Mr Obama, who is leading Republican John McCain in national polls, showed his daughter his ballot and smiled as he cast his vote. -- PHOTO: AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
WASHINGTON - AMERICANS crowded polling stations on Tuesday to vote in their historic election, with front-running Democrat Barack Obama fighting to be the first black US president and Republican John McCain hoping for an upset win.
Amid predictions of record turnout, long queues snaked in the dark outside polling stations waiting to open in states like New York, Maryland, and hotly contested Virginia, with many expecting to stand for hours to vote.
Early voters cast ballots in historic US election
BETHESDA (Maryland) - CLUTCHING cups of coffee or the morning paper, voters flocked to polling stations on Tuesday to cast their ballots in the hard-fought race for the White House between Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain.
BERLIN - THE world was riveted by the election drama unfolding Tuesday in the United States, inspired by the hope embodied by Barack Obama or simply relieved that - whoever wins - an administration that spawned Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay was coming to an end.
From Berlin's Brandenburg Gate to the small town of Obama, Japan, the globe geared up to celebrate a fresh start for America after eight wearisome years of George W. Bush.
NEW YORK - A LIKELY record presidential election voter turnout has polling officials across the United States braced for problems. Some difficulties surfaced early on Tuesday as people turned out in droves even before balloting began before sunrise in eastern states.
Voters had to use paper ballots because of problems with electronic voting machines in some New Jersey precincts, and in Virginia, long lines of voters waited even longer in one case because, poll workers said, the head of a branch library had overslept.
Results were expected to start pouring in after the first polls closed at 6pm (7am Singapore time, Wednesday), though it was not clear when it would be known who will succeed US President George W. Bush ending his second four-year term in January.
'The last eight years has been a horror story,' said Michael Smith, a 54-year-old salesman, standing among hundreds stretching around the block at a polling station in Manhattan. He said he would vote for Mr Obama.
'The country itself is slipping in the (popularity) polls,' he said. 'In the end that's what people are going to vote for today - a new direction.'
In Christianburg, Virginia, Norma Jean Lundis said she voted for McCain because he 'stands for what I believe in - less government, lets me control my money, the right to bear arms, life begins at conception, marriage between man and woman.'
History's longest, costliest White House campaign ended with Mr Obama the hot favorite, enjoying wide leads in national polls and the edge in a string of battleground states which could swing the election either way.
The Hawaii-born Illinois senator's strategists hoped unusually high turnout of new and younger voters would carry him to victory over his colleague from Arizona.
In the eye of the worst financial storm since the 1930s and with US troops embroiled in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, both Obama and McCain have vowed to restore the frayed self-confidence of the world's lone superpower.
After an epic campaign, a political realignment in Washington was also possible, with Democrats targeting big gains in the Senate and House of Representatives fueled by Bush's record unpopularity.
Mr Obama and Mr McCain were chasing the 270 electoral votes needed across the state-by-state electoral map to take the White House. More than 100 million people were expected to trek to the polls to add to 30 million advance votes.
Mr Obama, joined by his wife Michelle Obama and his young daughters Sasha and Malia, voted in Chicago, telling reporters later: 'I feel great.'
His running mate, Delaware Senator Joe Biden, voted in his home state with his 91-year-old mother and wife Jill.
Mr McCain was to vote in Arizona at 9am (10pm Singapore time), while his running mate, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, was scheduled to vote in her hometown of Wasilla as soon as polls open.
Mr Obama and Mr McCain, one of whom will become the first sitting senator elected president since John F. Kennedy in 1960, hit the finish line on Monday with competing cross-country campaign blitzes.
In a cruel twist of fate on Monday, Mr Obama learned that Madelyn Dunham, his maternal grandmother who helped bring him up, had died in his native Hawaii from cancer, aged 86.
Tears running down his face at a rally in Charlotte, North Carolina, Mr Obama thanked Mr McCain for an 'incredibly gracious' statement of condolence on Monday.
Mr Obama, 47, told voters they were close to 'changing the United States of America', speaking in Florida as he also whipped up crowds in North Carolina and Virginia, hoping to squeeze his rival on normally Republican territory.
But Mr McCain was defiant on Monday, vowing to confound pollsters and pundits and overcome a treacherous political map which has him struggling to cling to Republican bastions and where one big loss could make Mr Obama president.
'The Mac is back!' he roared at his campaign stops, promising a stunning act of political escapology that would confound almost every major opinion poll.
The decorated Vietnam War hero, 72, raced through Florida, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Indiana, New Mexico and Nevada before heading home to Arizona.
Mr McCain also scheduled an 11th-hour get-out-the-vote campaign in New Mexico and Colorado, two traditionally Republican states under threat from Obama.
Mr Obama, the son of a black Kenyan father and white mother from Kansas, would become the first African American president after a stunning rise to the pinnacle of US politics.
He promises to alleviate the economic pinch for the middle class and repair ties with US allies, weigh opening talks with foes such as Iran and Cuba, bring troops home from Iraq and refocus on the Afghan war.
Mr McCain has lambasted Mr Obama for 'socialist' tax policies, and argues his rival is unprepared for an age of global turmoil.
