in the presidential race. Ohio's 20 electoral votes are among the most in the battleground states.
Even when polls taken after the Republican National Convention showed Bush opening a lead on Kerry, the Democrat didn't surrender Ohio. He continued to campaign in the state. Many recent polls show Ohio is a statistical dead-heat, so both candidates are spending much time here.
Kerry and U.S. Sen. John Edwards, his vice presidential nominee, have campaigned in Ohio every day for the past week. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have been in the Buckeye State nearly every day during the past week.
"We've never seen anything here like this before," Sracic said. "The candidates are leading the get-out-to-vote campaigns in Ohio."
Jesse Jackson
Also to be in town today to stir minority voters to the polls is the Rev. Jesse Jackson, a civil rights activist who unsuccessfully ran twice for the Democratic presidential nomination. Jackson was introduced by Kerry at the start of the rally.
Jackson is to be the guest at a Kerry/Edwards Minority Get Out the Vote community rally at the Buckeye Elks Youth Center in Youngstown, scheduled from 3 to 7 p.m.
The rally in Warren was the sixth visit by Kerry to the Mahoning Valley. Besides Saturday, the only other Kerry event open to the public was a rally in April on Youngstown's Federal Plaza that attracted about 1,000 people.
Bush visited the Valley twice during the campaign. Besides the airport rally, he held an invitation-only event in May at Youngstown State University to discuss community health care centers.
XContributors: Politics writer David Skolnick and staff writer Laure Cioffi.