Government shutdown opposed by majority

A pair of polls taking the temperature on the public's appetite for a government shutdown find a majority of people are against shutting down government over the implementation of the Affordable Care Act.

A CNBC poll finds that, while 38 percent of people oppose defunding Obamacare at all, when the defunding comes by the hand of a government shutdown, 59 percent of Americans say they oppose it.

Only 19 percent of respondents said they would support defunding the health care law if it came with a government shutdown. An additional 18 percent said they weren't sure, while 4 percent said they want to defund the law but became unsure when asked if defunding meant the shutdown.

The poll found a small majority of Republicans -- 51 percent -- are in favor of defunding the law, while 36 percent are opposed and 13 percent unsure. But when defunding the law comes with a government shutdown, the number of Republicans who support defunding drops to 36 percent, while 48 percent say they would then oppose it.

The CNBC poll was conducted September 16th through the 19th, and surveyed 800 people with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.4 percent.

And a Washington Post-ABC News poll, conducted September 12th to 15th among 1,004 adults, found a comparable pattern.

While the poll found only 42 percent of those surveyed support the law, compared to 52 percent who oppose it, only 20 percent of respondents would approve of a government shutdown in order to defund it.

The deadline for Congress to approve funding for the federal government is midnight on September 30, and all but essential government services would be shuttered beginning October 1.

This latest round of brinksmanship came to a head when Republicans in the House of Representatives packaged -- and then pushed through -- a bill that stripped funding of the Affordable Care Act. The bill would face almost certain rejection in the Democrat-controlled Senate, if it were to get a floor vote at all.