As Barack Obama picked up support from another half dozen or so of the Democratic party elite this week, the attacks by Obama and Democratic rival Hillary Clinton started shifting away from each other and toward the Republican candidate, the dpa reported.
Senator Clinton, 60, has one last victory in her sights - West Virginia on Tuesday, where she is expected to beat Senator Obama, 46, by two-to-one among the conservative, working-class and largely white voters who dominate the state.
But she faces huge odds in the other five contests that remain - Oregon, Kentucky, Idaho, Montana and South Dakota.
Clinton has refused calls to step out of the race in the interest of party unity, although Obama now has 161 more delegates in his pocket of the 2,025 delegates needed to seal the party's nomination.
On Saturday, while insisting she had "what it takes" to beat Republican candidate John McCain, 71, she also assured fans in West Virginia that come November, Democrats "will have a unified party and we will stand together and defeat John McCain and go on to take the White House."
Obama, who has apparently offered an olive branch to Clinton and suggested he would help her pay off her campaign debt, echoed the tone.
"I know there are Democrats who are concerned about whether women will vote for Barack, and blacks will vote for Hillary," Obama told an audience in Oregon. "I know there's a lot of concern about division. One thing's for certain - this party will be unified by next November."