Las Vegas: The race is on to define John McCain. The likely Republican nominee has launched his first television ad of the general election campaign, casting himself as a ready-to-lead wartime president in advance of a biographical tour to pivotal places in his life.

Son of a military man, midshipman, Navy pilot, Vietnam PoW, member of Congress for nearly three decades - this is the resume of the 71-year-old McCain.

"In some ways, I m well-known to the American people. In other ways, I m not well-known," McCain told The Associated Press yesterday.

The Democratic Party - still lacking a nominee and its supporters offer a starkly different portrait. In their view, McCain is a Washington insider, backer of an unpopular war in Iraq, hair-trigger quick on Iran and indifferent on the economic woes of average Americans.

They cast McCain as four more years of President George W Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

"All he wants to do is continue on the George Bush failed policies of the past," says Democratic Senator Barack Obama.

His rival, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, talks about "a Bush/McCain Iraq policy" and argues that "we ve had enough of a president who didn t know enough about economics."

Seven months before Election Day, the two parties are furiously trying to establish a lasting image of McCain for voters.

Perceptions can take hold, whether it's the one the Bush campaign crafted in 2004 of a strong, steady leader or the one critics tagged to Democratic nominee John Kerry - flip-flopper.
Source : PTI