Super Tuesday ; Who is you Candidate

US voters have begun going to the polls in primaries and caucuses on Super Tuesday - the biggest day in the presidential nominating race so far.
The 24 states involved account for over half the delegates who will choose the candidates for November's election.

The Republican race, in which John McCain is leading his main challenger, Mitt Romney, may be decided on Tuesday.

But Democratic rivals Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are so close that this contest is set to go further.

Both parties' presidential hopefuls have been making last minute pushes for votes on the early morning US TV shows.

Mrs Clinton told CNN: "There are a lot of people who worry that the president just doesn't pay attention. I want them to know that I get it and I'll be there for them if they're willing to go out and vote for me today."

Meanwhile, Mr Obama told NBC: "The fact that we've made so much progress I think indicates that we've got the right message, and the question is are we going to be able to pull some states out."



For his part, Mr Romney asserted his conservative credentials, telling Fox News that voters would be saying to themselves: " If I want the conservative [candidate] I've gotta vote for Mitt Romney - he's the only one who's got a realistic chance of getting this nomination."

Mr McCain said he was cautiously optimistic that the next 24 hours would settle his party's race in his favour.

"I'm happy that we're doing as well as we are, but this could be a long night," he told NBC.

The BBC's James Coomarasamy in Washington says that in what seems like the blink of an eye, a sprawling, multi-candidate presidential race has shrunk and transformed itself into an intense and highly focused one.

In both the Republican and Democratic contests, it now comes down to a scramble for delegates on what is, without doubt, the most significant day of the campaign so far, our correspondent says.

In three states, only the Democratic Party is involved, and in two, only the Republican Party. In the other 19, which together account for nearly half the US population, both parties are in action.

Georgia is the first state to end voting at 2400 GMT, although West Virginia Republicans will make their choices at a convention earlier in the day. Voting in California ends at 0400 GMT.

Nine of the states holding their Republican primaries, including big states such as New York and New Jersey, have a winner-takes-all system.

Whoever gets the most voters in those states is awarded all of their delegates to the party's convention, where the candidate who wins more than 1,191 votes becomes the nominee for the presidential election.

A national poll for the Washington Post and ABC showed Mr McCain well ahead of his rivals. The Arizona senator had 48% against Mr Romney's 24%, with Mike Huckabee and Ron Paul trailing far behind.




A Reuters/C-Span/Zogby poll gave Mr McCain double digit leads over Mr Romney in New York, New Jersey and Missouri, although the former Massachusetts governor was ahead 40% to 32% in California.

The Republican front-runner kicked off his final push on Monday with a rally in Massachusetts, before heading for New Jersey and New York. He also made a last-minute change to his schedule to appear one more time in California.

Mr Romney, meanwhile, had an exhausting schedule of events in Tennessee, Georgia, Oklahoma and California.

'Exhausting and exhilarating'

The Democratic Party race is likely to be less decisive, our correspondent says.

Their delegates are allocated along more complex, proportional lines that can vary from district to district, making it more difficult to predict when one of the two remaining candidates will cross the decisive delegate threshold.

Further complicating the nomination contest is the presence of what are known as "super delegates" - members of the party hierarchy who will make up about a fifth of all those attending the party convention in late August.

They can choose whom to support at any point between now and then. In close presidential races, their votes have proved decisive, our correspondent adds.

Monday's Washington Post/ABC poll showed Senator Clinton's lead over Senator Obama had narrowed to 4%, while other polls showed the two neck-and-neck in the key state of California.

Of the 2,025 delegates needed to secure the nomination as the Democratic Party's presidential candidate, California carries 370.

Despite this, both candidates spent Monday campaigning on the East Coast.

Mrs Clinton began the day with a visit to a child study centre at Yale University, where she volunteered as a law student, before later making stops in Massachusetts and New York.

Mr Obama flew out of Chicago and landed in New Jersey, where he attended a rally in East Rutherford.