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CNN poll finds more optimism about U.S.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 25 (UPI) -- The U.S. public is less pessimistic about the state of the country than it has been in more than three years, a CNN poll released Tuesday indicated.

The poll, released a few hours before President Obama was to give his State of the Union message to Congress, shows a majority still believe the country is in bad shape. But 43 percent think otherwise, up 14 percentage points since December.

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The 71 percent who said the country was in bad shape in December has dropped to 56 percent.

"We haven't seen numbers this good since April of 2007," CNN Polling Director Keating Holland said. "One likely reason for the change is the public's growing optimism about the economy."

Holland said there may be other reasons for a lightening of the public mood. Generally, polls turn upward with the start of the new year in January, and the decline in openly nasty partisanship since the shootings in Tucson also may have contributed.

There was a marked partisan trend in the results, with the percentage of Republicans who see improvement up only 5 points, while independents were up 16 and Democrats 24. College graduates, Midwesterners and people living in cities and suburbs rather than rural areas also showed greater increases in optimism.

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The CNN/Opinion Research Survey poll of 1,012 adults was conducted by telephone Jan. 21-23. The margin of error is 3 percentage points.

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