Numbers show close race in N.C. with Kerry-Edwards ticket

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Numbers show close race in N.C. with Kerry-Edwards ticket

In state that's voted GOP since '76, tobacco issue, war hurt Bush

TIM FUNK

Observer Washington Bureau


WASHINGTON - A new poll of N.C. voters puts Democratic Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., much closer to President Bush in the Tar Heel State -- and virtually neck-and-neck if Kerry chooses Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., as his running mate.

A Mason-Dixon poll expected to be released today puts Bush ahead of Kerry 48 percent to 41 percent, with 3 percent for Ralph Nader and 8 percent undecided, according to Democratic sources. The margin of error is plus or minus 4 percentage points.

But when asked how they would vote if Edwards were the Democrats' choice for vice president, the race tightened to a statistical dead heat: Bush-Cheney 46 percent, Kerry/Edwards 45 percent, with 2 percent for Nader and 7 percent undecided.

North Carolina hasn't gone Democratic in a presidential election since 1976. In 2000, Bush carried it with ease, 56 percent to Al Gore's 41 percent.

Most political analysts expect Bush to carry North Carolina again this year. But his dip below 50 percent in this new N.C. poll could worry Republicans -- and hearten Democrats -- at a time when bad news out of Iraq and lingering unease about the economy have driven the president's national approval ratings to their lowest levels ever


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http://www.charlotte.com/mld/observer/news/8700134.htm

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