by Katie Fretland

If you had three choices regarding the laws governing same-sex marriage, what would you choose?

1.Same-sex couples should be allowed legally to marry
2.Same-sex couples should be allowed legally to form civil unions but not marry
3.Same-sex couples should not be allowed to obtain legal recognition of their relationships

The pollsters at Quinnipiac University posed that question to 1,783 Americans across the country, and found that 32 supported same-sex marriage, 33 percent support civil unions and 29 percent said no legal recognition should exist for same-sex couples. Overall, voters oppose same-sex marriage by 55 to 36 percent, but the majority does not want the government to ban it, according to the poll.

Democrats and independents showed more support for same-sex marriage than Republicans. Forty-seven percent of Democrats, 43 percent of independents and 14 percent of Republicans support same-sex marriage, according to the poll.

Men showed more opposition to same-sex marriage at 61 percent, compared to women at 51 percent.

Despite opposition to same-sex marriage, 56 percent of voters oppose amending the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage. Sixty-four percent of Democrats oppose a ban, as well as 61 percent of independents. Fifty-six percent of Republicans favor the ban.
At the state level, 49 percent of voters said states should not attempt to ban same-sex marriage, compared to 45 percent who support a state-level ban.

"American voters oppose same-sex marriage and they don't want to recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states, but by a narrow margin, they don't want their states to ban it," Maurice Carroll, director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute, said in a statement. "And they don't want to amend the Constitution on this issue. Given a range of choices, they divide into thirds - for gay marriage, for civil unions, for a complete ban."

by Jesse Hamilton

The Senate duo that brought you the foreclosure prevention bill -- Sen. Chris Dodd and Sen. Richard Shelby, the ranking Republican on Dodd's banking committee -- has cranked out another bipartisan bill. This one, an expansion of sanctions against Iran, is in answer to Iranian bad behavior.

Says Dodd: "Iran's missile tests last week underscore its serious threat to our allies and interests in the region. This bipartisan bill strengthens economic sanctions against Iran, and authorizes divestment from companies that do business with Iran's key oil sector to increase pressure on its government to meet the demands of the international community. It also helps to prevent the illegal diversion of sensitive U.S. technologies to Iran."

All of that from the banking committee. [They must get sick of the mortgage market sometimes.]

Dodd, who is also a senior member of the foreign affairs committee, and Shelby intend to hash out the final version in the banking committee on Thursday.

To read a summary of the bill, visit On Background, the Hartford Courant's national politics blog.

by Frank James

Many national polls suggest that the presidential election is going to be close if nothing changes to shift the race's dynamics significantly in one direction or another.

Here's another indicator of how close the election could be. Voters appear evenly split on whether or not there should be a timetable for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq, according to a Washington Post and ABC News poll.

According to the poll, 50 percent of the respondents favored a timetable while 49 percent didn't. Here was another close one: 47 percent of those surveyed said they trusted Sen. John McCain, the all-but-official Republican nominee, on Iraq while 45 percent said they trusted Obama.

But when asked whether McCain would make a good commander-in-chief, 72 percent said yes while 25 percent said no.

By comparison, respondents were evenly split at 48 percent on the question of whether Obama would make a good leader of the U.S. military.

However, many analysts believe the election will turn not on Iraq but on the economy. If that holds, then Obama could have the advantage since polling shows him leading McCain on economic issues.

But what's really interesting about this Iraq poll is that it seems to indicate that McCain's position on Iraq isn't as unpopular with voters as it's frequently portrayed.

by Mark Silva

Remember that Newsweek magazine poll a few weeks back that portrayed a big advantage for Barack Obama in his contest with John McCain for the White House?

Forget it.

The newest Newsweek poll shows pretty much what the daily tracking poll of the Gallup organization has been recording for some time now: A virtual tie between the Democratic and Republican candidates for president among voters surveyed nationally. Newsweek says the virtual tie portrayed in its latest poll, as compared with the 15-point lead that Obama enjoyed in a poll reported on June 20, is "hard to explain.''

A lot of people probably have their own explanations.

Now, one of the Swamp's most faithful readers and persistent critics wondered in these e-pages if the Swamp, which reported a big double-digit lead for Obama in the Newsweek poll past, would be reporting the narrowing of the race in the newest Newsweek poll, and the answer is, of course we would. And we are. (Though we are not quite sure what to make of this business about Obama's "glow," which Newsweek illustrates with the AP photo shown here.)

The Swamp also asked, way back in the moment when Hillary Clinton had stepped aside from the Democratic contest and suddenly Obama showed a big lead over his Republican rival, if that was perhaps an outlier among the various polls.

Maybe it was, maybe not. Whatever, this is the latest:

"A month after emerging victorious from the bruising Democratic nominating contest, some of Barack Obama's glow may be fading,'' Newsweek reports. "In the latest Newsweek Poll, the Illinois senator leads Republican nominee John McCain by just 3 percentage points, 44 percent to 41 percent.

"The statistical dead heat is a marked change from last month's Newsweek Poll, where Obama led McCain by 15 points, 51 percent to 36 percent.

"Obama's rapid drop comes at a strategically challenging moment for the Democratic candidate,'' Newsweek notes. "Having vanquished Hillary Clinton in early June, Obama quickly went about repositioning himself for a general-election audience--an unpleasant task for any nominee emerging from the pander-heavy primary contests and particularly for a candidate who'd slogged through a vigorous primary challenge in most every contest from January until June...

"More seriously, some Obama supporters worry that the spectacle of their candidate eagerly embracing his old rival, Hillary Clinton, and traveling the country courting big donors at lavish fund-raisers, may have done lasting damage to his image as an arbiter of a new kind of politics.

"This is a major concern since Obama's outsider credentials, have, in the past, played a large part in his appeal to moderate, swing voters. In the new poll, McCain leads Obama among independents 41 percent to 34 percent, with 25 percent favoring neither candidate. In June's Newsweek Poll, Obama bested McCain among independent voters, 48 percent to 36 percent.''

For more, see Newsweek's report on the Obama-McCain contest:

by Frank James

Voters, especially Democrats, are more interested in the coming presidential election than they've been in two decades, a trend that could significantly boost turnout and give Sen. Barack Obama a big advantage over Sen. John McCain, according to a new poll from the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press.

Another finding from the Pew poll that could augur well for Obama is that voter engagement was especially high among younger voters under 50, exactly that voter group Obama is counting on to turn out in large numbers for him.

The Obama campaign is hoping for historic levels of turnout amoung voters on the young end of the age scale in particular, voters who in past elections have typically not shown up at the polls the way older voters have. The poll suggests that such voters are psyched for Obama. The question, of course, is whether they'll stay excited about Obama all the way to the election booth.

Here's yet another interesting result: despite the good news for Obama, there was bad news for him too. Democrats weren't as unified behind him as Republicans were behind McCain. But what Obama lacked in party unity he made up for in enthusiam, an area that was a McCain weakness.

And here's why both candidates are taking such pains currently to move towards the center of the political spectrum: Pew's results suggest there exists a substantial pool of undecided swing voters out there yet to be won over.

Here's a summary from Pew:

The outlook for the presidential election at mid-year is substantially different than at comparable points in time in recent campaigns. First, turnout is likely to be higher this fall - perhaps much higher than in previous elections - as voter interest continues at record levels. Second, as has been the case since the start of the campaign, Democrats enjoy a substantial engagement advantage over Republicans that may significantly alter the composition of the November electorate.

by Mark Silva

Never mind soccer moms, security moms and the bitter working class.

This is a question for pet owners.

And John McCain is Best in Show.

The pet-owning public may have caught on to the fact that McCain, like George Washington and George W. Bush, shares his home with a number of pets - more than a dozen, in McCain's case. Democrat Barack Obama, by contrast, is petless.

Among pet-owners, McCain has clawed his way to a marginal advantage; 42 percent supporting the Republican, 37 percent the Democrat, according to the results of an AP-Yahoo News poll (remember, it was Jonathan Swift who brought us the Yahoos.)

Among the petless, the poll found, Obama is favored by a rather solid margin of 48 to 34 percent.

Obama reportedly has promised his two daughters a dog once this campaign is over. If this poll is any indication of anything, the junior senator from Illinois may want to purchase that puppy before November.

by Frank James

A new Zogby poll gives Sen. Barack Obama a six percentage point lead over Sen. John McCain in its national online poll.

UTICA, New York - As the race for President passes the Independence Day holiday and heads toward the dog days of summer, Sen. Barack Obama holds a 44% to 38% lead over Sen. John McCain in the horserace contest, but also leads by a substantial margin in a state-by-state Electoral College tally, a new Zogby Interactive poll shows.

The extensive national poll of of 46,274 likely voters also shows Libertarian candidate and former Congressman Bob Barr wins 6% support, eating into McCain's needed conservative base of support.

The online poll also gave the senator from Illinois a wide electoral college margin in those states whose results were beyond the margin of error (MoE). Obama led in states adding up to 273 electoral votes versus 158 EVs for McCain. A candidate needs 270 to win.

In 11 states totaling 107 EVs the MoE was too narrow for the state to be awarded to either candidate. There are 538 EVs all told.

Obama also beat McCain by slightly more than six points on favorability, Zogby said.

The bottom line? This poll, like those done by Gallup and others are pointing towards a very close race. But it's still only early July. We haven't had the nominating conventions or presidential debates or all the 527 TV ads yet. Then there's always the unexpected.

by Mark Silva

Democratic Sen. Barack Obama claims a significant advantage over Republican Sen. John McCain at the start of their campaign for the White House, according to the results of a new poll conducted by the Los Angeles Times and Bloomberg News.

In a two-way matchup, the poll has found Obama favored among 49 percent of those surveyed, McCain 37 percent. This is almost as wide an advantage as Obama held (15 points) in a Newsweek poll published over the weekend - both surveys portraying Obama far better positioned in his bid for the White House than other surveys have shown in recent days. The poll was run over the weekend.

In a four-way ballot that includes independent candidate Ralph Nader and Libertarian Bob Barr, Obama holds a 48-33 percentage-point advantage over McCain in the L.A. Times and Bloomberg survey - suggesting that it is McCain who stands to lose the most to third- and fourth-party alternatives who may appeal to an independent voter whom both Obama and McCain are courting in their campaigns for president.

The added margin for Obama in the broader matchup appears due less to Obama's strength and more to McCain's weakness, the L.A. Times reports.

The Arizona senator suffers from a pronounced "enthusiasm gap," especially among conservatives who usually provide republican candidates with a reliable base, the Times adds. Fewer than 80 percent of self-described Republicans say they will vote for their party's candidate this year, with about 10 percent saying they plan to vote for someone else and about 10 percent undecided. Among voters who say they do plan to vote for McCain, almost half say they are "not enthusiastic" about the candidate.

By contrast, the Times reports, about 80 percent of Obama's voters say they are enthusiastic and almost half say they are "very enthusiastic.''

See the story at the Los Angeles Times.

by Mark Silva

It could be one of those earlier outliers.

Or it could be really bad news for John McCain.

But Newsweek magazine, reporting on the results of a survey run June 18-19, reports a 15-percentage point advantage for Barack Obama in the race for the White House.

"Barack finally has his bounce,'' Newsweek suggests of the Democratic Party's presumptive nominee, who clinched the party's nomination within the past three weeks and has been looking for the bounce that might come with that.

The Illinois senator stands particularly strong among independents in this survey - favored by a margin of 48 to 36 percent over McCain, the Republican Party's presumptive nominee, among swing voters critical to the outcome of the vote on Nov. 4 Overall. Obama holds a 51 percentage point to 36-point advantage among all surveyed by Newsweek.

Now, this is a far greater advantage than other surveys have found since Obama clinched the nomination, with NBC News and the Wall Street Journal finding just a few-points edge for the Illinoisan.

The Gallup Poll in particular, which has been running a daily tracking poll and found Obama up seven points at one point since he silenced Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York in the Democratic primaries, portrays a virtual tie in the race with McCain: 46 percent Obama, 44 percent McCain.

There are screens and there are samples to consider in these surveys, too.

Newsweek surveyed 1,010 adults, registered voters, and the reported results carry a possible 4 percentage point margin of error. Gallup's daily track is the result of a three-day rolling average, with 2,640 registered voters represented in its latest, June 17, 19 and 20 survey, reported today carrying a possible margin of error of just 2 percentage points.

By Paul West

A fierce debate over national security, perhaps the clearest and widest difference between John McCain and Barack Obama, was triggered this week by, of all people, five justices of the Supreme Court. How it plays out could determine who becomes the next president.

The court's decision in a Guantanamo Bay case, giving non-citizen prisoners the right to challenge their detention in federal court, "threw a stone in the pond" of the presidential contest, remarked Robert Gibbs, the Obama campaign's communications director.

A boulder might be more like it.

Ripples from the ruling launched a furious argument over Obama's national security views, as he was rolling out an ad campaign designed to cast him in a patriotic light. Coincidentally or not, McCain's support in Gallup's national tracking poll ticked upward and Obama's lead was down to two percentage points by Friday.

by Mark Silva

The second full week of the known contest for the White House ends with Barack Obama and John McCain in a virtual tie in national polling, according to the Gallup Poll's daily tracking.

Obama, the Democratic, junior senator from Illinois, had opened up a modest advantage over McCain, the Republican, senior senator from Arizona, after clinching the Democratic nomination early this month. Gallup isn't the only poll that showed "a modest bump'' for Obama, seven points up several days back. The pollsters working for NBC News and the Wall Street Journal found a similar spread, and announcers voiced surprise it wasn't wider.

The latest Gallup snapshot: Obama 46 percent, McCain 44 percent.

In a survey with a 2 percentage point margin of error, that's a virtual tie.

Which will make for a long, hot summer.

At the same time, in a race that will be fought in several states rather than on a national canvas, the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute has found Obama holding advantages over McCain in three critical states: Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio.

The Gallup results come from surveys June 16-17 and June 19.

"In the broadest sense, the race between McCain and Obama has been close for months now,'' reports Gallup Editor-in-Chief Frank Newport, "with McCain holding small leads over Obama in earlier months this spring prior to Obama's gaining his slight edge in recent weeks.''

For more, see the Gallup Poll.

by Mark Silva

Once a year, the folks at Gallup step back and take a look at confidence in the great institutions of our society.

Guess who's at the bottom of the heap this year?

Congress. Right below HMOs.

Just 12 percent of Ameriicans surveyed voice confidence in Congress, "the lowest of the 16 institutions tested this year, and the worst rating Gallup has measured for any institution in the 35-year history of this question,'' Gallup's Jeffrey Jones adds.

"The poor economy and lack of effective government action on important issues such as gas prices, the Iraq War, and immigration help contribute to the erosion of trust and confidence in government institutions,'' Jones reports. These ratings indicate that people "may be hungry for change in Washington come the fall's elections.''

For more on the survey, read on below, and see Gallup's report.

by Frank James

House Democrats responded to President Bush's proposal to end the moratorium on drilling for oil offshore as well as in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge by telling the president to drop dead, although they used a lot more words to make the same point.

The Democrats' main argument was that the oil industry is already in possession of 68 million acres of oil leases and that Big Oil should drill away on those before they come around asking the federal government for any more land or ocean floor.

At a Capitol Hill press conference following Bush's White House Rose Garden appearance, Rep. Ed Markey of Massachusetts ridiculed the president as essentially a mouthpiece for the oil and gas industry.

Then he urged Bush to support legislation that would charge oil companies fees that would increase the longer the companies hold onto the leases without producing oil on them:

And you know, today is an historic day. The president has decided to take out some of the oldest ideas which the oil and gas industry have had for destroying the most pristine wilderness and shoreline that we have in the United States. After eight years, President Bush and Dick Cheney have turned the GOP into the "Gas and Oil Party." That's the legacy that they are going to leave.

And what we're going to do, Mr. (Rahm) Emanuel, Mr. (Nick) Rahall, Mr. (Maurice) Hinchey and the Democratic Party is going to do, is we're going to give them a chance in the White House to put their money where their mouth is. We're going to give them a chance to impose fees on the oil industry on the public lands where they do not drill, where the American people have already given them an opportunity to drill. And we will increase the fees as the years go by, because otherwise, they will have wound up warehousing where the oil is in the United States that the American people, the Democratic Party, everyone wants them to drill, but they're refusing to drill, and at the same time, they're insisting that we should go to places that should be preserved forever.

by Frank James

Has the U.S. passed the point where it can enjoy the luxury of restricting drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf and even the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge?

That is clearly the decision that's been made by Sen. John McCain, the all-but-official Republican presidential nominee, who now supports drilling off the U.S. coast, though he's still hanging on, for now, to his opposition to drilling in Alaska. Florida politicians and fellow Republicans like Gov. Charlie Crist and Sen. Mel Martinez have followed suit.

President Bush has long supported drilling in Alaska but is now calling for lifting the federal ban on off-shore drilling.

Democrats, at least to this point, are showing no such change of heart. Indeed, it will be harder for Democrats to make a similar shift because the party has an environmental constituency that would make such a move painful for any Democratic politician who dares suggest that such drilling bans be lifted.

Many Democrats and environmentalists argue the nation can't "drill it's way out of the problem," that any effort to increase the domestic production of oil just continues the nation's addition to that energy source by postponing the needed transition to alternative and renewable fuel sources and increased conservation.

by Mark Silva

Here is a notable early read from some important states:

Democrat Barack Obama holds an apparent advantage over Republican John McCain in Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio, according to the results of a new Quinnipiac University "swing state'' survey.

These are all states in which Hillary Clinton prevailed over Obama in the party primaries - though Florida's disputed primary in January was uncontested. In Ohio and Pennsylvania, in particular, the primary contest was portrayed as a question of who might be able to carry working class voters in a general election matchup with McCain.

"Finally getting Sen. Hillary Clinton out of the race has been a big boost for Sen. Barack Obama,'' suggests Peter Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Inttitute.

The results from Quinnipiac's sizable surveys of voters in these three states critical to either presidential candidate in November:

Florida: Obama 47 percent, McCain 43 percent.

Pennsylvania: Obama 52, McCain 40

Ohio: Obama 48, McCain 42.

Obama draws his advantage "with strong support from women, blacks and younger voters,'' Quinnipiac report - noting that this also marks the first time that Obama, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, has led McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, in matchups in these states.

"No one has been elected president since 1960 without taking two of these three largest swing states in the Electoral College,'' the pollsters note.

These were sizable surveys run between June 9-16: Polls of 1,453 Florida likely voters, with a possible margin of error of plus or minus 2.6 percent; 1,396 Ohio likely voters with a margin of 2.6 percent; 1,511 Pennsylvania likely voters with a 2.5 percent margin.

For mnre on the surveys, read on below, and see the poll here.

by Mark Silva

Numbers to remember, from our friends at Top of the Ticket who have a new poll of Latino voters which is of particular interest to Sen. Barack Obama:

76 percent: Jimmy Carter's share of the Latino vote in 1976.

72 percent: Bill Clinton's share at reelection in 1996.

67 percent: Al Gore's share in winning the popular vote in 2000.

56 percent: John Kerry's share in his loss to George W. Bush in '04.

Republicans like the way those numbers have trended, with Bush - a Texas-schooled politician who told Latinos he wanted to "look you in the ojos'' - raising hopes within his party with a 43 percent share in '04.

But a new poll of Latino voters in 21 states run by Pacific Market Research and political scientists at the University of Washington has found Obama's potential level of support approaching what predecessors in his party, prior to 2004, have been able to attract. Obama was the favorite among 60 percent surveyed, McCain 23 percent, with 16 percent undecided. The poll has a 3.5 percentage-point margn of error.

See the story in Top of the Ticket, the L.A. Times political blog.