The Obama campaign on Friday lined up a new roll call of senior Republican figures to endorse the Democratic candidate while the McCain campaign launched a series of new attack advertisements in the hope of reversing the powerful tide running against it.

Mr Obama, who was in Honolulu on Friday visiting his ailing grandmother whom he doubted would live to see the election ten days from now, maintained his lead in the opinion polls with the RealClear political site giving him an average lead of 7.4 percentage points – enough to deliver a landslide win.