KALAMAZOO, Mich. (AP) — In a last-day bid for votes in the Republican stronghold of west Michigan, John McCain on Monday said Michigan's best days are ahead despite an economy reeling from the domestic auto industry's decline.

"The best, most productive workers in the world reside in this state," McCain told more than 500 people at Kalamazoo Christian High School, one of three campaign stops before he traveled to Detroit to tour the North American International Auto Show. "We're not going to leave these people behind. That's what America is supposed to be all about."

The Arizona senator said he would retool training programs to help people who have lost their jobs.

Two of McCain's town hall-style events — held the day before Michigan's primary — featured questions from audience members about the Iraq war, Social Security, health care, taxes, oil, McCain's age, Sudan and other topics.

"Every indicator we have is it's a close race," he told reporters on his "Straight Talk Express" campaign bus from Kalamazoo to Holland. "We're doing everything we can to get our vote out."

Recent polls showed former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney doing better than McCain among Republicans, but the two were close when pollsters considered the preferences of Democrats and independents who might back McCain in the GOP primary. Crossover votes helped McCain beat George W. Bush in Michigan's 2000 GOP race.

Speaking in Holland at Hope College, a small liberal arts school affiliated with The Reformed Church in America, McCain — a former Vietnam prisoner of war — focused on national security and the military, making it a point to introduce veterans.

He said the transcendent challenge of the 21st century is fighting Islamic extremists, and that he is uniquely prepared to handle that challenge.

"If I have to follow him to the gates of hell, I will get Osama bin Laden," McCain said to loud applause.

He said a top domestic priority is improving veterans' health care, and he criticized problems at military hospitals.

He also railed against what he called pork-barrel spending projects and said he wouldn't try to divert Great Lakes water to dry states such as Arizona, where he lives. Money saved by vetoing pork projects could be spent to retrain displaced manufacturing workers at community colleges, he said.

One voter McCain won over was Bob Bishop, a 57-year-old retiree from Holland.

Bishop said he was debating whether to vote for McCain or Romney, but McCain swayed him, especially while answering numerous questions from the audience.

"I think he's got my vote. I like his upfront talk," Bishop said. "The straightforwardness is great. He's one of the few candidates who comes across that way."

He noted that, when McCain was challenged by one questioner for breaking with President Bush on tax cuts, he told the questioner he didn't vote for the tax cuts because there weren't spending cuts as well.

"He's telling you the reason why he feels that way," Bishop said.

That quality also appealed to Joe Meyers, a 52-year-old teacher from Kalamazoo who brought his sixth-grade class to hear McCain at Kalamazoo Christian High School. Although he's a Democrat and plans to vote in the Democratic primary Tuesday, Meyers said of McCain: "I like the way he does not pander to people."

McCain later stopped in Spring Lake near the Lake Michigan town of Grand Haven. He spoke to a large crowd at the Nichols Co., a distributor that specializes in packaging, paper and sanitary supplies.

McCain decided against appearing at a previously scheduled late afternoon Grand Rapids event so he could visit the auto show in Detroit, which Romney and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee also attended Monday.

McCain, touring the Detroit auto show late in the day, praised auto industry workers for building "green technology" and credited Democratic Rep. John Dingell of Dearborn for helping to mold a recent agreement on fuel economy standards.

McCain's wife, Cindy, appeared at the Grand Rapids rally in his place. McCain later flew to Traverse City, where he was to hold a get-out-the-vote rally early Tuesday morning.