Obama and McCain: A nervous wait for results

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain began a nervous wait for results in their fight for the White House on Tuesday, with Obama in clear command as voting began to end in the first two U.S. states.

Polls in parts of Indiana and Kentucky began to close at 6 p.m. EST, with closing times spread over the next six hours in the other 48 states and the District of Columbia.

Long lines greeted voters in many battleground states like Pennsylvania, Ohio and Virginia, but no major breakdowns or irregularities were reported as at least 130 million Americans cast votes on a successor to unpopular Republican President George W. Bush.

Obama, 47, a first-term senator from Illinois, would be the first black U.S. president. Opinion polls indicate he is running ahead of McCain in enough states to give him more than the 270 electoral votes he needs to win.

A victory for McCain, 72, would make him the oldest president to begin a first term in the White House and make his running mate Sarah Palin the first female U.S. vice president.

McCain's hopes for an upset rested on a tightening trend seen in some polls last week, or the possibility that all polls have overestimated Obama's support.

Tuesday's winner will face a crush of challenges over the next four years, including the economic crisis, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, a health-care overhaul and other issues.

Opinion polls showed Obama ahead or even with McCain in at least eight states won by Bush in 2004, including the big prizes of Ohio and Florida. Obama led comfortably in all of the states won by Democrat John Kerry in 2004.

Obama victories in either Ohio or Florida, or in traditionally Republican states where polls show he is competitive like Virginia, Colorado, Indiana and North Carolina, would likely propel him to the White House.

World stocks rose to a two-week high and U.S. stocks gained with major indices up more than 2 percent, as investors looked with relief to the end of the campaign.

Analysts have said market prices probably already reflect expectations of an Obama victory. If Democrats expand their control of Congress, it may be easier for the new administration, which takes over in January, to deal with the financial crisis.

In Ohio, Ian Edwards said he voted for Obama. "Very simple," said Edwards, the chief executive of a small technology company. "Bad war. Bad economy. Bad reputation overseas."

Cattleman Casey Bradshaw of Canyon, Texas, said he voted early for McCain. "He's more experienced, and he's known to the people who make up this country," he said.

The race was closely watched around the world, including in Kenya, where in Obama's late father's village of Kogelo, residents prayed for his presidential bid and for his maternal grandmother, who died in Hawaii this week.

CAMPAIGN THEMES

Obama and his wife, Michelle, voted at his Chicago polling station accompanied by their two daughters. Poll workers and voters snapped pictures and cheered. "Voting with my daughters, that was a big deal," he said.

Obama made a final campaign stop in Indianapolis, visiting a union hall to thank members and making several phone calls to voters. He later played basketball in Chicago with friends and staff before watching election returns.

McCain, an Arizona senator, voted near his Phoenix apartment before final stops in Colorado and New Mexico. He will watch returns in Arizona.

"I'm happy to tell you that there is very big turnout in the states we need big turnout in," McCain told volunteers at a phone bank in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

"Virginia, Florida, North Carolina are coming along well. Ohio and Pennsylvania, it's very early, but things are looking good for turnouts in our parts of those states," he said.

Voting monitors in Florida said the biggest problem was long lines, especially on college campuses. In two Sarasota precincts, so many votes were cast no more could be stuffed into the ballot boxes.

"The lock box is overflowing and they are putting the ballots in bags," said Marcia Johnson-Blanco from the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, which was part of a vote-monitoring coalition.

CAMPAIGNING TO THE END

The candidates hammered their campaign themes in the final hours, with Obama accusing McCain of representing a third term for Bush's policies and being out of touch on the economy.

McCain, whose campaign has attacked Obama as a socialist and accused him of being a "pal" with terrorists, portrayed him as a tax-raising liberal.

But in a difficult political environment for Republicans, McCain has struggled to separate himself from Bush. Exit polls showed three out of every four voters thought the United States was on the wrong track.

Obama took command of the race in the last month as a deepening financial crisis reinforced his perceived strengths on the economy, and what was viewed as a better performance in three debates.

Democrats are also expected to expand majorities in both chambers of Congress. They need to gain nine Senate seats to reach a 60-seat majority that would give them the muscle to defeat Republican procedural hurdles.

That would raise pressure on Democrats to deliver on campaign promises to end the war in Iraq, eliminate Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy and overhaul health care.

(Additional reporting by Randall Mikkelsen, Andrea Hopkins, Jeff Mason, Caren Bohan and Tim Gaynor; Editing by Kristin Roberts and Frances Kerry)