Social Issues Draw Lines Between Republicans, Other Voters

Social issues are tricky terrain for Republican presidential hopefuls, the new WSJ/NBC News poll underscores. On a series of “trends in American society today” – including tightening abortion restrictions and increasing legislation protecting gays and lesbians – Americans who identify as Republicans have different beliefs about the direction the country […] Read more »

NBC/WSJ Poll: Anger Defines 2016 Electorate

One word seems to define the American public’s mood more than 13 months until Election Day 2016 – anger. According to the new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, 62 percent of respondents believe the country is headed in the wrong direction – the 59th-straight NBC/WSJ poll over the past six […] Read more »

Adapt or Resist?

… Spurred primarily, but not solely, by Donald Trump, the Republican field has spent months debating whether undocumented immigrants from Mexico pose an economic and security threat, whether gays and liberals are waging a “war on Christians” and now, whether Muslims can be trusted as loyal Americans fit for the […] Read more »

The People’s Pope: American Catholics Align With Pope Francis

While it is too soon to say whether Pope Francis’ speech will be well received by Congress, a new online survey shows that American Catholics are likely to agree with his less-than-traditional message. “The Shriver Report Snapshot: Insight Into the Conscience of the Complex Catholic” found that 86 percent of […] Read more »

Rowan County, Ground Zero in Gay Marriage License Fight

The fight over gay marriage this week runs through Rowan County, Ky., (population 25,000), where the local clerk won’t issue marriage licenses, and a judge ordered her to be jailed. … The country is full of counties like Rowan — places that are the exceptions to the dominant local culture, […] Read more »