Obama to rally thousands of voters in Philadelphia [October 10 2010]

President Barack Obama headlines a rally in Philadelphia on Sunday, hoping to re-ignite the type of Democratic enthusiasm that carried him to victory two years ago.

Vice President Joe Biden will join Obama in the Germantown community, where the hip-hop band the Roots will warm up the crowd. Its the second of four large rallies designed to recapture some of the big-stage excitement that Obama created in 2008 with stirring speeches to thousands of young and first-time voters. The president spoke to more than 17,000 people last week in Madison, Wis., where many more thousands watched on screens in an overflow area.

Democrats are desperate to close the "enthusiasm gap" that may lead to huge Republican victories on Nov. 2. Obama is telling liberal-leaning voters that theres no excuse for them to stay home on Election Day. But the president sometimes sounds wistful when noting the differences between this year and 2008.

"Sometimes I feel as if we had such a high on election night, and then there was the inauguration and Bono was singing and Beyonce," Obama said at a fundraiser in Chicago last week. "That was the start, not the finish, of the journey. And it made each of you a shareholder in the mission of rebuilding our country and reclaiming our future."