McCain ignites White House race

Washington: John McCain is finally making noise in the White House race, after weeks of anaemic photo ops, scattershot attacks and looking on as Democrat Barack Obama soaked up adulation and opinion poll leads.

The Republican stiffened his campaign with a negative new strategy, claimed Obama is playing the "race card" against him, and mocked his Democratic foe as an empty celebrity and prone to a Messiah complex.

In the fiercest combat of the general election so far, McCain tasted successive victories last week in the battle for daily news coverage, the political trench warfare which adds up to define a campaign.

At risk

But McCain's change of tack, which followed Republican whispering about his performance and Obama's return from a triumphant foreign tour, carries risks along with its promise of political gain.

He hopes voters will soon start to share his view of Obama as a talented, yet presumptuous pretender unprepared for the presidency. But such tactics are the political equivalent of playing with fire - and could cement Obama's narrative that McCain is ignoring real issues at a time of economic peril, has an unpleasant temper and is a typical, cynical politician.

"Any time you engage in negative campaigning, you always run the risk of it backfiring on your own campaign," said Costas Panagopoulos, of Fordham University's Elections and Campaigns Management programme. "That said, people remember negative ads - candidates use them because they are effective. If they can capitalise on pre-existing fears the electorate has about Obama, or hesitations they have about him it can be an effective strategy."

McCain is betting that he can dim Obama's so far remarkably resilient star power - and seems to be making preemptive bid to limit any "bounce" his rival enjoys from his party convention in three weeks.

But one political giant - Hillary Clinton - has already tried such a strategy and failed, during the Democratic primary season when she branded Obama "a lot of talk, no action".

McCain's barrage opened with an ad using footage of Obama's barnstorming European tour to compare him to troubled popular culture icons Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, the message: the Democrat is all show and no substance.

McCain's campaign then set off a firestorm, accusing African American Obama of playing the "race card" after he commented that Republicans will point out that he does not look like presidents memorialised on US currency.

Then McCain made headlines again with an ad mocking Obama as a Moses-like figure, which sarcastically asked "can you see the light?" suggesting his opponent had anointed himself to save the world.

Three debates

Obama on Saturday backed away from rival McCain's challenge for a series of joint appearances, agreeing only to the standard three debates in the fall.

Obama's reversal on town hall debates is part of a play-it-safe strategy he has adopted since claiming the nomination and grabbing a lead in national polls. Advisers to the Illinois senator, speaking on condition of anonymity, say Obama is reluctant to take chances or give McCain a high-profile stage now that Obama is the front-runner.