ELECTION 2004

• Chabot has a nice chat with justice • Health care looms as president's task • Fingerhut knows underdogs • Women for Kerry draws 2,500 • Kerry: Bush has hidden plan • Disagreements mark race • Voting opens today in Fla. • Newspaper: More votes uncounted in black areas • 2004 Presidential endorsements • Election 2004 section

The crowd of about 2,500 at the Women for Kerry rally on Sunday cheered and laughed.

Energy ran throughout the event at Sawyer Point, which in April was the site of Sen. John Kerry's first visit to Cincinnati. Groups present included the Sierra Club, Yes on Three, Veterans for Kerry, Catholics for Kerry and Republicans for Kerry.

While rally speeches included talk of health care, education, national security and the economy, the most emphasis was placed on simply getting women to the polls.

"We don't have the power to change the past, but we have the power to change right now," said former Cincinnati mayor Roxanne Qualls.

The Kerry and Bush campaigns are aggressively targeting women voters. In the last presidential election, 22 million eligible females did not vote. On the Republican side, a grass-roots effort called "W Stands for Women" is supporting President Bush.

Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius emphasized at Sunday's rally how much every vote counts by telling a story about her father, former Ohio Gov. John Gilligan, who lost his bid for a second term in 1974 by 11,488 votes out of nearly 3 million cast. "We know about close votes in Ohio," she said, while joined on stage by her father. "You need to vote as if your life depends on it, because the future depends on it."

Peggy Kerry spoke about why votes should be cast for her brother, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry.

"This is what my brother stands for, and it can all be summed up in three words - the Supreme Court," she said.

Kerry detailed her brother's platform on affirmative action, pay equity, defending Title IX (gender equality in athletics), child care, AIDS funding, health care, stem cell research and the economy.

Rally attendee Susan McElroy-Marcus, 47, of Madeira, said she has not been very politically active in the past. Now, as an Evangelical Christian, she proudly supports Kerry.

"It's important for other Christians to know this doesn't have to be an automatic vote for Bush. There are complex issues facing us," she said, expressing her outrage over the war in Iraq.

Madeira resident Deborah Gentry Davis, 52, also said the war in Iraq is her motivation for voting for Kerry. "The current administration frightens me as an American, as a woman and as a mother," she said. "It's absolutely critical that we make a change."

About 20 percent of the crowd was made up of men. Blue Ash resident Jeff Pfaendtner, 37, brought his three young children to the rally while his wife volunteered there.

"I vote every election, and I've voted for both parties," he said. "But George Bush has made me a Democrat."

E-mail mdowns@enquirer.com