Associated Press
By JENNIFER AGIESTA
and NANCY BENAC
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Still sour on the state of the U.S. economy, Americans are nonetheless heading into the home stretch to Election Day feeling better about the country’s future and about how President Barack Obama is doing his job, a new Associated Press-GfK poll shows.
Republican rival Mitt Romney, meanwhile, has lost his pre-convention edge on the economy amid a flurry of distractions that have taken him on a detour from the central message of his campaign.
For all of that, neither candidate has managed to break away in the drum-tight presidential race.
Obama is supported by 47 percent of likely voters and Romney by 46 percent, according to the poll. The survey was ending just as word surfaced of Romney’s caught-on-tape comment that he doesn’t worry about the 47 percent of people who pay no income taxes, describing them as believing they are vic-