TOLEDO, OHIO ? John Kerry says George Bush is like Harry Truman — in reverse.

“This president believes the buck stops everywhere but with the president of the United States,” the challenger said Thursday during a rally in Toledo, Ohio.

Bush, meanwhile, said that when Kerry called Iraq “the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time,” he was really offering a self-description.

“John Kerry is the wrong man for the wrong job at the wrong time,” the president told supporters in Saginaw, Mich.

Both candidates are down to their last-minute zingers.

As campaign days get fewer, the putdowns are getting sharper — with the contenders spending more and more time on their rivals’ vices than their own virtues. It’s a sure-fire way to get their base voters to the polls Tuesday, even if it turns off some remaining undecided voters.

Arguing that Bush is ignoring the Truman presidential dictum that “the buck stops here,” Kerry harped on the story that has dominated the campaign week: hundreds of tons of explosives gone missing in Iraq.

Blasting the president’s “shifting explanations and excuses,” Kerry said the story “speaks directly to the president’s continuing misjudgments in Iraq.”

In calling Kerry “the wrong man” for the presidency, Bush knocked what he called “the senator’s willingness to trade principle for political convenience.”

Cameron Mess, 6, center, stands with Karie Pohl, 12, left, and her sister Kaylie, 10, right, as they listen to Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. John Edwards speak Thursday at a rally in Davenport, Iowa.

In the final days of what has been a tough, exhaustive campaign, the rivals are making their closing arguments — on the stump and in millions of dollars worth of new television advertising.

The formal Kerry line: Voters should fire Bush for a botched invasion of Iraq, a mismanaged war on terrorism, a faltering economy that favors the rich over the middle class. In that framework, the Massachusetts senator and his message-makers have looked for opportunities to take humorous shots at Bush.

On Thursday, Kerry got inspiration from a high-profile guest, rock ‘n’ roll legend Bruce Springsteen. The Boss played a couple of old tunes for more than 80,000 people in the university towns of Madison, Wis., and Columbus, Ohio.

Kerry joked that the president had a strange reaction when told his opponent would be campaigning with The Boss. “He thought they meant Dick Cheney,” Kerry said. “Or the CEO of Halliburton.”

In Las Vegas this week, Kerry said that a friend claimed that local magicians had nothing on George Bush.

“He made our allies disappear,” the challenger said. “He cut those jobs — sawed ’em right in half. And he made a huge deficit appear out of nowhere.”

A young girl cheers as President Bush appears on stage Thursday at a campaign rally in Yardley, Pa.

Focusing on the economy at a high school in Sioux City, Iowa, Kerry blasted Vice President Dick Cheney as “chief minister of disinformation,” while Bush wants four more years so “he can keep up the bad work.”

Just as Bush did to him, Kerry has also tried to use the president’s own words against him.

Citing the attacks over the missing explosives in Iraq, Bush said this week: “A political candidate who jumps to conclusions without knowing the facts is not a person you want as your commander in chief when it comes to your security.”

During his rally at the University of Toledo basketball arena, Kerry said Bush jumped to conclusions that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, that it had major connections to al-Qaida, and that its citizens would welcome American troops with open arms.

“And guess what?” Kerry said. “According to George Bush’s own words, he shouldn’t be our commander in chief. And I couldn’t agree more.”

For Bush, meanwhile, it has been one carefully choreographed chapter after another during the final week.

Monday, it was the nation’s security and the war against terrorism.

“On Iraq, my opponent has a strategy of pessimism and retreat,” Bush charged.

Tuesday, it was the economy, with a big banner at one Wisconsin rally proclaiming: “Protecting your family budget.”

By Thursday, the issues were more about character and leadership. And Bush was eager to draw distinctions with Kerry, charging that he would “say anything to get elected,” frequently changes his positions, and offers only a “long litany of complaints without a significant record.”

“He doesn’t want you to know where he stands on national security because he has a record of weakness,” Bush said.

And while Kerry had Springsteen, the president echoed Bob Dylan in saying that Kerry has sent “mixed signals” in the war against terrorism that would “confuse our friends, embolden our enemies.”

“As presidents from Abraham Lincoln to Franklin Roosevelt to Ronald Reagan so clearly demonstrated, a president cannot blow in the wind,” Bush said. “A president has to make tough decisions and stand by them. The president must not follow the path of the latest polls.”