BARACK OBAMA has launched a website to counter false rumours, including the suggestion that he is a Muslim and the claim that a video shows his wife Michelle using the word "whitey" in a speech from a church pulpit.
The site at www.fightthesmears.cominvites supporters to submit e-mails containing hostile rumours and to spread the word when the rumours are debunked.
Mr Obama complained last week that rumours such as that about the alleged "whitey" video has passed into the media mainstream. "It is a destructive aspect of our politics right now," he said.
"And simply because something appears in an e-mail, that should lend it no more credence than if you heard it on the corner. And you know, presumably the job of the press is to not go around and spread scurrilous rumours like this until there's actually anything, one iota of substance or evidence that would substantiate it."
The new website says that no such recording of Ms Obama exists and also describes as a "smear" the rumour that Mr Obama is a Muslim, was educated at a radical religious school and used the Koran when he was sworn in as a senator.
"Senator Obama has never been a Muslim, was not raised as a Muslim, and is a committed Christian," the website says.
Mr Obama's latest offensive against the rumour mill comes as an NBC News/ Wall Street Journalopinion poll shows him opening up a six-point lead over Republican John McCain. The poll, which was conducted last weekend, after Hillary Clinton conceded defeat in the Democratic primaries and endorsed Mr Obama, shows the Democrat ahead among most voter groups.
Mr Obama leads Mr McCain among African-Americans by 83 per cent to 7 per cent, Hispanics by more than two to one, women by 52 per cent to 33 per cent, and he also has an edge among Catholics, independents and even blue-collar workers. Mr McCain has a 20 point lead, however, among white men - who made up more than one-third of voters in 2004 and the Republican is also ahead among white suburban women, an important group of swing voters that account for 10 per cent of the electorate.
The poll suggests that Mr Obama could benefit from choosing Ms Clinton as his running mate. Offered a choice between such a Democratic ticket and a Republican ticket of Mr McCain and former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, 39 per cent of previously undecided voters said they would choose the Democrats, compared to 26 per cent for the Republicans.
Among white suburban women, with Ms Clinton on the ticket, Mr Obama would go from six points down against Mr McCain to two points.
Mr Obama's search for a running mate stumbled this week with the resignation of Jim Johnson, who had led a three-person team vetting possible vice-presidential candidates. Mr Johnson, who performed a similar role for John Kerry in 2004 and Walter Mondale in 1984, stepped down after the Wall Street Journal reported that he had received loans worth $1.7 million from the troubled sub-prime lender, Countrywide Home Loans, through a special arrangement with the company's chief executive.
Mr Obama, who had criticised Countrywide for its role in the US mortgage crisis, initially dismissed the controversy, saying that Mr Johnson was an unpaid volunteer performing a "discrete task" for his campaign. On Wednesday, however, Mr Obama changed course and accepted Mr Johnson's resignation on the grounds that the story had become a distraction.
Mr McCain's campaign said the move raised "serious questions about Barack Obama's judgment".