BY TRADE he is a car mechanic. But standing on the steps of the polling station after casting his vote for the US president, Will Moore is transformed into a preacher.
"Obama is speaking to my spirit!" he declares to anyone who will listen. "He's speaking to the people who're really needing him! I see the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer! We're going in the wrong direction! People are hurting!" He pumps his fist in the air. "But no more!"
The 46-year-old African-American is visibly trying to calm himself down, but the pent-up emotion of the hour spent in a queue at the Electoral Commission building in Peoria, Illinois, just needs venting. "Obama's not about black and white," he says to me, eyes wide and arms outstretched. "He speaks to white people! He's winning because of the white vote! He's speaking to all of us!"
Like millions across America yesterday, Moore was taking advantage of advance voting ahead of election day on Tuesday. "I couldn't wait," he says, calming down a little. "I was like a little kid waiting for Christmas." He takes a deep breath, steadying himself. He can go home now. He's played his part. He has helped push Barack Obama towards the presidency of the US.
This weekend, Obama stands in the wings of history. The latest polls show the Democrat candidate with 50% of the vote, to Republican candidate John McCain's 43.5%. In the electoral college that ultimately determines who occupies the White House, the battleground states look safe for Obama and the votes are stacking up nicely.
Even in McCain's home state of Arizona, to which the Obama camp has unexpectedly taken the fight with TV ads, the Democrat has narrowed the gap to a little over four points. In the last three days, every vote is being chased, every state contested. "We want to win everywhere," said Obama.
As if the stakes weren't high enough, Obama raised them higher yesterday. Delivering the Democratic party's weekly radio address, he said: "If you give me your vote on Tuesday, we won't just win this election; together, we will change this country and change the world."
Unless the polls are wrong, Obama will be the first black president of the US, making an indelible mark on history. Yet for many Obama voters, that word – unless – is this weekend the source of anxiety as they ponder the imponderables.
Will some white voters balk at voting for a black man when they get to the booth, regardless of what they've been telling pollsters? And will the young people and African-Americans who have newly registered in their hundreds of thousands actually turn up to vote? If there's a two-hour queue, will they wait? What if the 'don't knows' – often older people who prefer to consider a whole campaign before making up their minds – fall mostly to McCain?
Democrats also fear Republican dirty tricks could still deny Obama the White House. In Virginia, where McCain was campaigning yesterday morning in an attempt to keep it Republican, leaflets had been distributed purporting to come from the state government, saying Republicans should vote on November 4 and Democrats vote on November 5. Obama supporters condemned it as a last-minute dirty trick by desperate McCain supporters.
In Iowa, Obama accused the Republicans of practising "slash and burn, say-anything, do-anything politics that's calculated to divide and distract; to tear us apart instead of bringing us together". He said he admired a presidential candidate who said in 2000: "I will not take the low road to the highest office in this land."
"Those words were spoken eight years ago by my opponent, John McCain," Obama said. "But the high road didn't lead him to the White House then, so this time he decided to take a different route."
Despite this, Obama said that, if elected, he would consider appointing McCain to "any position… where I thought he was going to be the best person for our country".
There was embarrassment for Obama, however, with the revelation that his aunt, a Kenyan who has been living in public housing in Boston, is in the US illegally after her request for asylum was rejected four years ago. Zeituni Onyango, 56, referred to as "Aunti Zeituni" in Obama's memoirs, was instructed to leave the US by a judge.
A statement by Obama's campaign said: "Senator Obama has no knowledge of her status, but obviously believes that any and all appropriate laws be followed." The campaign said it was returning $260 that Onyango had contributed in small increments to Obama's presidential bid over several months. Federal election law prohibits foreigners from making political donations.
Onyango is part of Obama's large paternal family, with many related to him by blood whom he never knew growing up. His father, Barack Obama Sr, left when he was two, and they reunited only once – for a month-long visit when Obama was 10. He first met his father's side of the family when he travelled to Africa 20 years ago.
Obama's campaign said he had seen Onyango a few times since that meeting, in Kenya and the US, but had last heard from her about two years ago when she called saying she was in Boston. He did not see her there.
Obama yesterday travelled to final get-out-the-vote rallies in Nevada, Colorado and Missouri, and was scheduled to campaign in Ohio all day today, including a Cleveland rally with singer Bruce Springsteen.
McCain has eight states on his final three-day itinerary, including a detour to New York last night to appear on Saturday Night Live hosted by Obama supporter Ben Affleck.
In a Peoria coffee shop, I speak to an old friend of Obama. Matt Jones is perhaps an unlikely pal of a would-be Democratic president – he's a Republican strategist for Illinois state. The two became friends when Jones was a lobbyist and Obama was a lowly state senator, and they worked together on a contentious law-and-order bill.
"It's an extraordinary thing that an African-American is days from the presidency," says Jones. "If Obama doesn't win, there will be a huge rift in this country, a feeling that the presidency was somehow stolen.
"The irony is that if Obama doesn't win, it will not be because Republicans don't vote for him. Regardless of whether he was black, white, purple or green, they weren't going to vote for him. If he loses, it will be because Democrats don't vote for him.
"The gut-wrenching feeling will be that we are politically and culturally divided. I would not be surprised to see rioting if Obama were to lose."
Jones, however, predicts an Obama victory – and an ideological change of course for the US: "What Barack represents in terms of policies could be much more dramatic than the fact of his race. I think our country is on the verge of a philosophical turn."
However, an Associated Press-Yahoo News poll yesterday revealed that one in seven voters, 14% of the total, are undecided or might change their minds. This election is not over.
•
Read Kenny Farquharson's US election blog•
Scotland on Sunday's US election guide•
Join Kenny from 9pm (UK time) today for an online chat about the US election. Add your questions or comments below – now – and visit here later today for the live discussionThe full article contains 1250 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
