US: Struggling with disarray in his campaign staff, Democratic challenger Senator John Kerry tried to regain the initiative against President Bush yesterday, accusing him of presiding over an "excuse presidency" and challenged his credibility on jobs, the economy and the war in Iraq.
Despite a more aggressive campaign in recent days, Mr Kerry has not yet managed to stem a slide in support for Mr Bush following the Republican Convention in New York two weeks ago.
Even in New York state, which the Bush campaign long ago ceded to the Democrats, Mr Kerry's lead over the President has dropped from 18 to six points.
The Kerry campaign is a "campaign in chaos" with nobody in charge, and former Clinton staff and Kerry loyalists not talking to each other, according to former Al Gore campaign manager, Mr Tony Coelho.
The most recent addition to the campaign is Mr Clinton's former press officer, Mr Mike McCurry, who said: "There is a strong sense that we really need to get in there and try to help."
In an interview with Don Imus on MSNBC yesterday, Mr Kerry said his campaign was still being run by Senator Edward Kennedy's former aide, Ms Mary Beth Cahill, who is said to be at odds with Mr Kerry's close adviser Mr Bob Shrum.
As the Kerry campaign struggles with internal dissent, the highly-focused Mr Bush is maintaining his surge in important battleground states such as Wisconsin, a must-win state for the Democrats which voted narrowly for Democrat Al Gore in 2000, but where Mr Bush's lead has risen from three to eight points in the last two weeks.
Mr Kerry can take comfort from a 50-41 lead in Minnesota, and a six-point lead in Michigan but he is struggling in the other key battleground states, Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Iowa, Nevada, New Mexico, West Virginia and New Hampshire.
Mr Bush, who also has been campaigning almost non-stop, yesterday stayed home in Washington for the first time in five weeks to court the Hispanic vote by hosting a White House concert and reception celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month.
Mr Kerry went to Detroit, Ohio, to assail Mr Bush on the economy. "This President has created more excuses than jobs," he told the Detroit Economic Club. "His is the excuse presidency - never wrong, never responsible, never to blame. President Bush's desk isn't where the buck stops - it's where the blame begins."
Of the last 11 presidents, Mr Bush was the only one to oversee a national job loss, said Mr Kerry, and many of them had faced more severe recessions and bigger wars.
Earlier Mr Kerry told Don Imus: "We are punching back, I am absolutely taking the gloves off." The Massachusetts senator offered an apology on the programme to Vietnam veterans, who are furious that he accused US soldiers in congressional testimony in the 1970s of committing war crimes in Vietnam.
He was referring to the US policy of creating free-fire zones and the Phoenix programme of assassinations, said Mr Kerry, who has been dogged by a group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth that has been running ads critical of his testimony.
"I never meant to impugn them," and "I told the truth and if some people have trouble dealing with it I'm sorry about that."
Mr Kerry also offered an explanation for saying recently - to the fury of many of his supporters - that he would still vote to give Mr Bush authority to attack Iraq, knowing what he now knows about the failure to find weapons of mass destruction or links with al-Qaeda.
"The only way to get the inspectors in was to be tough," he said, "but I warned the President to take his time to build up a coalition and not to rush to war. We needed the threat to hold him (Saddam Hussein) accountable."
There were no circumstances under which the US should have gone to war in Iraq, Mr Kerry said, where it was difficult to see how elections could be held with insurgents in control of much of the country.
Pressed to say what he would do to get the US out of Iraq, Mr Kerry replied: "What you ought to be doing, and what everybody in America ought to be doing today, is not asking me. They ought to be asking the President, what's your plan? What's your plan, Mr President, to stop these kids from being killed?"
Responding to charges on the economy, Bush spokesman Mr Scott McClellan said: "We've seen 1.7 million new jobs created over the last year and the last thing we need to do is turn back from those policies.
"The failed policies of higher taxes, more regulation, more litigation and more government control of people's lives would put the brakes on our economy."