Mormon supporters of Mitt Romney are promoting a day of mass fasting and prayer to seek divine help for the Republican candidate in the debates. 
 
 The plan — which is not endorsed by the politically neutral Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — is laid out in an email inviting like-minded Mormons to fast on September 30th with the purpose of bringing God’s blessings to Romney as he heads into the presidential debates. 
 
 The name of the original author of the e-mail was redacted in both versions sent to BuzzFeed, but sources who have received it said it has reached Latter-day Saints in Utah, California, Nevada, and Colorado at least. 
 
 “I am asking you to join me and my family on Sunday Sept. 30 by fasting and praying for Mitt Romney,” the author writes. “That he will be blessed in the debates, which will be held starting Oct. 3rd. I know that seems like such a small thing, but I believe ‘from small things, great things can come about.’” 
 
 In Mormonism, believers often participate in fasts — which consist of 24 hours without food or water — to show gratitude, and ask God for special blessings, though they generally aren’t political. The Church also encourages congregants to donate the money they would have spent on food during their fasts to a fund for the needy. 
 
 Some of the people forwarding the e-mail have done so politely, with a recognition that not everyone in their faith supports Romney. 
 
 For example, one wrote, “As I said, this is just an idea. You can do this or not and you can send this to others or not.” 
 
 But others were more forceful. One Mormon wrote, “This is from one of our Sister Service Missionaries in our ward. I have been concerned that Obama, with his fast talking and lies, will appear to be better in the debates. It is true, his only redeeming quality seems to be his ability to confound those who would speak the truth.” 
 
 The e-mail is both a reflection of Romney’s wide and intense support within the Mormon faith, and an illustration of the church’s challenge in demonstrating its partisan neutrality to the public. While church officials in Salt Lake City have gone to great lengths this year to show they’re not meddling in the presidential race, many individual Mormons are excited by the prospect of seeing one of their own in the White House — and disappointed that he’s currently trailing in the polls. 
 
 But if there’s one virtue Mormons hold tightly to, it’s faith. As one person who forwarded the e-mail wrote: “May we have the faith to fast and pray for the help we so desperately need throughout this great nation at this time.” 
 
 Here’s the full e-mail: ||||| President Barack Obama is pitching a broad economic argument to voters ahead of next week's debate with Republican opponent Mitt Romney, buying TV time in seven battleground states to promote what he calls a "new economic patriotism." 
 
 In a two-minute ad, Obama looks into the camera as he promotes an economic plan he says will create 1 million manufacturing jobs, cut oil imports and hire thousands of new teachers. 
 
 The ad set to air in New Hampshire, Virginia, Florida, Ohio, Iowa, Nevada and Colorado comes as Obama and Republican Mitt Romney shadow each while looking for votes in a closely contested race. On Thursday, the two candidates are scheduled to campaign in the same state for the third straight day, this time in Virginia, a critical battleground in the Nov. 6 election. The president is not chosen by popular vote but in state-by-state contests. That makes these battleground states _ which are neither reliably Republican nor Democratic _ especially important in a tight election like this one. 
 
 Romney is to appear in suburban Washington for a veterans event, while Obama speaks to a farm bureau in Virginia Beach. 
 
 The simultaneous visits follow an all-day duel Wednesday in Ohio, where Romney declared he can do more than Obama to improve the lives of average people. Obama scoffed that a challenger who calls half the nation "victims" was unlikely to be of much help. 
 
 Meanwhile, new Republican-leaning independent groups have entered the presidential advertising fray as polling suggests Romney's campaign may be losing ground against Obama in key states such as Ohio and Florida. 
 
 The commercials, aimed at voters who supported Obama in 2008 but are now undecided, join those from the campaigns and outside groups swamping a narrow and possibly shrinking map of competitive states in the fast-moving presidential contest. Americans for Job Security launched an $8.7 million ad buy in six battleground states, while the Ending Spending Action Fund, a new conservative group bankrolled by billionaire Joe Ricketts, was set to debut a $10 million, four-state ad campaign on Thursday. 
 
 Polls show Obama widening his lead in several key states amid backlash from a leaked video in which Romney disparages the 47 percent of Americans who don't pay federal income tax as government-dependent Obama supporters who see themselves as victims and won't take responsibility for their own lives. 
 
 Obama's campaign was reveling in the latest public polling but trying to crush any sense of overconfidence. "If we need to pass out horse blinders to all of our staff, we will do that," campaign spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Wednesday. 
 
 Romney went after working-class voters at three stops in Ohio, while Obama rallied college crowds at Bowling Green and Kent State. Early voting in Ohio begins next week. 
 
 "If President Obama were to be re-elected, what you'd see is four more years like the last four years, and we can't afford another four more years like the last four years," Romney told a boisterous crowd in Toledo at the day's final stop. 
 
 Romney said the country had lost more than half a million manufacturing jobs in the past four years. "This is not the path we want for America," he said. 
 
 Romney's campaign has been reeling from his caught-on-video comments at a Florida fundraiser last May. New opinion polls, conducted after the video became public last week, show Obama opening up apparent leads over Romney in battleground states, including Ohio and Virginia. 
 
 Romney told ABC News that the race was in a statistical tie in some national polls. 
 
 Obama was not about to let the video comments fade away. He said Wednesday that "America is not about what can be done for us. It's about what can be done by us together, as one nation, as one people." 
 
 And he added: "You can't make it happen if you write off half the nation before you take office." ||||| In an interview with POLITICO's Jonathan Martin this morning, Newt Gingrich gave Mitt Romney some advice for the upcoming presidential debates: be assertive and don't be afraid to hit back. 
 
 "If Romney is decisively effective -- as my wife put it to me the other day, if he is as assertive and direct with Obama as he was with me in the two Florida debates, he’ll be fine," Gingrich said. "He's got to go in there, not be hostile but be assertive, clear and direct and not back off." 
 
 (Also on POLITICO: Gingrich appears on POLITICO LIVE) 
 
 He said Romney needs to offer specifics about his own vision for the country, and can't back down when Obama launches a counter-attack. 
 
 "Gov. Romney has the challenge in the very first debate to communicate precisely what he's going to do," Gingrich said. "I think he's got to draw a sharp contrast between a Romney recovery and Obama stagnation -- he's got to say, with all due respect, Mr. President, this is the worst recovery since the Great Depression. ... He's got to say it in a way that's direct and clear, and when the president counter-attacks he can't flinch." 
 
 Gingrich added that he's looking forward to watching the debate, saying it will be "fascinating" to see "how the two personalities interact." 
 
 (PHOTOS:10 great debate moments) 
 
 Read more about: Newt Gingrich ||||| Dow Jones Reprints: This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. To order presentation-ready copies for distribution to your colleagues, clients or customers, use the Order Reprints tool at the bottom of any article or visit www.djreprints.com 
 
 WESTERVILLE, Ohio—Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, seeking to emphasize his deficit-cutting ambitions, is warning Americans that his tax-cut plan might not decrease their tax bills as much as they expect. 
 
 Amid a push by the campaign to remind voters of big deficits, Mr. Romney on Wednesday told an Ohio crowd that while he would work to lower tax rates on businesses and individuals, they shouldn't "be expecting a huge cut in taxes because I'm also going to lower deductions and exemptions." 
 
 The campaign is still exploring options to broaden the taxable-income base, which would mean limiting or cutting deductions and ...
– With the first presidential debate just days away, Mitt Romney is taking aim at the deficit, an issue even more important than job creation to independent voters, according to a Wall Street Journal poll. He told voters at a rally in Ohio yesterday that despite his tax-cutting plans, they shouldn't "be expecting a huge cut in taxes because I'm also going to lower deductions and exemptions." Romney plans to cut all income tax rates by 20% and lower the corporate tax rate to to 25% from 35%, but his staffers describe the plan as a tax reform, not a tax cut, and argue that it will not significantly increase the deficit. President Obama, meanwhile, is pushing "economic patriotism" ahead of the debate, the AP reports. In a new ad airing in seven battleground states, the president outlines an economic plan he says will create a million new manufacturing jobs. Some conservative Mormons are doing their own debate preparation, according to an email obtained by BuzzFeed. The email—not officially sanctioned by the church—is circulating in at least four states and urges Mormons to fast and pray for Romney for 24 hours to ensure he will be blessed in the debates, which start Wednesday. In the debates, Romney needs to be assertive and "draw a sharp contrast between a Romney recovery and Obama stagnation," Newt Gingrich tells Politico. "If he is as assertive and direct with Obama as he was with me in the two Florida debates, he’ll be fine," Gingrich says. "He's got to go in there, not be hostile but be assertive, clear, and direct, and not back off."