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Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Few Americans interested in royal wedding: poll

Britain's Prince William and his fiancee Kate Middleton (L) pose for a photograph in St. James's Palace, central London in a November 16, 2010 file photo. REUTERS/Suzanne Plunkett/files(Reuters) - Sixty-five percent of Americans have no interest in Prince William's pending marriage and only a small minority are paying attention, making the royal wedding about as popular as WikiLeaks, a new poll shows.

Four percent of 1,058 people questioned in the 60 Minutes/Vanity Fair poll said they were interested in all of the wedding and wished they could go and 21 percent considered it a "harmless spectacle."

England's Prince William is due to marry his fiancée Kate Middleton on April 29 at London's Westminster Abbey.

Only nine percent said they were interested in whether the marriage would last.

The same nine percent believed WikiLeaks, the whistle-blowing website, was "a good thing" versus 23 percent who saw it as destructive and 22 percent think of it as treasonous.

Forty-two percent were unsure what WikiLeaks is. It is an organization that has published secret U.S. military and diplomatic cables that exposed internal views about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and assessments of foreign governments.

The poll also found 69 percent of Americans believe they were underpaid -- a figure that jumps to 77 percent for those who make less than $50,000 a year.

Eighty percent agree gays and lesbians should be able to serve openly in the military.

The telephone poll of 1,058 adults nationwide was conducted December 17-20 and claimed a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent.