President Obama opened the post-Labor Day stretch of the midterm campaign in the perennial swing state of Ohio on Wednesday, accusing the GOP of pushing bankrupt economic policies and putting politics ahead of national welfare.

He pushed a new $350 billion plan to lift the sagging economy, including $200 billion in tax cuts for businesses to purchase new equipment and write off 100 percent of new investments through the end of 2011.

The president also highlighted a $50 billion proposal for infrastructure investment, as well as $100 billion to permanently extend tax credits to businesses for research and development.

He stood by his plan to allow the Bush tax cuts to expire for people making over $250,000, while extending the cuts for those making less.

Obama refused to use the word "stimulus" to describe his new proposals. Republicans have repeatedly savaged the White House for the controversial $862 billion recovery stimulus plan passed last year, arguing that it ballooned the deficit while failing to revive the economy.

But Obama saved his strongest rhetoric for his GOP opponents, especially House Minority Leader John Boehner.

The Ohio Republican -- in line to become House speaker if the GOP wins control of Congress -- has rejected new ideas and embraced "the same philosophy we already tried for the last decade -- the same philosophy that led to this mess in the first place," Obama told a crowd outside Cleveland.

Boehner and other Republicans are trying to ride a wave of "fear and anger all the way to Election Day," Obama said.

The election is about "fear versus hope (and) the past versus the future. It's still a choice between sliding backward and moving forward. That's what this election is about. That's the choice you'll face in November."

Obama spoke longingly of a proud Republican tradition of producing "serious leaders for serious times." Current GOP leaders, he said, are more interested in "playing games and scoring points."

Boehner immediately lashed back at Obama, declaring in a written statement that if the president "is serious about finally focusing on jobs, a good start would be taking the advice of his recently departed budget director and freezing all tax rates, coupled with cutting federal spending to where it was before all the bailouts, government takeovers, and 'stimulus' spending sprees."

Former White House Budget Director Peter Orszag recently offered an alternative to Obama's plan on the issue of whether the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy should be scrapped, asserting in a New York Times op-ed that failing to extend the tax cuts for the rich over the next couple of years would make an "already stagnating jobs market worse."

Orszag, however, proposed allowing all of the Bush tax cuts to expire after two more years.

A former soldier arrested after a hostage incident at a Georgia military base is scheduled to appear in court Wednesday.

Robert Anthony Quinones, 29, of Hinesville, Georgia, will appear before a U.S. magistrate judge in Savannah, Georgia, on multiple charges, including threats to kill President Obama and former President Bill Clinton.

Quinones was arrested Monday after a two-hour hostage situation at Winn Army Community Hospital on Fort Stewart, about 45 miles from Savannah, according to the FBI.

Officials said he had demanded mental health care at the hospital.

Quinones is charged with assault of a federal officer and kidnapping in the incident, which ended with the gunman's surrender. No one was injured in the incident, officials said.

After he was taken into custody and during interviews, Quinones "expressed his plans, preparation and intentions to kill President Obama and former President Clinton," according to an affidavit filed in federal court.

"Quinones detailed his studies of Secret Service protocols, sniper techniques and means of disguise and weapons concealment to implement his assassination plans."

A search of his residence resulted in the discovery of 11 long guns, four pistols, multiple rounds of ammunition and dozens of bayonets and knives, according to the affidavit.

Authorities also found books and manuals about FBI hostage rescue teams, Osama bin Laden, Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, the Russian mafia and other topics, according to the affidavit signed by FBI and secret service agents.

When asked whether he would kill Obama or Clinton if given a chance, Quinones said, "Yes. On a scale of 1 to 10 about being serious, I am a 10," the affidavit said.

Quinones was discharged from the military in February and had a civilian job at Fort Stewart, said the FBI, which released no other information on his military record.

Neighbor Jerry Franklin said he has known Quinones for several years.

"He was a good kid," he said.

Franklin, 48, an Army retiree, said Quinones would talk with him and other veterans because they understood the stress brought on by combat. Quinones had served two tours in Iraq, Franklin said.

"All I know is he saw death," Franklin told CNN.

"Maybe they [the Army] should have helped him a little more," said Franklin, adding he was not blaming the military for the incident. Quinones might not have received sufficient individual treatment after returning from Iraq, Franklin said.

Quinones worked at one of Fort Stewart's post-exchange stores, the neighbor said, adding he didn't believe Quinones had been treated at Winn Army Community Hospital, the scene of Monday's hostage situation.

The hostage incident started about 4 a.m. Monday when the former Army serviceman entered the facility and demanded care, spokesman Kevin Larson said Monday.

The gunman immediately took one hostage and went to the third floor, which houses the behavioral health unit, where he held two more people at gunpoint, including a nurse practitioner, Larson said.

The nurse, an Army major, was able to calm the man and authorities started negotiations, Larson said. The gunman eventually surrendered and was taken into custody for questioning, he said.

Quinones was armed with an MP5 assault rifle, an AR-15 assault rifle, a 9 mm handgun and a .38-caliber pistol, according to the affidavit. It accuses the gunman of pointing a firearm at an Army negotiator.

Quinones' attorney, Karl Christian Zipperer, said late Tuesday afternoon he had just gotten the case and would have no comment. A phone number for Quinones in Hinesville was disconnected.

A determined Republican stall campaign in the Senate has sidetracked so many of the men and women nominated by President Barack Obama for judgeships that he has put fewer people on the bench than any president since Richard Nixon at a similar point in his first term 40 years ago.

The delaying tactics have proved so successful, despite the Democrats' substantial Senate majority, that fewer than half of Obama's nominees have been confirmed and 102 out of 854 judgeships are vacant.

Forty-seven of those vacancies have been labeled emergencies by the judiciary because of heavy caseloads.

Even some Republican senators have complained. Sen. Lamar Alexander took to the Senate floor in July to plead with his own leaders for a vote on an appeals court judge supported by Alexander and fellow Tennessee Republican Sen. Bob Corker.

With Congress returning Sept. 13 for a session shortened by members' desire to campaign for re-election in November, there's little time to reverse the trend. Some say there's little chance of reversing it as polls show a rising chance the GOP will capture the Senate, which could stiffen GOP resistance to confirmation votes.

The Obama administration got a slow start sending names to the Senate last year and has yet to try to fill two vacancies on the high-profile federal appeals court in the District of Columbia, where four current Supreme Court justices once served.

Obama has voiced only tepid public objection as more and more of his judicial nominees become stranded in Senate limbo. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has been unwilling to set aside the considerable time needed to force votes under complex Senate rules.

Now there are 45 nominees awaiting action, two for nearly 13 months. After Alexander's complaint, the Republicans agreed to allow a mid-September vote for appeals court nominee Jane Stranch, first nominated by Obama in August 2009.

At this point in President George W. Bush's first term, 72 judges had been confirmed by a Senate that Democrats controlled for much of Bush's first two years. By contrast, the Senate has had 59 or 60 seats under Democratic control during Obama's tenure but has only confirmed 40 of his judges. Nixon got 33 judges through a Democratic-controlled Senate.

"What's interesting is you got a guy (Bush) who was barely elected president with a Senate in the hands of the opposing party, and he is going to come out better in his first two years than a guy who got elected with a big majority and had a big majority in the Senate too," said Brookings Institution scholar Russell Wheeler.

White House counsel Bob Bauer and progressive groups squarely blame Republicans.

The Senate GOP is obstructing "confirmations across the board, even forcing noncontroversial nominees who passed committee with overwhelming bipartisan support to wait months for a floor vote," Bauer said.

Marge Baker, executive vice president of the liberal People for the American Way, said that stalling votes on judges is "part and parcel of the general obstruction we're seeing right now."

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky has acknowledged that his strategy is partly payback for Democrats' blocking some Bush appointees.

But McConnell spokesman Don Stewart said the responsibility for the lack of confirmations lies with Obama, who nominated just 33 people to judgeships in 2009, and Reid, who controls the Senate calendar.

"We can't confirm what's not there," Stewart said.

But Republican senators have forced postponements of hearings and votes in the Judiciary Committee and used their power under the chamber's rules to block any easy route to full Senate votes.

Persistent resistance by the opposition to a president's appeals court nominees reaches back to President Bill Clinton's administration and a Senate controlled by Republicans for six of Clinton's eight years.

Wheeler said the Republicans now are delaying votes on district court nominees, too. And in one instance, Republicans for months even blocked confirmation of openly gay Marisa Demeo to be a local trial judge in the nation's capital. The Senate confirms local judges because the city is a federal enclave.

Republican objections to Obama's nominees, however, are not primarily rooted in the candidates' ideology. With a couple of exceptions, the president has nominated moderates who receive overwhelming, sometimes unanimous, support once they get a vote.

The Obama nominees so far have not excited progressive groups that once hoped a Democratic administration combined with a large Democratic Senate majority would remake the federal courts.

When Bush left office, Republicans had appointed just under 60 percent of all federal judges. Twenty months later, the number has dipped only slightly to a shade under 59 percent, according to statistics compiled by the liberal Alliance for Justice. Because of retirements, the percentage of Republican-nominated district judges actually has gone up.

The president has had some successes, notably changing the composition of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., which had been dominated by conservatives chosen by Republican presidents.

His nominees also have been diverse: Just under half are women, one-quarter are African-American, 12 percent are Asian-American and 7 percent are Hispanic.

Obama also filled two Supreme Court vacancies. The confirmations of Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan took considerable time, although they do not completely explain the initially slow rollout of judicial nominees.

Even now, Obama has nominated roughly 40 fewer people for judgeships than either Bush or Clinton at this point.

The smaller number of nominees has been a surprise because Obama once taught constitutional law and installed a team with vast experience nominating and confirming judges.

"It seems like it has not been a priority," said Ilya Shapiro, senior fellow at the libertarian Cato Institute in Washington. "It's been surprising because he's a constitutional lawyer, he knows how courts work, how important they are. It seemed like an easy bone to throw to his base to make a mark, a lasting mark."

There's been yet another delay in former Rep. William Jefferson'sappeal of his federal corruption convictions. Jefferson's lawyers were given a one-month extension to complete briefs by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va. The briefs are now due Nov. 15, with prosecutors required to file a response brief by Dec. 10. The likelihood is that oral arguments will be held in the spring of 2011.

Jefferson, the former nine-term Democratic congressman from New Orleans, was convicted on 11 of 16 corruption counts by a Virginia juryin the summer of 2009. He remains free pending resolution of the appeal.

In asking for more time, Jefferson's new appellate attorney,Lawrence Robbins, said the case is complicated and the paperwork is extensive from the eight-week trial. In addition, Robbins said that one of Jefferson's appellate lawyers is getting married in October, and will be out of the country for 10 days that month. There were apparently no objections to the requested delay from federal prosecutors.

A federal grand jury has indicted a Maryland state senator on charges of bribery, conspiracy, mail fraud and extortion in connection with a scheme involving Shoppers Food Warehouse.

State Sen. Ulysses S. Currie, 73, of Forestville, was indicted Wednesday on 18 criminal counts charging that he and executives of Shoppers took part in a scheme in which Currie was paid by the company in exchange for using his official position to influence dozens of matters that benefited the supermarket chain and its executives.

The scheme went on from 2002 to 2008, prosecutors said. In that time, Currie was paid from $3,000 per month in 2003 to $7,600 per month in 2007, but the payments were never reported on annual government ethics forms, prosecutors said.

According to the indictment, Currie lobbied state highway officials to get traffic signals installed at the site of two Shoppers stores -- one in Baltimore County, the other in Laurel.

The indictment said he also helped the company get $2 million in public funding for its project at Mondawmin Mall, and Currie smoothed the way for the company to transfer a liquor license in Prince George's County.

"Government officials cross a bright line when they accept payments in return for using the authority of their office, whether they take cash in envelopes or checks labeled as consulting payments," said U.S. Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein. "When businesses can obtain valuable government benefits by putting a senator on the payroll, it diminishes public confidence and disadvantages companies that refuse to go along with the pay-to-play approach."

The indictment follows a two-year long investigation that came to light in the spring of 2008.

Reached by phone on Wednesday by 11 News I-Team lead investigative reporter Jayne Miller, Currie said he had no comment on the indictment and no comment on whether he plans to stay in office.

However, shortly after making that statement, Senate President Mike Miller released a statement saying Currie told him he would step down from his position as chairman of the Budget and Taxation Committee until the matter is resolved.

"He believes that he will be unable to dedicate himself fully to serving as chairman of Budget and Taxation Committee as he works to prove his innocence," Miller said in the release. "I am saddened that the investigation of Sen. Currie has reached this point. Sen. Currie has confronted adversity throughout his life, and I am confident he will be exonerated." "When businesses can obtain valuable government benefits by putting a senator on the payroll, it diminishes public confidence and disadvantages companies that refuse to go along with the pay-to-play approach."
- U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein

Currie has been in the Legislature since 1987. He is currently running for re-election and is unopposed in this month's primary.

Two former grocery store chain executives are also charged in the scheme. They are William White, 67, of Annapolis, and Kevin Small, 55, of Lewisburg, Pa.

Gov. Martin O'Malley also issued a statement regarding the indictment.

"This is a sad day for the people of Prince George's County and Sen. Currie personally. People have the right to expect the highest ethical service from their public servants," he said.

Currie's lawyer told reporters that the senator committed no crime, calling the case an unusual bribery case because it doesn't involve cash payments under the table or a hush-hush deal.

Shoppers Food Warehouse has agreed to pay a $2.5 million fine.

President Barack Obama blasted Senate Republicans on Monday for blocking a small business assistance bill, calling their opposition "pure partisan politics."

The country needs a "full scale attack" on economic sluggishness, he told reporters at the White House.

"While we have taken a series of measures and come a long way ... too many Americans are still looking for work and too many communities are far from being whole again," he said.

The president also said his economic team is "hard at work" on a series of new measure designed both to spark short-term hiring and lay the foundation for long-term economic growth.

Among other things, Obama said the administration will continue to push for an extension of middle class tax cuts, new incentives for clean energy research and development and initiatives to help rebuild infrastructure.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, released a statement immediately after Obama's remarks criticizing the president and Democratic congressional leaders for dramatically increasing the size of the national debt while doing little to restore stronger economic growth.

"Instead of growing jobs as promised, Washington Democrats have grown the size of the national debt, the federal government and the unemployment rate," McConnell said.

"It's no surprise that most Americans think the country is on the wrong track and that Democrat policies have failed to do anything to fix their top concern, the economy."

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said boosting small businesses and extending middle-class tax cuts both are important in improving the economy.

"The Republican Party talks a lot about their support for and their helping of small business," he said. "I think the question that the president put toward them today is, 'If that's what you support, why are you standing in the way of something that small businesses acknowledge would help with their hiring, with their purchasing and with their expansion?'"

Gibbs said the president does not believe there is any magic bullet to quickly getting out of the financial crisis.

"It took us a long time to get to this point. We got here not simply because of one thing, but because of many things," Gibbs said.

"We've seen the housing market collapse. We saw what happened to credit markets. We saw what happened to the stability of our financial system. All of that accumulated after many years into one big pothole ... the size of which any stimulus was unlikely to fill."

Growing economic jitters amid new signs of a slow recovery remain a top political issue in the runup to November's midterm elections.

The U.S. economy sputtered to a near stop in the second quarter, according to estimates from the government released Friday, although the slowdown wasn't as bad as many had feared.

The nation's gross domestic product, the broadest measure of economic activity, was revised sharply lower to an annual growth rate of 1.6 percent in the three months ending in June. The initial reading had been for a 2.4 percent growth rate in the period.

The bill currently stuck in the Senate authorizes the creation of a $30 billion lending fund. The Treasury Department would run the program, which would deliver cheap capital to community banks, defined as those with less than $10 billion in total assets.

The idea is that community banks are the ones that do the bulk of lending to small businesses and so by pumping capital into them, it will get in the hands of Main Street businesses.

Other key components of the bill would provide $12 billion worth of tax relief for small businesses between 2010 and 2020, according to an estimate from the Joint Committee on Taxation.

The bill also increases Small Business Administration loan limits and extends loan sweeteners through the end of the year. It offers several tax cuts for small businesses, to both encourage investment and entrepreneurship.

The legislation also provides $1.5 billion in grants to state lending programs that can't rely on depleted state coffers for more cash.

President Obama chuckles when Brian Williams asks him about polls that show may Americans still believe he is a Muslim. He says he doesn't pay much attention to those polls, because "I can't spend all my time with my birth certificate plastered on my forehead."

"I don't think the American people want me to spend all my time on it," he says.

Obama is clearly intent on casting himself as above the political fray, saying American politics is in its "silly season." For example, he swears he didn't watch any of Glenn Beck's "Restoring Honor" rally on the National Mall yesterday and says he doesn't find it surprising that "a Glenn Beck can stir up some of the people."

"I'm making decisions that are not necessarily good for the nightly news and not good for the next election, but for the next generations," he says.

Calling the federal response to Hurricane Katrina "a shameful breakdown in government," President Barack Obama said Sunday as rebuilding continues, officials are looking ahead to avoid a repeat when future disasters strike.

Speaking at Xavier University of Louisiana in New Orleans to mark the fifth anniversary of Katrina, Obama said construction of a fortified levee system to protect the city is underway and will be finished by next year, "We should not be playing Russian roulette every hurricane season," he said.

"There is no need to dwell on what you experienced and what the world witnessed," the president said, speaking to a crowd that included current New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu and members of Louisiana's Congressional delegation.

"We all remember it keenly -- water pouring through broken levees; mothers holding their children above the waterline; people stranded on rooftops begging for help; and bodies lying in the streets of a great American city," Obama said. "It was a natural disaster but also a man-made catastrophe; a shameful breakdown in government that left countless men and women and children abandoned and alone."

But the president spoke of the resilience of city residents. "Because of all of you -- all the advocates, all the organizers who are here today, folks standing behind me who have worked so hard and never gave up hope, you are all leading the way toward a better future for this city with innovative approaches to fight poverty, improve health care, reduce crime and create opportunities for young people -- because of you, New Orleans is coming back."

The president noted that New Orleans is now one of the nation's fastest-growing cities, and small businesses have surged. "Five years ago, the Saints had to play every game on the road because of the damage to the Superdome," he said. "Two weeks ago, we welcomed the Saints to the White House as Super Bowl champions."

"I don't have to tell you that there are still too many vacant and overgrown lots," Obama said. "There are still too many students attending classes in trailers. There are still too many people unable to find work. And there's still too many New Orleans folks who haven't been able to come home."

"So while an incredible amount of progress has been made, on this fifth anniversary, I wanted to come here and tell the people of this city directly: My administration is going to stand with you -- and fight alongside you -- until the job is done, until New Orleans is all the way back."

He said his administration has made efforts to reduce red tape and turf wars between agencies, and has put in place a new way to handle disputes, with help from Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-Louisiana. More than 170 projects are now underway as a result, he said.

In addition, federal officials are tackling "corruption and inefficiency that has long plagued the New Orleans Housing Authority," he said.

And a group led by Housing Secretary Shaun Donovan and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is examining disaster recovery nationwide. "We're improving coordination on the ground, modernizing emergency communications and helping families plan for a crisis," Obama said. "And we're putting in place reforms so that never again in America is someone left behind in a disaster because they're living with a disability or because they're elderly or because they're infirm. That will not happen again."

On Friday, he said, his administration announced a final agreement on $1.8 billion for Orleans Parish schools, money the president said had been "locked up for years, but now it's freed up, so folks here can determine how best to restore the school system."

In addition, the largest civil works project in American history -- the construction of a fortified levee system to protect New Orleans -- is underway and will be finished by next year, he said.

"Together we are helping to make New Orleans a place that stands for what we can do in America -- not just for what we can't do," he said. "And ultimately, that must be the legacy of Katrina: not one of neglect, but of action; not one of indifference, but of empathy; not of abandonment, but of a community working together to meet shared challenges."

Some wounds, the president acknowledged, have not yet healed, and "there are some losses that can't be repaid. For many who lived through those harrowing days five years ago, there are searing memories that time may not erase. But even amid so much tragedy, we saw the stirrings of a brighter day."

He said he recalled being struck, upon visiting New Orleans four years ago, by the amount of greenery that had returned.

"The work ahead will not be easy," he said, "and there will be setbacks. There will be challenges along the way. But thanks to you, thanks to the great people of this great city, New Orleans is blossoming again."

Following his speech, the president, accompanied by first lady Michelle Obama, were given a short tour of a new neighborhood built on a part of the city that experienced severe flooding when Katrina hit.

Americans increasingly are convinced -- incorrectly -- that President Barack Obama is a Muslim, and a growing number are thoroughly confused about his religion.

Sen. Barack Obama visited the First Emanuel Baptist Church in Central City as a candidate for the Democratic nomination for president in August 2007. Church Pastor Charles Joseph Southall III and the choir put a blessing upon him. Nearly one in five people, or 18 percent, said they think Obama is Muslim, up from the 11 percent who said so in March 2009, according to a poll released Thursday. The proportion who correctly say he is a Christian is down to just 34 percent.

The largest share of people, 43 percent, said they don't know his religion, an increase from the 34 percent who said that in early 2009.

The survey, conducted by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center and its affiliated Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, is based on interviews conducted before the controversy over whether Muslims should be permitted to construct a mosque near the World Trade Center site. Obama has said he believes Muslims have the right to build an Islamic center there, though he's also said he won't take a position on whether they should actually build it.

In a separate poll by Time magazine/ABT SRBI conducted Monday and Tuesday -- after Obama's comments about the mosque -- 24 percent said they think he is Muslim, 47 percent said they think he is Christian and 24 percent didn't know or didn't respond.

In addition, 61 percent opposed building the Muslim center near the Trade Center site and 26 percent said they favor it.

The Pew poll found that about three in 10 of Obama's fiercest political rivals, Republicans and conservatives, say he is a Muslim. That is up significantly from last year and far higher than the share of Democrats and liberals who say so. But even among his supporters, the number saying he is a Christian has fallen since 2009, with just 43 percent of blacks and 46 percent of Democrats saying he is Christian.

Among independents, 18 percent say Obama is Muslim -- up from 10 percent last year.

Pew analysts attribute the findings to attacks by his opponents and Obama's limited attendance at religious services, particularly in contrast with Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, whose worship was more public.

Andrew Kohut, the Pew Research Center's director, said the confusion partly reflects "the intensification of negative views about Obama among his critics." Alan Cooperman, the Pew Forum's associate director for research, said that with the public hearing little about Obama's religion, "maybe there's more possibility for other people to make suggestions that the president is this or he's really that or he's really a Muslim."

Obama is the Christian son of a Kenyan Muslim father and a Kansas mother. From age 6 to 10, Obama lived in predominantly Muslim Indonesia with his mother and Indonesian stepfather. His full name, Barack Hussein Obama, sounds Muslim to many.

White House officials did not provide on-the-record comments on the survey, but they prompted Pastor Kirbyjon Caldwell of Houston to call The Associated Press.

Caldwell, who said he has known Obama for years, said the president is a Christian who prays every day. He said he was not sure where the public confusion about the president's religion came from, but he called false media reports about it "a 24-hour noise box committed to presenting the president in a false light."

Six in 10 of those saying Obama is a Muslim said they got the information from the media, with the largest portion -- 16 percent -- saying it was on television. Eleven percent said they learned it from Obama's behavior and words.

Despite the confusion about Obama's religion, there is noteworthy support for how he uses it to make decisions. Nearly half, or 48 percent, said he relies on his religion the right amount when making policy choices, 21 percent said he uses it too little and 11 percent too much.

At the same time, the poll provides broad indications that the public feels religion is playing a diminished role in politics today, with fewer people than in 2008 saying the Democratic and Republican parties are friendly toward religion.

With elections for control of Congress just over two months away, the poll contains optimistic news for Republicans. Half of white non-Hispanic Catholics, plus three in 10 unaffiliated with a religion and a third of Jews, support the GOP -- all up since 2008.

The survey also found:

--The Democratic Party is seen as friendly to religion by 26 percent, while 43 percent say the same about the GOP. That's a 9 percentage point drop for Republicans since 2008, and 12 points lower for Democrats.

--Fifty-two percent say churches should stay away from politics, a reversal of the slim majorities that supported churches' political involvement from 1996 to 2006.

The poll, overseen by Princeton Survey Research Associates International, involved landline and cell phone interviews with 3,003 randomly chosen adults. It was conducted July 21-Aug. 5 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.