DaytonDailyNews.com

DAYTON — Taking a page from Bill Clinton's 1992 playbook, fellow Democrat Barack Obama used the first day of a two-day Ohio campaign swing to highlight his plans to solve the current financial mess.

"This is about Americans here in Dayton who are losing their jobs, and their homes, and their life savings," he told a cheering crowd estimated at 8,500 gathered at Fifth Third Field on Thursday, Oct. 9.

Obama called John McCain's leadership "erratic and uncertain" and, in an applause line, said the Arizona Republican would follow the same Bush administration policies that have turned 401(k) retirement plans into 101(k)s.

Obama blasted McCain for trying to make the campaign about Obama, not the economy. Obama said he could take four more weeks of McCain's attacks but that Americans couldn't take four more years of continuing President Bush's policies.

Obama said that McCain's plan to direct the Treasury secretary to have the government buy bad mortgages would hurt taxpayers and reward irresponsible lenders. McCain at first proposed the government buy the mortgages at marked down rates and then shifted positions, Obama said.

"Well, I don't think we can afford that kind of erratic and uncertain leadership in these uncertain times," he said.