POLL: Transformed by Iowa and N.H., '08 Kicks Off as a Free-for-All

who predominate in most GOP primaries -- split more narrowly, 25 percent for McCain, 23 percent for Huckabee and 17 percent for Romney, with 16 percent for Giuliani. Similarly, McCain has 36 percent support among independents -- up 19 points since December -- with Huckabee at 27 percent. McCain's gains among independents have come at the expense of Romney and Giuliani, both down 10 points in this group, to 8 and 11 percent, respectively.

McCain has also gained ground among mainline Republicans, with 25 percent support, up 12 points since December, now running slightly ahead of Giuliani at 19 percent. Giuliani has lost 10 points among Republicans since December. Perhaps surprisingly, McCain is running competitively among evangelical white Protestants, a core Republican group, with 25 percent support to Huckabee's 31 percent; that's a 13-point gain for McCain since December, while Huckabee's been essentially flat. Romney gets just 8 percent support from evangelicals, Giuliani, 15 percent.

In another of Giuliani's weaker groups, he's supported by just 12 percent of Republicans and Republican leaners who oppose legal abortion -- and they account for 53 percent of the party. Among leaned Republicans who prefer strength and experience over new ideas and a new direction, three in 10 support McCain (up 14 points since December), 12 points more than his nearest competitor, Huckabee. Among those who prefer new ideas, McCain and Huckabee run evenly.

NOT BUSH -- In the end there's one thing majorities on both sides agree on, and that's a change from George W. Bush's leadership. Seventy-nine percent of Americans say the next president should set the nation on a new course rather than following the direction in which Bush has been leading. (And two-thirds feel that way strongly.)

For the first time this is even more than said so about Bush's father, 75 percent, the summer before he was voted out of office in 1992. And it's vastly more than the most who ever wanted a new direction after Reagan (58 percent) or Bill Clinton (48 percent).

It holds in both parties, albeit to different degrees. Ninety-four percent of leaned Democrats, and 57 percent of leaned Republicans, say they want the next president to take a different direction than Bush's. Claims to the mantle of "change" are likely to continue apace for the next 10 months.

METHODOLOGY -- This ABC News/Washington Post poll was conducted by telephone Jan. 9-12, 2008, among a random national sample of 1,130 adults, including an oversample of African-Americans for a total of 202 black respondents (weighted back to their correct share of the national population). The results have a 3-point error margin for the full sample, 4 points for the 612 Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents, 5 points for the 389 Republicans and Republican-leaning independents, 5 points for the 423 likely Democratic primary voters and 6 points for the 280 likely Republican primary voters. Sampling, data collection and tabulation by TNS of Horsham, Pa.

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