Candidates make final appeals in N.C.

N.C. voters hear from the hopefuls one final time as long campaign winds down with today's election

Candidates crisscrossed North Carolina on Monday, making final appeals before voters go to the polls today.

President

Democrat Barack Obama, who also was in Florida and Virginia, appeared at a rally Monday evening in Charlotte. Meanwhile, Republican John McCain was in Florida, Pennsylvania, Indiana and in Tennessee near the Virginia line. See stories on Page 6A.

U.S. Senate

Republican U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole said at Raleigh-Durham International Airport that she's been unfairly criticized by $18 million worth of "rough attack ads" from groups such as MoveOn.org. She said her Democratic opponent, Kay Hagan, "would be in [Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid's pocket the moment she gets there."

Hagan continued to portray Dole as an absentee senator. "We need a senator who was not only born here, but who went to school here, worked here and raised a family here," Hagan said. "I want to be a senator who spends a lot more time in Wayne, Wake and Watauga County than the Watergate and Washington, D.C."

Governor

Republican Pat McCrory told more than 100 supporters at the state capitol that among his first acts would be to assemble crisis teams to overhaul the state budget and mental health system. Those groups will help usher in the culture shift he has promised for the state capital. "It starts Wednesday," McCrory said.

Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue, the Democratic candidate, hit a restaurant in Winston-Salem, greeted supporters in Asheville and visited a cafeteria in Charlotte. She held a tarmac rally in her home turf of New Bern and finished the day by greeting supporters at The Point restaurant in Raleigh.

"We can just feel the momentum," Perdue told reporters. "I feel really good about where we are."