As the Republican convention rolls into its final day today, the Democrats have not called in many of their highest-rolling players to offer rebuttals, opting instead for politicians with less kitchen-table name recognition.

Although the party has launched an aggressive campaign to counter this week’s Republican wall of sound, some are asking: Why haven’t the big-ticket Democrats been deployed in full force?

“John Kerry has been called up to fight and nobody is punching back,” a Democratic political consultant, Hank Sheinkopf, said. “So far, we haven’t seen those big names to counter the big-time Republicans.”

Yesterday, as Governor Schwarzenegger visited P.S. 129 in Harlem, the Democrats staged their own news conference to protest what they argue are failures by President Bush to adequately fund his No Child Left Behind mandate.

Although President Clinton’s 125th Street office was nearby, the task of going head-to-head with the popular actor-turned-politician fell to several city politicians. City Council Speaker Gifford Miller, the United Federation of Teachers president, Randi Weingarten, and several others handled the tall task.

The Democratic National Committee chairman, Terry McAuliffe, dismissed the idea that the party needed more star power. This week’s headliners -Governor Vilsack of Iowa, Rep. Charles Rangel, Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones of Ohio, retired Air Force General Merrill McPeak – have been successfully hammering away at the Bush administration’s record on jobs, health insurance, the economy, and the war in Iraq, he said.

“To someone at home in Des Moines, Iowa, listening to Arnold Schwarzenegger – that is not going to determine how they vote in the presidential election,” Mr. McAuliffe said. “We are addressing the issues that affect people’s daily lives.”

Senator Clinton made the rounds on Sunday’s morning talk shows and Senator Schumer greeted buses of Kerry supporters from swing states. But while both were scheduled to have big roles in the Democratic war room this week, they have been virtually invisible since the weekend.

A spokesman for Mr. Schumer said the senator, not known for avoiding the spotlight, visited three upstate cities Monday, but had no public schedule yesterday or the day before. And Mr. McAuliffe said several high-profile politicians had conflicts because they were stumping for Senator Kerry in other parts of the country. Wesley Clark, for example, joined vice presidential candidate John Edwards in West Virginia Tuesday, he said.

A call to Mrs. Clinton’s office was not returned.

Several Democrats acknowledged that the Kerry campaign had lost momentum since last month’s Democratic National Convention but expressed satisfaction with the party’s response this week.

Retired Air Force Colonel P.J. Crowley, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress in Washington, a liberal think tank, said: “It makes sense for the Democrats to counterpunch, but what is more important is what they start doing on Friday when it becomes a two-way conversation again.”

Yesterday, the Democrats brought out New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer and Senator Lautenberg of New Jersey, two of the bigger names this week. Both characterized the GOP theme-of-the-day “opportunity” as opportunity for corporations, rather than average citizens.

“I’ve been tempted to bring consumer fraud action against the Republican Party for their false claims,” Mr. Spitzer joked.

“When you rip away the veneer, the feel-good veneer of the bubble of this convention, the American public knows something bad is happening,” he said.

And though the GOP used one of its biggest draws, Mayor Giuliani, during the Democratic Convention, a spokesman for the Democrats, Matt Bennett, pointed out that many other GOP stars did not make appearances. Bringing on players like Vice President Gore, Governor Dean, and Mr. Clinton would not be appropriate, he said.

Plus, he added: “All hands on deck when the convention is over and the campaigning starts in earnest.”