Democratic presidential hopeful Mr Howard Dean today questioned chief rival Mr John Kerry's judgment on the issue of war and accused unnamed campaigns of engaging in last-minute "dirty tricks."
The former Vermont governor, who is trying to claw his way back after a dismal third place finish last week in Iowa behind Mr Kerry and Mr Edwards, said the race was "closing very fast" in New Hampshire, which holds the nation's first state primary tomorrow.
"We're feeling very positive," he told reporters. "We know its very close, we know we're surging and the question is can we close the gap and eliminate the gap by tomorrow."
Mr Dean, who has toned down his "red meat rhetoric" after a bellowing concession speech in Iowa, took on Mr Kerry directly over his votes on the 1991 Gulf War and last year's US-led invasion to oust Saddam Hussein.
"John Kerry has gone out of his way to say how inexperienced I am in foreign policy," Mr Dean told a town hall meeting in Nashua. "Let's talk about this. In 1991, I supported George Bush the first ... because one of our allies had been attacked, there were Iraqi troops on the ground in Kuwait setting fire to oil wells, an environmental disaster, and John Kerry voted against the war."
"Where was John Kerry when George (W.) Bush was handing out all this misinformation about Saddam had something to do with al Qaeda?" Mr Dean asked. "He was voting in favor of the war and it turned out all the reasons the president gave us were not true."
Mr Dean, who has acknowledged a foreign policy "gap" in his resume, argued that expertise in the international arena depended upon "patience and judgment" and said that was something he had learned from practicing medicine .
Mr Kerry held a shrinking three-point lead over Dean on the eve of the New Hampshire primary, according to a Reuters/MSNBC/Zogby poll released today. He shaved four points off Mr Kerry's advantage, as supporters who wavered after his poor showing in Iowa and fist-pumping, shrieking speech, appeared to be returning to the fold.