Romney looking to shrug off Obama’s job-figures boost

Mr Romney rallied in battleground Florida, the day after the government reported an unemployment rate of 7.8 per cent in September, breaking a 43-month streak of joblessness of 8 per cent or higher.

The report risked breaking Mr Romney’s stride, gained in a strong debate performance days earlier.

Because the American presidential race is decided in state-by-state votes rather than by popular vote, such “battleground” states that do not reliably vote either Republican or Democratic will probably decide the race.

The President was scheduled to launch a lucrative and celebrity-studded fundraising swing to Los Angeles and San Francisco followed by a campaign rally in battleground Ohio.

“There is exactly one month left to go until election day,” Mr Obama’s campaign manager, Jim Messina, said in an email pitch.

“The stakes are too high for us to take our foot off the gas now.”

Persistently high unemployment, long after the recession’s official end, has been a leading threat to Mr Obama’s re-election and the improvement came as a marked relief to the Obama campaign.

Meanwhile, a Republican congressman said in videotaped remarks that evolution, embryology and the Big Bang theory are “lies straight from the pit of hell” meant to convince people that they do not need a saviour.

Georgia Representative Paul Broun made his comments during a speech in September.

Mr Broun, a medical doctor, is running for re-election in November unopposed by Democrats.

“God’s word is true,” Mr Broun said, according to a video posted on the church’s website.

Mr Broun also said that he believes the Earth is about 9,000 years old and that it was made in six days.