Campaign '08: The Inauguration

NEW YORK (CBS News) ― For the series, "Final Battleground," the CBS Evening News is traveling to three key areas of the country - the South, the Midwest and the West - to hone in on the states that will decide this presidential election. Missouri is one state that could swing toward either Barack Obama or John McCain, CBS News anchor Katie Couric reports.

Economy Big Factor In Bellwether Missouri

In every election since 1900 - except in 1956 - whoever won Missouri went on to the White House. No wonder both candidates are campaigning there with a vengeance.

Traditional heartland ideals - like guns and God - play high here.

"I'm not going to vote for Obama," said McCain supporter Larry Flemming. "Obama is going to take away our rights to carry guns, carry arms."

But the weight of a faltering economy is shifting historic allegiances - evident in the most unlikely of places.

That's right: Rednecks for Obama. Hailing from Missouri's bible belt, the NASCAR-loving, gun-toting duo spent the last year working to convert social conservatives over to the Democratic ticket.

"I'm sensing a feeling that we have to change," Les Spencer of Rednecks for Obama said. "This is the most important election that there's ever been."

But in their disillusionment, the Obama campaign sees opportunity.

Obama has 40 Missouri campaign offices; McCain only 16. The Obama team has spent over half a million dollars more in state-wide advertising - and worked to get Democratic registration up in places like St. Louis County.

Wherever you live in Missouri, hard economic times are weighing heavily on voters here.

Especially at the Chrysler plant just outside of the city of St. Louis. At the end of the month, just four days before the election, it will shut down and 1,200 jobs will be lost. But for every one of these manufacturing jobs, five to seven others exist - so the impact will be enormous.

Brenda Carter has worked for Chrysler since 1984. She was five years short of retirement when she got the news she would lose her job at the end of the month.

"And now I'm worried about my health benefits," she said. "I'm worried about my Social Security. I'm worried about my pension."

"How do you think what's going on here in Missouri, in terms of the economy, will affect the way people vote? What's your sense?" Couric asked Bruce Reece.

"People want a change," he said. "They want a change for the middle class. And my sense is, this, Barack Obama, is the man to give us that."

Reece faces the prospect of collecting unemployment, or having to move away from his wife and young son in order to carry on the work he's known and loved for 23 years.

Couric said: "Your wife voted for President Bush in 2004. Will she stay Republican this go-round?"

"No, no," Reece said. "She's - her main concern right now is the economy."

Like North Carolina or Virginia, the McCain campaign thought Missouri would be strongly in his column. But the declining economy and Obama's soaring campaign war chest may make it difficult for McCain to make up the deficit.

McCain's Challenge In 'Must-Win' Ohio

Nobody has to spell it out for John McCain. Like every other Republican nominee in history, if he does not win Ohio, he won't win the White House, Greenfield reports.

And the terrain is daunting: with more than 88 offices throughout the Buckeye state - more than double that of McCain - and with more than 10,000 volunteers, Obama's ground game has neutralized the Republican operation that gave President Bush his narrow victory there four years ago.

"What's significant compared to '04 is that the Democrats and the Obama campaign are making a run at the collar counties. They were ignored by, largely ignored by, Kerry in 2004," said Mark Naymik of the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

The "collar counties" are ones surrounding large cities like Cleveland.

That city and Columbus will likely generate huge majorities for Obama; Cincinnati, and Southern Ohio will likely be big for McCain. So the key are those collar counties - like Lake County, narrowly won by Mr. Bush four years ago.

John McCain's fate in Ohio may come down to places like Painesville, some 30 miles northwest of Cleveland. Without big majorities among working and middle-class whites in places like these, McCain simply cannot win the state.

"We're going to have to do a little bit stronger here in Lake County as other collar counties," said Lake County GOP chair Dale Fellows. "That's where the battleground is going to be to offset what we know we're going to lose in the urban counties."

Fellows says that apart from taxes and McCain's personal story, the message is to raise doubts about Obama - as with the "robocalls" that link Obama to Bill Ayers.

"What Sen. Obama represents is so far out of the mainstream but he's been able to paint himself more into the mainstream. What we're trying to do is just say, here's really who Barack Obama is," Fellows said.

Tim Hagan a 40-year veteran of Ohio Democratic politics, says there's a racial undertone to "out-of-the-mainstream" message - but it is complex.

"They're making a case, not in a boldness of saying, you know, 'don't vote for the black guy,' they're making the case of saying, 'vote for one of your own.' The subtlety of it is simply this: He's not like us."

A McCain victory in Ohio will not be enough to save his campaign, but it is an absolute necessity for his presidential hopes.

The New GOP Push For Indiana

The Republicans certainly have had their way in this state for a long time. There have only been three elections in the 20th century where they haven't won, and the last one was 1964.

In my opinion, the McCain-Palin campaign has taken Indiana for granted this year. Sarah Palin made her first stop last Friday. We have only seen John McCain once.

They have really been out-performed by Obama on all fronts. He's got over 40 offices open around the state in small communities. The Obama campaign has probably registered 150,000, maybe 200,000, new voters.

And I think what their plan is, is to try and offset some of the latent racism that may exist here in the state with a new voter.

To use an Indiana basketball term, this is a barn burner.

Hoosiers have a long love affair with the internal combustion engine. We were an auto center and what has happened to Detroit has really impacted the economy her in Indiana. And I think that is why, a lot of Republicans and Independents are certainly taking a long look at Barack Obama.

I was told by McCain operatives here that they were going to do it the old-fashioned way - they felt like they had a very strong state organization. And the Indiana Republican Party is a very strong state organization.

Traditionally, Republican presidential nominees swoop in to Indiana to raise money. And now they have to put out a prairie fire.

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