ST. PAUL, Minn. — John McCain, a POW turned political rebel, vowed Thursday night to vanquish the “constant partisan rancor’’ that grips Washington as he launched his fall campaign for the White House. “Change is coming,’’ he promised the roaring Republican National Convention and a prime-time television audience.

“Fight with me. Fight with me. Fight with me. Fight for what’s right for our country,’’ he said in a convention crescendo.

To repeated cheers from his delegates, McCain made only passing reference to an unpopular George W. Bush and criticized fellow Republicans as well as Democratic rival Barack Obama in reaching out to independents and swing voters who will pick the next president.

“We were elected to change Washington, and we let Washington change us,’’ he said of the Republicans who controlled Congress for a dozen years before they were voted out of office in 2006.

As for Obama, he said, “I will keep taxes low and cut them where I can. My opponent will raise them. I will cut government spending. He will increase it.’’

McCain’s wife, Cindy, and ticketmate Sarah Palin and her husband joined him on stage as tens of thousands red, white and blue balloons cascaded from high above the convention floor.

Unlike Obama’s speech a week ago, McCain offered no soaring oratory until his speech-ending summons to fight for the country’s future.

But his own measured style left his crowd cheering, and as is his habit in campaign stops around the country, he stepped off the stage to plunge into the crowd after his speech.

McCain’s appearance was the climax of the final night of the party convention, coming after delegates made Palin the first female vice presidential nominee in Republican history.

“She stands up for what’s right and she doesn’t let anyone tell her to sit down,’’ McCain said of the woman who has faced intense scrutiny in the week since she was picked.

“And let me offer an advance warning to the old, big-spending, do-nothing, me-first, country-second Washington crowd: Change is coming,’’ McCain declared.

He and Palin were departing their convention city immediately after the Arizona senator’s acceptance speech, bound for Wisconsin and an early start on the final weeks of the White House campaign.

McCain, at 72 bidding to become the oldest first-term president, drew a roar from the convention crowd when he walked out onto the stage lighted by a single spotlight. He was introduced by a video that dwelt heavily on his time spent as a prisoner of war in Vietnam and as a member of Congress, hailed for a “faithful unyielding love for America, country first.’’

“USA, USA, USA,’’ chanted the crowd in the hall.

McCain faced a delicate assignment as he formally accepted his party’s presidential nomination: presenting his credentials as a reformer willing to take on his own party and stressing his independence from an unpopular President Bush — all without breaking faith with his Republican base.

He set about it methodically.

“After we’ve won, we’re going to reach out our hand to any willing patriot, make this government start working for you again,’’ he said, and he pledged to invite Democrats and independents to serve in his administration.

He mentioned Bush only in passing, as the leader who led the country through the days after the terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

And there was plenty for conservative Republicans to cheer — from his pledge to free the country from the grip of its dependence on foreign oil, to a vow to have schools answer to parents and students rather than “unions and entrenched bureaucrats.’’

A man who has clashed repeatedly with Republicans in Congress, he said proudly, “I’ve been called a maverick. Sometimes it’s meant as a compliment and sometimes it’s not. What it really means is I understand who I work for.

“I don’t work for a party. I don’t work for a special interest. I don’t work for myself. I work for you.’’

Thousands of red, white and blue balloons nestled in netting above the convention floor, to be released on cue for the traditional celebratory convention finale.

Given McCain’s political mission, it was left to other Republicans to deliver much of the criticism aimed at Obama.

In the race for the White House, “It’s not about building a record, it’s about having one,’’ said former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge. “It’s not about talking pretty, it’s about talking straight.’’

McCain invoked the five years he spent in a North Vietnamese prison. “I fell in love with my country when I was a prisoner in someone else’s,’’ he said. “I was never the same again. I wasn’t my own man anymore. I was my country’s.’’

The last night of the McCain-Palin convention also marked the end of an intensive stretch of politics with the potential to reshape the race for the White House. Democrats held their own convention last week in Denver, nominating Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden as running mate for Obama, whose own acceptance speech drew an estimated 84,000 partisans to an outdoor football stadium.

The polls indicate a close race between McCain and Obama, at 47 a generation younger than his Republican opponent, with the outcome likely to be decided in scattered swing states in the industrial Midwest and the Southwest.

Ahead lie the traditional major checkpoints — presidential and vice presidential debates, millions of dollars in ads — but also the unscripted, spontaneous moments that can take on outsized importance in the race to pick a president.

Before he spoke Thursday night, Cindy McCain recommended her husband to the crowd — and the nation. “If Americans want straight talk and the plain truth they should take a good close look at John McCain, a man tested and true who’s never wavered in his devotion to our country,’’ she said. She called him “a man who’s served in Washington without ever becoming a Washington insider.’’

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., also had a speaking slot, and he used it to criticize McCain’s rival. He said Obama and the liberal group MoveOn.org were the only ones who didn’t realize that Bush’s decision to deploy additional troops to Iraq last year had succeeded.

Ridge’s turn at the podium came after he had been mentioned prominently in speculation about a running mate.

That was an honor that went unexpectedly to Palin, the first female vice presidential candidate in party history, a 44-year-old Alaska governor virtually unknown nationally a week ago.

In the days since, she has faced a storm of scrutiny, some of it relating to her tenure as mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, and her time as governor, but most involving her 17-year-old unmarried daughter who is pregnant.

For the most part, McCain’s aides have kept Palin out of public sight while vociferously defending her readiness to become president. She emerged Wednesday night during prime time to deliver a smiling, sarcastic attack on Obama that generated roars of approval — and acceptance — from the delegates.

She followed up in the hours before McCain’s convention appearance with a meeting with Republican governors and a fundraising appeal that blamed Democrats for spreading “misinformation and flat-out lies’’ about her family and her.

Even so, there were fresh questions about her readiness to sit one chair away from the Oval Office.

McCain has cited her authority over the Alaska National Guard as one example. But in a memo last spring, Air Force Maj. Gen. Craig Campbell warned that “missions are at risk’’ in the state’s units because of a personnel shortage. The lack of qualified airmen, Campbell said, “has reached a crisis level.’’

In an interview on Wednesday with The Associated Press, Campbell said the situation has improved since then, but not enough to eliminate his concern that shortages will result in the burnout of troops.

McCain won the presidential nomination late Wednesday night in an anticlimactic vote that followed a campaign lasting most of a decade. He first ran for the White House in 2000, but lost the Republican nomination to Bush in a bruising struggle. He began the current campaign the Republican front-runner, but his chances seemed to collapse last winter when opposition to the Iraq war rose among independents and conservatives grew upset over his backing for legislation to give illegal immigrants a path toward citizenship.

In one of the most remarkable comebacks in recent times, he recovered to win the New Hampshire primary in early January, then wrapped up the nomination on Feb. 5 with big-state primary victories on Super Tuesday.

Obama, campaigning in swing-state Pennsylvania on Thursday, said he wasn’t surprised at Palin’s criticism of him, and said Democrats intended to focus on her record.

“I think she’s got a compelling story, but I assume she wants to be treated the same way that guys want to be treated,’’ he said. “I’ve been through this 19 months, she’s been through it — what — four days so far?’’

Obama’s campaign announced it had raised roughly $10 million from more than 130,000 donors since Palin delivered her speech Wednesday night.

Outside the hall, police on horseback thwarted plans by anti-war demonstrators to march on the convention hall.

Scattered protesters inside interrupted his speech briefly near the start. He dismissed them, telling the crowd not to be diverted by “ground noise and static.’’

Not far from the convention center, police rounded up about 200 protesters on a bridge over Interstate 94. Caught up were reporters from several media outlets, including two AP reporters.

Police arrest anti-war protesters in march to GOP convention

By RYAN J. FOLEY and MARTIGA LOHN
Associated Press Writer

ST. PAUL, Minn. — Police surrounded some 200 protesters Thursday night after a lengthy series of marches and sit-ins timed to coincide with Sen. John McCain’s acceptance of the Republican Party’s nomination for president.

Caught up in the clash were several reporters assigned to cover the event, including Amy Forliti and Jon Krawczynski of The Associated Press. Officers ordered them to sit on the pavement on a bridge over Interstate 94 and to keep their hands over their heads as they were led away two at a time.

The arrests came three days after AP photographer Matt Rourke, also on assignment covering the protests, was arrested. He was released without being charged Monday after being held for several hours.

The confrontation resulted in about a dozen arrests; protesters had gone ahead with a planned march near the state Capitol even though their permit had expired.

Marchers tried to cross two different bridges leading from the Capitol to the Xcel Energy Center, where McCain was to accept his party’s nomination for president. But they were stopped by lines of police in gas masks and riot gear who blocked the bridges after the marching permit expired.

A cat-and-mouse game followed as protesters moved around the Capitol area, splintered, and then organized into a marching force again. The size of the crowd varied from a high of about 1,000 down to a hundred and back to around 500.

About three hours into the standoff, about 300 protesters sat down on a major thoroughfare and police closed the four-lane boulevard. Officers then set off smoke bombs and fired seven percussion grenades, causing protesters to scatter.

A spokesman at an information center set up during the convention said the number of arrests would likely increase as people were processed.

Some of the scattering protesters entered a residential area north of the Capitol. Later, at least three smoke bombs were discharged in the area of apartments and houses.

About two hours into the standoff, police began arresting a handful of people even as the crowd dwindled from around 1,000 to around a hundred.

“The important thing is even though we didn’t have a permit to march, people have decided they want to keep protesting despite all these riot police,’’ said Meredith Aby, a member of the Anti-War Committee.

Even as protesters were being arrested, the mood was much more relaxed than earlier in the week. It even turned festive at times.

Younger people did cartwheels. Tourists came by to check out the spectacle. The chants, which were political at the outset, turned silly a couple hours in.

“You’re sexy, you’re cute, take off the riot suit,’’ protesters serenaded those blocking their path.

Brandon Thorson didn’t find much to joke about. The 23-year-old factory worker from Minneapolis said he just wanted to go home — but he tried to do it through police lines.

“One officer used his club to push me away and another officer hit me in the back with his club,’’ Thorson said. “A third officer came in and sprayed me right in the face.’’

Minutes after the skirmish, Thorson’s right eye was nearly swollen shut from the pepper spray. He was not arrested.

“This is a fascist military style occupation of the city of St. Paul,’’ Thorson said. “Just because the Republicans are in town doesn’t mean they can turn our city into a battlefront.’’

More than 400 people have been arrested in the past week, most on Monday, when violence broke out at the end of another anti-war march.

The Anti-War Committee, which organized Thursday’s march, urged others to join in and denounced the increased presence of police in riot gear and acts of “intimidation’’ in the city.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty blamed the week’s violence on a small group of “anarchists, nihilists, and goofballs who want to break stuff and hurt people.’’

“They need to be dealt with,’’ Pawlenty said in a radio interview with WCCO-AM of Minneapolis.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit on Wednesday to recover leaflets seized during police raids, claiming a violation of First Amendment rights because protesters haven’t been able to distribute the flyers.

Associated Press writers Amy Forliti and Jon Krawczynski contributed to this report.