New York: In their most lively but contentious face-to-face debate, Republican and Democratic presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama sparred over their respective economic, healthcare, energy and education policies, promoting their ideas to mostly undecided voters and slamming the other s as doomed to failure.

In their third and final televised debate before the November 4 presidential election, underdog in opinion polls McCain reacted angrily when Obama compared his ideas to President George W Bush's eight years of "failed policies", a line that Democrats regularly take to criticise him.

"Senator Obama, I am not President Bush. If you wanted to run against President Bush, you should have run four years ago," McCain shot back looking directly into Obama's eyes. "If I occasionally mistaken your policies for George Bush's policies, it s because on the core economic issues that matter most to the American people, on tax policies, on energy policy, on spending priorities, you have been vigorous supporter of President Bush," Obama replied.

This was one of the highly contentious exchanges which highlighted the nervousness of the candidates with election only three weeks away. With some polls showing that McCain was behind some of the battle ground states as also those which had voted Republican in the previous several elections, he was under strong pressure to distance himself from Bush.

Though polls give Obama up to ten per cent advantage over McCain, analysts say that much would depend on whether the White voters are ready to accept a black in the White House. If race factor does play up, Obama lead could come down sharply, they say, giving example from previous elections.

Source : PTI