US: Less than two weeks before Americans vote in congressional elections, Democrats have opened up an 11-point lead over Republicans and appear poised to win control of the House of Representatives.
A Reuters/Zogby poll published yesterday showed Democrats increasing their lead, as the Iraq war and President Bush's unpopularity hurt Republican candidates.
Forty-four per cent of voters say they will vote for a Democrat, with 33 per cent backing the Republicans and 19 per cent undecided.
"There is no question Republicans are in trouble. There is also no question a lot of races remain competitive.
But it's a big hill for Republicans to climb and it's getting very late," pollster John Zogby said. The poll found that 57 per cent of Americans now believe the war in Iraq is not worth the loss of US lives, up from 53 per cent last month, and 57 per cent believe the US is on the wrong track, up slightly from 55 per cent.
Democrats are confident of winning between 20 and 30 seats in the House, comfortably more than the 15 they need for a majority.
The party needs to pickup six seats to win control of theSenate, and although four Republican-held seats are leaningtowards the Democrats, three others remain too close to call. Control of the Senate is likelyto depend on the outcome of tight races in Tennessee, Virginia and Missouri, where both parties are concentrating extra resources in the final days of the campaign.
In Tennessee, Democrat Harold Ford Jr is seeking to become the first black senator elected from the South since the post-Civil War period.
He has faced a tough Republican campaign, including a television ad featuring an attractive white woman saying she met Mr Ford at a Playboy party and adding, with USA Today poll a wink, "Harold, call me".
African-American groups denounced the ad as playing to racial stereotypes and sensitivities towards inter racial dating and Republicans withdrew it. In Virginia, Republican George Allen was expected to beat Democratic challenger Jim Webb until the senator committed a series of gaffes, including an allegedly racist remark and an initial denial of his own Jewish roots.
Missouri's contest between Republican senator Jim Talent and Democrat Claire McCaskill, has been dominated in recent days by a debate over embryonic stem-cell research. The dispute made headlines throughout the US when a conservative talkshow host accused actor Michael J Fox, who appeared in an ad for Ms McCaskill, of exaggerating his Parkinson's disease symptoms.
A new Gallup/USA Today poll found that about eight in 10 voters expect a Democratic-controlled Congress to set a timetable for US troop withdrawals from Iraq, a move that 63 per cent of respondents said they would approve.