Johnstown is a small working-class town, not the kind of place you would expect to find an anti-war rally.
MAN: It's a war we should have never, never ever been in.
WOMAN: I am not for the Iraq war, I am for the war on terror, but we have took a wrong turn in Iraq. And it is sad for our kids. And, you know, we have just got to find a way out of there.
Here in a key swing state like Pennsylvania, this sentiment translates directly into support for the local congressman's re-election.
MAN: Good to see you. All the way! All the way! All the way!
A 20-year veteran of Congress who served in Vietnam, John Murtha has always been known as a military hawk within the Democratic Party. So people sat up and listened when this conservative military man publicly called for American troops to be brought home from Iraq.
JOHN MURTHA, DEMOCRAT: Our troops, our sacred troops are caught in the middle of a civil war. And we've got to let them settle this themselves. We cannot do it for them!
Like the Labor Party in Australia, the Democrats have seen the polls that show solid majorities in both countries opposed to the war. Iraq is now their key ammunition against the Republicans this election.
MAN: There's a lot of people speaking out this year, you know. I mean, President Bush's popularity has gone down the tank so even Republicans don't like the war. Murtha was just one of the first public figures to speak out.
MAN 2: Listen, can I get a picture of you for Downing Street? Thank you. I'm a registered Republican.
REPORTER: But you support Murtha and his stance on the war?
MAN 2: Absolutely. That answer your question?
MAN 3: Murtha has made me pretty much switch to being a Democrat.
JOHN MURTHA: How are you doing over here, huh? Nice to see you. All the close seats will be decided by this particular issue, no question about it.
CURT WELDON, REPUBLICAN CONGRESSMAN: Yet if you read the statements he made when he was on the aircraft carrier, they were pretty belligerent.
In outer suburbs of Philadelphia, Republican Curt Weldon is desperately trying to hold on to his seat against Democrat challenger Joe Sestak.
CURT WELDON: He resigned his position before the war started.
A senior Republican, Weldon is vice-chair of the Armed Services Committee. So as the candidates debate at the local press club, it's remarkable to see him on the defensive.
CURT WELDON: We shouldn't cut and run. What we should do is allow the decision not to be made by Dick Cheney or Don Rumsfeld.
PHIL HERON, DELAWARE COUNTRY TIMES, NEWSPAPER EDITOR: Mr Sestak, the recent Keystone Poll of voters in the 7th District indicated 31%, the largest portion, believe Iraq is the most important issue in this race.
On the panel at the debate is local newspaper editor Phil Heron. He thinks it is extraordinary that Weldon is in such a tight race.
PHIL HERON: It is clear that he is in a race unlike any of the others he's had. He has been our congressman here in this district since 1986. He has won re-election 10 times and almost always by an overwhelming majority. So everyone was a little bit taken aback when the first independent poll came out last week and showed literally the race is almost a dead heat.
Democrat challenger Joe Sestak knows which issue has brought him into such close contention.
JOE SESTAK, DEMOCRAT CANDIDATE: I never would have voted for this war into Iraq as Congressman Weldon did. Nor would I continue to support President Bush every step of the way with every vote on this Iraqi policy that has no exit strategy.
MAN: You are bringing back hope, sir.
JOE SESTAK: Thank you very much.
PHIL HERON: And like it or not, Curt Weldon - the long-time incumbent here in the 7th District - has been linked with the President and his policies, and that has become something almost of a referendum on Iraq.
Like many Democrats in tight races Sestak's campaign strategy has focused on linking Weldon as close to President Bush as possible.
VOICEOVER: He votes with George Bush 9 out of 10 times, and voted to raise his own pay by $64,000.
JOE SESTAK: I am Joe Sestak and I authorise this message.
While the President is polling in the 30s, Laura Bush's approval ratings are in the 80s, so Curt Weldon has made an astute political decision to campaign with the first lady. Local radio reporter David Madden believes Weldon is trying to distance himself from President Bush.
DAVID MADDEN, RADIO REPORTER: Mr Bush may be seen more as a liability in a very close race.
CURT WELDON: Please join me in welcoming our first lady, the world's first lady, Laura Bush.
LAURA BUSH, THE FIRST LADY: Congressman Weldon is especially supportive of young people with disabilities. But keeping young Pennsylvanians safe also requires protecting them from foreign threats by defeating terrorism and increasing liberty abroad.
The first lady has a more upbeat spin on the war in Iraq.
LAURA BUSH: And thanks to our troops the Iraqi people are now free from the oppression of Saddam Hussein
So keen is Curt Weldon to distance himself from the President's Iraq policy that he has come up with his own troop withdrawal plan.
DAVID MADDEN: He would normally be, you know, "I'll do whatever the President wants me to do on this." But now now he is sounding a more middle-of-the-road tone, which is to say, "I want the generals on the ground to make the call when we leave, rather than a politician sitting in an armchair."
Weldon's plan is certainly out of character. He has been known as a reliable Bush supporter, who just four months ago still maintained there could be weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and even offered to go look for them himself.
REPORTER: You haven't always been for troop withdrawal. Why did you feel the need to come up with this plan?
CURT WELDON: I have always been for bringing our troops out but the question is under what circumstances and what...and what and to give the American people a better understanding.
REPORTER: So why is it important now?
CURT WELDON: It's just because I think the President has not articulated what the criteria for withdrawal is. I gave him this plan a year ago to basically let the American people know that there is a plan.
CURT WELDON: But make no mistake about it, folks, while I support our troops and will go to the end for them, my ultimate responsibility in Washington is to avoid war.
On the campaign trail again that afternoon Weldon is sounding more like an anti-war Democrat.
CURT WELDON: War is a symbol of diplomatic failure. And I use my voice and my energy to avoid having America's sons and daughters go into harm's way.
But across the road these Joe Sestak supporters aren't buying this sudden change of heart.
MAN: He had no criticism of the war until this summer. And he's simply making it up because he's worried about losing the election. So if you see his signs, you see it says 'independent'. Curt Weldon has never been independent of the Republican right wing of the party in his life. If he wins, he will go right back to supporting everything in the Republican ticket from start to finish. It's completely cynical and opportunistic.
The Republicans are so worried by this tight race in Pennsylvania they have also rolled out the popular Senator John McCain.
JOHN McCAIN, REPUBLICAN SENATOR: And we have to prevail. And I know it is tough and I know it is hard. And we have made mistakes and mistakes have been made. And we should have told the American people much more clearly how long and hard and tough this struggle is and what it was going to be. But we are there now, we are there now.
MAN: I admire you so much, I just want you to know. Could I just please get a picture with you? Thank you, sir.
REPORTER: How is the campaigning going so far?
JOHN McCAIN: Fine thanks.
REPORTER: Are you worried about the effect the war is going to have on this election?
JOHN Mc CAIN: I am worried about a lot of things. We've got some tough races but I think we can win. OK?
And while some Republicans are doing backflips to appear less gung-ho about the war, the Democrats are trying their hardest to appear tough. This campaign event for Weldon's challenger, Joe Sestak, is being held on the grounds of the local military academy. There is good reason why Sestak, a former navy admiral, was picked to challenge in this tight race.
WOMAN: I believe that he brings military credibility to the Democrats and I think that is very important.
It is a big effort to turn their image around and the party is pulling out all the big names to help out.
BILL CLINTON, FORMER US PRESIDENT: We have nine, NINE Iraq war veterans running for Congress as Democrats this year.
Bill Clinton is still a huge drawcard, and he challenges head-on the Republican charge that his party is soft on security.
BILL CLINTON: You have heard their campaign. Their basic campaign is "OK, we messed up Katrina, we messed up Iraq, we've got a big deficit, but you've still got to vote for us because those Democrats won't protect you and there will be a terrorist on every street corner." You know, they're nice people, I'm not saying they're not patriotic but they are just spineless and they won't stand up for you and they will all lay down. Now, if you think... I think it's a pretty hard sell against a guy who spent 31 years in the navy and was on the National Security Council and was an admiral.
Clinton still knows how to energise the party faithful.
BILL CLINTON: If people are afraid and take flight into that other world, we lose. If they stay in the reality based world, he wins, and you win and your children win. Go make it happen. God bless you.
President Bush rejects the notion that he is running a scare campaign.
PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: I...you know, I understand that some are saying, "Well, he's just trying to scare us." My job is to look at the intelligence. And I'm going to tell you there is an enemy out there that would like to do harm again to the United States because we're in a war.
And while the President is doing his best to frame the election around national security, another issue threatens support in his core constituency. Christian conservatives were shocked when Republican congressman Mark Foley was forced to resign after sending suggestive emails to young male pages at Congress.
JOURNALIST: Who would have predicted that a paper trail of email would expose a congressman having Internet sex with a slew of Capitol pages, that the trail of cover-up would find its way to the top, causing this 2006 political pinball machine to all of a sudden flash 'Filth'?
The small towns of rural Pennsylvania are home to some of these Christian conservative voters. One of the most powerful Republicans, Senator Rick Santorum, has comfortably held this seat since 1995, but this year he is in trouble.
SPEAKER: Rick Santorum has earned the support of small business for his re-election campaign.
And no event is too small when you are behind in the polls. Santorum now finds himself addressing a handful of small businessman in a desperate attempt to win his suddenly tight race.
RICK SANTORUM, REPUBLICAN SENATOR: Thank you, Lou. I appreciate that. It is a great pleasure for me to be here this morning.
But the local press doesn't want to know about the Builders Association endorsement. They want to know about the new threat posed by a nuclear-armed North Korea.
RICK SANTORUM: We are being faced now with a situation that I think could lead to a series of events that really could shake the foundation of the security of the world.
It is possible the North Korean crisis, by focusing voters back on national security, will work to the Republicans' advantage, especially as that axis of evil seems to keep on expanding.
RICK SANTORUM: This test by North Korea, that issue has even heightened more about how we're going to defend ourselves against this growing storm of evil, as the President referred to them as the axis of evil, of North Korea, Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, Syria.
REPORTER: What impact would having a Democratically controlled House have on the Iraq war? What would it do?
RICK SANTORUM: I think you would see...you would see a push by the Democrats to try to pull our troops back as quickly as possible irrespective of whether that results in a victory over the enemy that is before us. And I think it could lead us to, in my opinion, cataclysmic consequences of not defeating the enemy before the enemy gets to the point where they become a more serious threat than they are today.
To concentrate voters' minds on the enemy, Republicans have released this new campaign ad featuring Osama bin Laden and al-Qa'ida threatening United States. The Republicans can only hope that their bigger war chest for television advertising will give them the last-minute edge.
RICK SANTORUM: This is great. You guys have many members here in Pennsylvania? How many? Tens of thousands. Tens of thousands. That's good, that's good.
But the Iraq war, the defining issue of Bush's presidency, is clearly worrying even the party's keenest supporters.
MAN: I think they just need to have a more direct appearance that they know what they're going to do, and that there is some plans in the making. Right now I think a lot of the public feels unsure as to - does anybody really know what they're doing? Do they have a plan at all?
BILL CLINTON: Because evidence and argument are the enemies of ideology.
If the current polls are right, the Democrats stand a good chance of winning the House and possibly the Senate too. This would radically change the dynamic of American politics and make the last two years of Bush's presidency most interesting indeed.
Reporter/Camera: SOPHIE McNEILL
Editor: ROWAN TUCKER-EVANS
Executive Producer: MIKE CAREY
MAN: It's a war we should have never, never ever been in.
WOMAN: I am not for the Iraq war, I am for the war on terror, but we have took a wrong turn in Iraq. And it is sad for our kids. And, you know, we have just got to find a way out of there.
Here in a key swing state like Pennsylvania, this sentiment translates directly into support for the local congressman's re-election.
MAN: Good to see you. All the way! All the way! All the way!
A 20-year veteran of Congress who served in Vietnam, John Murtha has always been known as a military hawk within the Democratic Party. So people sat up and listened when this conservative military man publicly called for American troops to be brought home from Iraq.
JOHN MURTHA, DEMOCRAT: Our troops, our sacred troops are caught in the middle of a civil war. And we've got to let them settle this themselves. We cannot do it for them!
Like the Labor Party in Australia, the Democrats have seen the polls that show solid majorities in both countries opposed to the war. Iraq is now their key ammunition against the Republicans this election.
MAN: There's a lot of people speaking out this year, you know. I mean, President Bush's popularity has gone down the tank so even Republicans don't like the war. Murtha was just one of the first public figures to speak out.
MAN 2: Listen, can I get a picture of you for Downing Street? Thank you. I'm a registered Republican.
REPORTER: But you support Murtha and his stance on the war?
MAN 2: Absolutely. That answer your question?
MAN 3: Murtha has made me pretty much switch to being a Democrat.
JOHN MURTHA: How are you doing over here, huh? Nice to see you. All the close seats will be decided by this particular issue, no question about it.
CURT WELDON, REPUBLICAN CONGRESSMAN: Yet if you read the statements he made when he was on the aircraft carrier, they were pretty belligerent.
In outer suburbs of Philadelphia, Republican Curt Weldon is desperately trying to hold on to his seat against Democrat challenger Joe Sestak.
CURT WELDON: He resigned his position before the war started.
A senior Republican, Weldon is vice-chair of the Armed Services Committee. So as the candidates debate at the local press club, it's remarkable to see him on the defensive.
CURT WELDON: We shouldn't cut and run. What we should do is allow the decision not to be made by Dick Cheney or Don Rumsfeld.
PHIL HERON, DELAWARE COUNTRY TIMES, NEWSPAPER EDITOR: Mr Sestak, the recent Keystone Poll of voters in the 7th District indicated 31%, the largest portion, believe Iraq is the most important issue in this race.
On the panel at the debate is local newspaper editor Phil Heron. He thinks it is extraordinary that Weldon is in such a tight race.
PHIL HERON: It is clear that he is in a race unlike any of the others he's had. He has been our congressman here in this district since 1986. He has won re-election 10 times and almost always by an overwhelming majority. So everyone was a little bit taken aback when the first independent poll came out last week and showed literally the race is almost a dead heat.
Democrat challenger Joe Sestak knows which issue has brought him into such close contention.
JOE SESTAK, DEMOCRAT CANDIDATE: I never would have voted for this war into Iraq as Congressman Weldon did. Nor would I continue to support President Bush every step of the way with every vote on this Iraqi policy that has no exit strategy.
MAN: You are bringing back hope, sir.
JOE SESTAK: Thank you very much.
PHIL HERON: And like it or not, Curt Weldon - the long-time incumbent here in the 7th District - has been linked with the President and his policies, and that has become something almost of a referendum on Iraq.
Like many Democrats in tight races Sestak's campaign strategy has focused on linking Weldon as close to President Bush as possible.
VOICEOVER: He votes with George Bush 9 out of 10 times, and voted to raise his own pay by $64,000.
JOE SESTAK: I am Joe Sestak and I authorise this message.
While the President is polling in the 30s, Laura Bush's approval ratings are in the 80s, so Curt Weldon has made an astute political decision to campaign with the first lady. Local radio reporter David Madden believes Weldon is trying to distance himself from President Bush.
DAVID MADDEN, RADIO REPORTER: Mr Bush may be seen more as a liability in a very close race.
CURT WELDON: Please join me in welcoming our first lady, the world's first lady, Laura Bush.
LAURA BUSH, THE FIRST LADY: Congressman Weldon is especially supportive of young people with disabilities. But keeping young Pennsylvanians safe also requires protecting them from foreign threats by defeating terrorism and increasing liberty abroad.
The first lady has a more upbeat spin on the war in Iraq.
LAURA BUSH: And thanks to our troops the Iraqi people are now free from the oppression of Saddam Hussein
So keen is Curt Weldon to distance himself from the President's Iraq policy that he has come up with his own troop withdrawal plan.
DAVID MADDEN: He would normally be, you know, "I'll do whatever the President wants me to do on this." But now now he is sounding a more middle-of-the-road tone, which is to say, "I want the generals on the ground to make the call when we leave, rather than a politician sitting in an armchair."
Weldon's plan is certainly out of character. He has been known as a reliable Bush supporter, who just four months ago still maintained there could be weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and even offered to go look for them himself.
REPORTER: You haven't always been for troop withdrawal. Why did you feel the need to come up with this plan?
CURT WELDON: I have always been for bringing our troops out but the question is under what circumstances and what...and what and to give the American people a better understanding.
REPORTER: So why is it important now?
CURT WELDON: It's just because I think the President has not articulated what the criteria for withdrawal is. I gave him this plan a year ago to basically let the American people know that there is a plan.
CURT WELDON: But make no mistake about it, folks, while I support our troops and will go to the end for them, my ultimate responsibility in Washington is to avoid war.
On the campaign trail again that afternoon Weldon is sounding more like an anti-war Democrat.
CURT WELDON: War is a symbol of diplomatic failure. And I use my voice and my energy to avoid having America's sons and daughters go into harm's way.
But across the road these Joe Sestak supporters aren't buying this sudden change of heart.
MAN: He had no criticism of the war until this summer. And he's simply making it up because he's worried about losing the election. So if you see his signs, you see it says 'independent'. Curt Weldon has never been independent of the Republican right wing of the party in his life. If he wins, he will go right back to supporting everything in the Republican ticket from start to finish. It's completely cynical and opportunistic.
The Republicans are so worried by this tight race in Pennsylvania they have also rolled out the popular Senator John McCain.
JOHN McCAIN, REPUBLICAN SENATOR: And we have to prevail. And I know it is tough and I know it is hard. And we have made mistakes and mistakes have been made. And we should have told the American people much more clearly how long and hard and tough this struggle is and what it was going to be. But we are there now, we are there now.
MAN: I admire you so much, I just want you to know. Could I just please get a picture with you? Thank you, sir.
REPORTER: How is the campaigning going so far?
JOHN McCAIN: Fine thanks.
REPORTER: Are you worried about the effect the war is going to have on this election?
JOHN Mc CAIN: I am worried about a lot of things. We've got some tough races but I think we can win. OK?
And while some Republicans are doing backflips to appear less gung-ho about the war, the Democrats are trying their hardest to appear tough. This campaign event for Weldon's challenger, Joe Sestak, is being held on the grounds of the local military academy. There is good reason why Sestak, a former navy admiral, was picked to challenge in this tight race.
WOMAN: I believe that he brings military credibility to the Democrats and I think that is very important.
It is a big effort to turn their image around and the party is pulling out all the big names to help out.
BILL CLINTON, FORMER US PRESIDENT: We have nine, NINE Iraq war veterans running for Congress as Democrats this year.
Bill Clinton is still a huge drawcard, and he challenges head-on the Republican charge that his party is soft on security.
BILL CLINTON: You have heard their campaign. Their basic campaign is "OK, we messed up Katrina, we messed up Iraq, we've got a big deficit, but you've still got to vote for us because those Democrats won't protect you and there will be a terrorist on every street corner." You know, they're nice people, I'm not saying they're not patriotic but they are just spineless and they won't stand up for you and they will all lay down. Now, if you think... I think it's a pretty hard sell against a guy who spent 31 years in the navy and was on the National Security Council and was an admiral.
Clinton still knows how to energise the party faithful.
BILL CLINTON: If people are afraid and take flight into that other world, we lose. If they stay in the reality based world, he wins, and you win and your children win. Go make it happen. God bless you.
President Bush rejects the notion that he is running a scare campaign.
PRESIDENT GEORGE BUSH: I...you know, I understand that some are saying, "Well, he's just trying to scare us." My job is to look at the intelligence. And I'm going to tell you there is an enemy out there that would like to do harm again to the United States because we're in a war.
And while the President is doing his best to frame the election around national security, another issue threatens support in his core constituency. Christian conservatives were shocked when Republican congressman Mark Foley was forced to resign after sending suggestive emails to young male pages at Congress.
JOURNALIST: Who would have predicted that a paper trail of email would expose a congressman having Internet sex with a slew of Capitol pages, that the trail of cover-up would find its way to the top, causing this 2006 political pinball machine to all of a sudden flash 'Filth'?
The small towns of rural Pennsylvania are home to some of these Christian conservative voters. One of the most powerful Republicans, Senator Rick Santorum, has comfortably held this seat since 1995, but this year he is in trouble.
SPEAKER: Rick Santorum has earned the support of small business for his re-election campaign.
And no event is too small when you are behind in the polls. Santorum now finds himself addressing a handful of small businessman in a desperate attempt to win his suddenly tight race.
RICK SANTORUM, REPUBLICAN SENATOR: Thank you, Lou. I appreciate that. It is a great pleasure for me to be here this morning.
But the local press doesn't want to know about the Builders Association endorsement. They want to know about the new threat posed by a nuclear-armed North Korea.
RICK SANTORUM: We are being faced now with a situation that I think could lead to a series of events that really could shake the foundation of the security of the world.
It is possible the North Korean crisis, by focusing voters back on national security, will work to the Republicans' advantage, especially as that axis of evil seems to keep on expanding.
RICK SANTORUM: This test by North Korea, that issue has even heightened more about how we're going to defend ourselves against this growing storm of evil, as the President referred to them as the axis of evil, of North Korea, Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, Syria.
REPORTER: What impact would having a Democratically controlled House have on the Iraq war? What would it do?
RICK SANTORUM: I think you would see...you would see a push by the Democrats to try to pull our troops back as quickly as possible irrespective of whether that results in a victory over the enemy that is before us. And I think it could lead us to, in my opinion, cataclysmic consequences of not defeating the enemy before the enemy gets to the point where they become a more serious threat than they are today.
To concentrate voters' minds on the enemy, Republicans have released this new campaign ad featuring Osama bin Laden and al-Qa'ida threatening United States. The Republicans can only hope that their bigger war chest for television advertising will give them the last-minute edge.
RICK SANTORUM: This is great. You guys have many members here in Pennsylvania? How many? Tens of thousands. Tens of thousands. That's good, that's good.
But the Iraq war, the defining issue of Bush's presidency, is clearly worrying even the party's keenest supporters.
MAN: I think they just need to have a more direct appearance that they know what they're going to do, and that there is some plans in the making. Right now I think a lot of the public feels unsure as to - does anybody really know what they're doing? Do they have a plan at all?
BILL CLINTON: Because evidence and argument are the enemies of ideology.
If the current polls are right, the Democrats stand a good chance of winning the House and possibly the Senate too. This would radically change the dynamic of American politics and make the last two years of Bush's presidency most interesting indeed.
Reporter/Camera: SOPHIE McNEILL
Editor: ROWAN TUCKER-EVANS
Executive Producer: MIKE CAREY