From PRI, Public Radio International and KCRW Santa Monica, this is To the Point.

The preliminaries are over. Time for the main event.

Hello again, I'm Orman Alme, and this is To the Point from Public Radio International.

A daily look at the issues, Americans care about most.

John McCain and Barack Obama are the last official candidates in the presidential campaign. They're raising money today and talking about the economy. Hillary Clinton has suspended her effort

and endorsed Obama, but nobody knows what role she'll play between now and November.

On to the point, we'll look at the challenges for Obama, a first-term

senator trying to define himself against a veteran of politics and the military. Would it help him

if Clinton were on the ticket? Can the veteran McCain advocate change and avoid looking like

old news? On reporter's notebook later on, President Bush begins a farewell tour of Europe in Slovenia.

First, here's the news.

Support for To the Point comes from subscribers of KCRW Santa Monica and from the Public Radio International Program Fund,

whose contributors include the Ford Foundation and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

Hello again, Mormon-Aulney, back with To The Poet. With Hillary Clinton out, at least for the moment, it's down to McCain and Obama. On To the Point, we'll hear how the November campaign shapes up and what role Clinton still might be playing. On reporter's notebook, as President Bush heads for Slovenia, we'll hear about the rest of the Balkans, where the U.S. and Russia have

clashing interests. First, this news update. Global financial markets were still in shock when

they opened today. After Friday's huge jump in oil prices and the big Wall Street decline,

yesterday the average price of gasoline in the U.S. hit $4 a gallon. The big fear is a vicious cycle. That's according to Tom Petruno,

financial writer and columnist at the Los Angeles Times. Tom, thanks a lot for being with us.

Good morning. What is the vicious cycle or vicious circle that investors are worried about?

Well, one of them at the moment is the concern that the dollar is going to go into another tailspin here, the value of the

dollar. And if that should happen, because commodities worldwide, including oil, are priced

in dollars, in theory at least, the producers have a devalued currency. What they're receiving

...