WASHINGTON, Nov. 1 — A substantial majority of Americans expect Democrats to reduce or end American military involvement in Iraq if they win control of Congress next Tuesday and say Republicans will maintain or increase troop levels to try to win the war if they hold on to power on Capitol Hill, according to the final New York Times/CBS News poll before the midterm election.

The poll showed that 29 percent of Americans approve of the way President Bush is managing the war, matching the lowest mark of his presidency. Nearly 70 percent said Mr. Bush did not have a plan to end the war, and 80 percent said Mr. Bush’s latest effort to rally public support for the conflict amounted to a change in language but not policy.

The poll underlined the extent to which the war has framed the midterm elections. Americans cited Iraq as the most important issue affecting their vote, and majorities of Republicans and Democrats said they wanted a change in approach. Twenty percent said they thought the United States was winning in Iraq, down from a high this year of 36 percent in January.

Mr. Shays, who says he will vote for Mr. Lieberman on Election Day, argues that both he and the senator are the focus of attacks by the most partisan elements of the Democratic Party, a message clearly aimed at moderate voters in the general election.

“This is a huge election about whether or not people like Joe Lieberman and I are there reaching across the political divide,” said Mr. Shays, who has attacked Mrs. Farrell for supporting tax increases and what he calls excessive spending as the first selectwoman of Westport.

"I've seen polls that show us in a statistical dead heat, eight points down, 12 points down. I don't care," Lamont said. "I think the people of Connecticut want a change."

A one-day Rasmussen Poll conducted Oct. 28 and made public Tuesday has Lieberman leading, 48 percent to 40 percent. The survey of 500 likely voters has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.5 percentage points.

The Quinnipiac poll of 926 likely voters has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.2 percentage points. It was conducted from Oct. 24 to 30.

A less traditional poll by Zogby Interactive has Lieberman leading Lamont, 47percent to 43 percent, within the margin of error of 4.3 percentage points.

Lieberman generally found a warm welcome in conservative Naugatuck, but he was not conservative enough for Judith Busch. Sitting in a nearly empty beauty parlor, she told Lieberman that he did not share her strong opposition to abortion.

"You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to vote for my husband," Busch said, adding that she can't vote for any of the other candidates. "Ned Lamont is the biggest jerk in the world."

"Well, we agree on that," Lieberman replied.

Political committees may make expenditures of not more than $100 to any person or for a transaction out of the petty cash fund and are required to keep a written journal documenting the payments.

The campaign has said it is under no legal obligation to release the journal and has no plans to do so. Lieberman also said their attorney has assured him that they have done nothing illegal.

"To me, this is just a political trick," Lieberman said of the complaint filed by the Lamont campaign.

But interviews with some of the people who were brought in to help get out the vote for the campaign in the two weeks before the hotly contested Aug. 8 primary described situations that appear to be at odds with some campaign finance requirements.

At least one man who was hired as a consultant, Tomas Reyes of Oxford, said he has yet to be asked by the campaign to turn over material for the journal, which would justify expenditures of $8,250....

Several young men, who were paid $60 a day out of petty cash to canvass in Bridgeport, said they were paid in cash for aggregate earnings over $200.

Rob Dhanda, 18, or Stratford, said he earned $480 in cash over several weeks, while Walter Ruilova, 18, also of Stratford, said his total was an estimated $360 in cash. Ruilova estimated there were about 30 teenagers working out of the Bridgeport office, each earning $60 a day in cash, over a few weeks.

Michelle Ryan, a spokeswoman for the FEC, would not comment on specifics of the Lamont complaint, but said "in terms of itemization, it is required once the aggregate total to a recipient is in excess of $200."

Lieberman answered an inquiry about releasing the journal, by pointing to his history of compliance with campaign rules.

"I have an unblemished record of compliance with election laws. I always tell my staff at the beginning, whatever you do, just totally follow the law. I’ve never received anything approaching even a fine," the senator said in a recent interview.

The size of the petty cash involved raised eyebrows with the nonpartisan Public Campaign Action Fund, which asked the campaign to go beyond the legal requirements and disclose the particulars of the expenditures.

"No other senatorial campaign that we know of has ever left undisclosed to the public a sum as large as this," said the fund’s board Chairman Pete MacDowell, in a letter to the senator this week.