With the presidential election less than six weeks away, a new poll issued on Thursday showed that US President George W. Bush still has a lead in public support, but not as large as some other recent polls indicated.  

The latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll showed Bush with a lead of 48 percent to 45 percent over Democratic challenger John Kerry among registered voters. Meanwhile, 50 percent of likely voters questioned in the survey said they would vote for Bush while 46 percent said they would vote for Kerry.

The survey, conducted Sept. 17-Sept. 19 among 1,006 registered voters, suggest a possible rebound for Kerry after several recent polls gave Bush a strong lead of six to 13 points.

However, the poll also showed that the Kerry campaign has yet to get its message through. Fifty-four percent of respondents say that the campaign doesn't have a message, or that they don't know what a Kerry-Edwards team would do if elected. On the other hand, 68 percent say the Bush campaign has a message.

Another discouraging finding for Kerry is that he has just a 48-45 percent lead among women voters, much less than his performance before the Republican convention.

The troubling sign for Bush is that when voters were asked what they would want in a second term for Bush, 58 percent say they want major changes, compared with only 9 percent who say they want his second term to look a lot like his first term.

(Xinhua News Agency September 24, 2004)