Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin told voters in Florida last night to expect "rough" campaigning as she seeks to halt a slide in opinion polls in a state that could make or break the Republicans’ White House bid.
Strategists say the Alaska governor must rally Republican loyalists into a get-out-the-vote offensive in two days of campaigning in the state that George W. Bush won in 2000 and 2004 but where Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has taken the lead.
"There is a feeling now that we are beginning to see among Republicans that McCain can't win," said David Johnson, a Republican strategist and pollster who worked on Bob Dole's 1988 presidential campaign.
"A lot of the base is dissatisfied with Senator McCain," he said of party activists who helped Mr Bush win in 2000 and 2004.
Winning Florida's 27 electoral votes is vital to Mr McCain's chances of capturing the 270 needed to win the November 4th presidential election.
With the pressure on, Ms Palin is targeting Mr Obama's judgment and character in speeches that include the unsubstantiated charge that the Illinois senator has close ties to Bill Ayers, a former member of the 1960s-era militant Weather Underground.
The group was involved in bombings in the 1960s, when Mr Obama was eight years old. Mr Obama met him in the 1990s when first starting his political career in Chicago and the two served on a board together. Mr Obama has said he knows Mr Ayers only slightly and has denounced his actions with the Weather Underground.
"I am just so fearful that this is not a man who sees America the way you and I see America," Ms Palin said of Mr Obama at a rally of 5,000 supporters in Florida's heavily Republican city of Clearwater.
Critics say that line is especially pointed because of its potential subtext. Mr Obama would be the first black president and his background, including part of a childhood spent in Indonesia, is different from that of most Americans.
Ms Palin (44) seemed to acknowledge that the race was entering a new, harsher phase. "You are going to have to hang onto your hats because from now until election day it may get kind of rough," she said.
Ms Palin was feted like a rock star by the crowd of Republican loyalists, many of whom wore the red, white and blue colors of the American flag and held placards reading "Palin Power," "Go Sarah" and "Florida 4 Sarah."
"Man, some of your signs just make me want to cry. Thank you so much," Ms Palin said.
Ms Palin plans to visit many of the same areas where Mr Bush in 2004 solidified his support, such as north and southwest Florida. In addition to Clearwater, she held a rally in Fort Myers yesterday. Today, she heads to Jacksonville and then cuts across the northwestern Panhandle for an event in Pensacola.