Heading into the first Presidential Debate, President Bush has a modest lead over Senator Kerry. Support for the President is also a bit more solid than the Senator's--90% of Bush voters are certain as to how they will vote.
Fifty-two percent (52%) of American voters believe that people learn a lot about the Presidential candidates from the Presidential Debates. A Rasmussen Reports survey of 1,000 Likely Voters found that 32% disagree and say that not much is learned from these ritual performances.
President Bush leads Senator Kerry in Virginia by six percentage points, 50% to 44%. Those figures have changed little over the past month. Heading into the Republican National Convention, the President was ahead in Virginia 50% to 45%.
During the month of September, the number of people seeing President Bush as politically conservative dropped from 66% at the beginning of the month to 60% today.
In Georgia, President Bush still has a solid double digit lead. The latest Rasmussen Reports survey shows President Bush with 53% of the vote and Senator Kerry with 42%.
In the race for the six Electoral College votes from Arkansas, President George W. Bush has solidified his lead.
Most Americans (54%) favor leaving U.S. soldiers in Iraq until that country's political situation is stabilized. A Rasmussen Reports survey of 1,000 Likely Voters found that 31% are opposed to that policy.
George W. Bush and John Kerry will face a huge bi-partisan audience in their first televised debate this Thursday night. Sixty-one percent (61%) of voters say they plan to watch the entire debate while another 33% say they will watch some of it.
Forty-three percent (43%) of voters say relying on the government for Social Security benefits is riskier than letting workers invest for their own retirement.
While many lawmakers have been critical of President Bush's tax cuts, Congress overwhelmingly voted to extend those cuts this past week. The $1.9 trillion tax cut extension passed the House 339-65 and the Senate 92-3.
In his bid for re-election, Democratic Senator Harry Reid has a 12-point lead over Republican challenger Richard Ziser. Reid's 52% to 40% advantage today is a bit tighter than his 17-point lead a month ago (in August, Reid was ahead 53% to 36%).
Sixty-six percent (66%) of voters say that President Bush is an optimist. A Rasmussen Reports survey found that just 18% believe the President is a pessimist.
Longtime CBS news anchor Dan Rather is viewed favorably by 39% of Likely Voters and unfavorably by 36%. Those numbers are down slightly from a week ago. In our previous survey, 42% had a favorable opinion of Rather and while 33% said their view was unfavorable.
In West Virginia, the latest Rasmussen Reports survey shows President Bush leading Senator Kerry by a 50% to 44% margin. Four years ago, Bush won the state by six points over Al Gore, 52% to 46%.
John Kerry's lead in New York is down to single digits. The Empire State, among the bluest of the Blue States from Election 2000, is still in the Kerry column for our Electoral College projections, but the raw numbers are stunning.
Forty percent (40%) of voters see the campaign coverage of their local newspapers as unbiased. However, only 20% to 29% view national papers as unbiased.
Among five different papers, the New York Times is seen as the most biased--35% believe its coverage is biased to help Kerry while only 22% believe it is unbiased. This may be a lingering response to the Jayson Blair scandals from last year. At that time, only 46% of Americans viewed the New York Times as a reliable source of information.
Television news networks would like to see themselves as a team of impartial journalists working on behalf of their audience.
Many pundits (and 26% of voters) think that Election 2004 will be just like Election 2000—too close to call. Others wonder if it’s more like Clinton’s 1996 re-election effort or the 1988 campaign (the first President Bush vs. a different Massachusetts liberal Democrat).
If their favorite team was playing, one-third of the nation's voters would watch the World Series rather than the Presidential Debates.
Twenty-six percent (26%) of voters believe John Kerry's service during the Vietnam era was more admirable than most young men of that era.
