Contenders neck-and-neck in nine battleground states

GEORGE BUSH and John Kerry are tied in nine of 10 states that both campaigns consider battlegrounds, daily polls by Reuters/Zogby show.

Polls in Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio show a statistical tie. Together, the states have 68 of the 270 electoral votes needed to win the presidency.

In Colorado, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico and Wisconsin - which together have 58 electoral votes - results also are within the margin of error. In Nevada, which has five electoral votes, Bush leads Kerry by seven percentage points.