US: After trading punches once more over Iraq and national security, President George Bush and Senator John Kerry will retire from public view today to prepare for three key presidential debates, starting on Thursday, writes Conor O'Clery, North America Editor in New York.
President Bush will spend the weekend at Crawford in Texas while Mr Kerry goes into seclusion in Wisconsin to rehearse for the first 90-minute debate, on foreign policy and homeland security, to be held in Miami, Florida.
The second debate will be staged in St Louis, Missouri, on October 8th, and the third in Arizona on October 13th. Vice-President Dick Cheney and Mr Kerry's running mate, Senator John Edwards, will go head to head in Cleveland, Ohio, on October 5th.
In Philadelphia yesterday Mr Kerry sought to hit the President on his strongest electoral asset, his performance on terrorism, charging that he had made Iraq a haven for terrorists.
By pursuing Saddam Hussein Mr Bush had created a "profound diversion" from the battle against America's greatest enemy, al-Qaeda, "which still plans our destruction today," the Democratic challenger said.
"There's just no question about it. The President's misjudgment, miscalculation and mismanagement of the war in Iraq all make the war on terror harder to win," he went on. "George Bush made Saddam Hussein the priority. I would have made Osama bin Laden the priority. I will finish the job in Iraq and I will refocus our energies on the real war on terror."
Campaigning in Wisconsin, a battleground state, Mr Bush defended his decision to go to war. "Saddam was a threat," he said. After 9/11 "we must take threats seriously before they materialise. You cannot win the war on terror if you wilt when things get tough."
He made the case that the US had fought a "tough and brutal" war against Japan and then built democracy there despite scepticism at home.
Vice-President Cheney meanwhile castigated Mr Kerry for his criticism of Iraq's interim Prime Minister, Mr Ayad Allawi, on Thursday when he said his optimism contradicted earlier statements.
"I must say I was appalled at the complete lack of respect Senator Kerry showed for this man of courage," he told a campaign meeting."Ayad Allawi is our ally. He stands beside us in the war against terror. John Kerry is trying to tear him down and to trash all the good that has been accomplished, and his words are destructive."
He quoted Mr Allawi as saying: "When political leaders sound the siren of defeatism in the face of terrorism, it only encourages more violence."
The Democratic campaign produced a new ad yesterday in which it used Mr Bush's words in an appearance with Mr Allawi on Thursday against him.
Mr Bush had said: "I saw a poll that said the 'right track-wrong track' in Iraq was better than here in America." The ad voice over asks: "The right track? Americans are being kidnapped, held hostage, even beheaded. Over a thousand American soldiers have died. And George Bush has no plan to get us out of Iraq."
In another broadside Mr Kerry told the Columbus Dispatch newspaper that the war against Iraq showed Mr Bush "masquerading as a mainstream conservative while pursuing extremist policies" that had led him to deal with Iraq "in a way that weakened our nation, overextended our armed forces, cost us $200 billion and created a breach in our oldest alliances."
Mr Bush has a three-point lead over Mr Kerry according to a Wall Street Journal-ABC poll published on Thursday. An Associated Press poll yesterday gave him a seven-point lead (52-45 per cent) among likely voters.
The poll shows Mr Bush leading among men voters by 17 points, with Bush and Kerry tied among women, a traditionally Democratic group.