Iraq Poll Surprises Out-of-Touch Paper

August 02, 2007
Poll Surprises Out-of-Touch Paper
By Debra Saunders, SF Chronicle

When a New York Times poll found that the number of Americans who think it was right for the United States to go to war in Iraq rose from 35 percent in May to percent 42 percent in mid-July, rather than promptly report the new poll findings, the paper conducted another poll. As the Times' Janet Elder wrote Sunday, the increased support for the decision to go to war was "counterintuitive" and because it "could not be easily explained, the paper went back and did another poll on the very same subject."

Round Two found that 42 percent of voters think America was right to go into Iraq, while the percentage of those polled who said that it was wrong to go to war had fallen from 61 percent to 51 percent. The headline for Elder's piece read, "Same Question, Different Answer. Hmmm." But it should have read: "America's Paper of Record Out of Touch With American Public."

Elder wrote that growing support for the war seemed odd: "Once in a while a poll finding doesn't make sense." It occurred as Congress was debating the war and the Bush administration had to report that Iraq had failed to meet a number of benchmarks for progress.

Too true. But at the same time, U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker and Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari had begun warning the public of the consequences of a premature withdrawal. Brass serving in Iraq were explaining why they wanted more time to let the surge work, as they were making inroads in fighting insurgents and winning support from the Iraqi public. Most important: President Bush had responded to criticism of the administration's erstwhile undermanned whack-a-mole Iraq strategy, which had depressed U.S. troop morale, by putting Gen. David Petraeus in charge of Iraq and implementing his nuanced counterinsurgency and no-retreat surge plan.

To assume that this change in leadership made no difference is tantamount to admitting that the criticism of the Bush administration's policies was designed more to hurt Bush than to win the war. (Be it noted, many San Francisco Bay Area readers are so averse to the idea of victory that they will challenge me to define it. That's because they do not want to imagine an Iraq in which citizens are secure, Iraqi forces operational and U.S. troops can begin to withdraw without fearing genocide.)

While the Petraeus strategy does not quite bolster the decision to go into Iraq -- Elder noted that, oddly, the poll did not find a change in voter approval of Bush' handling of the war -- war polling always has been problematic.

Consider the July 13-15 Rasmussen poll that asked likely voters if it is "possible for the U.S. to win the war in Iraq": 32 percent answered yes, 54 percent no. Yet when asked if Washington should wait until September before making major changes in Iraq, 51 percent said yes, 38 percent said no. If voters really thought the war cannot be won, they would not want to wait until September.

On Monday, the Times also ran an opinion piece, "A War We Just Might Win," by war critics Michael O'Hanlon and Kenneth Pollack of the Brookings Institution, which has prompted Beltway biggies to notice that the surge is paying off.

Well, not everyone inside the Beltway. Rep. Jack Murtha, D-Pa., dismissed the piece as "rhetoric." "I don't know what they saw, but I know this, that it's not getting better," Murtha told CNN. Since this war began, there always have been people rooting for failure.

With the death toll of U.S. troops surpassing 3,560, Americans have cause to be wary and distressed. They may tell pollsters that they are pessimistic, but that does not mean that they are prepared to lose.

dsaunders@sfchronicle.com
Copyright 2007 Creators Syndicate Inc.

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From: Gonzalo Vergara
Sent: Thursday, August 02, 2007 10:54 AM
To: Saunders, Debra
Subject: Iraq War Strategy


Dear Ms. Saunders:

I found your article detailing increased support for Iraq strategy fascinating but not entirely surprising. While I was a student in the U.S. Army's Command and General Staff College in 1994-1995, I did a study on public support for the war in Vietnam. I found that Americans will support an action providing that we are doing something to win. The American public became dissolutioned with that war particularly after the Tet Offensive--a military disaster for the Viet Cong but a great strategic political victory for the North. Americans do not like losing, thus are willing to give General Petraeus a chance providing that he will do something to win--and win.

I am personally opposed to the Iraq invasion; I think that Osama Bin Laden is our No. 1 priority. While I abhor the "lone cowboy" policies Bush and Cheney, I am glad that the US Armed Forces are doing better now in that campaign--I do not want our armed forces and our country to experience the Vietnam agony all over again. For the armed forces it was a disaster.

Congratulations for a job well done.

Very truly yours,

Gonzalo I. Vergara, Lt. Col., USAF (Ret.)
Lincoln Hills, California

Recall the President: 28th Amendment

There are at least 3,011 reasons to immediately recall the President; and they are rising. The article below explains why we cannot count on Congress to do anything.

It is up to us. There are no others we can look to. We, the People, must ensure that no president ever again has the capacity to do whatever he or she pleases in a hubris of arrogance and royal perogatives. For this reason, we must amend the United States Constitution, allowing for the recall of an arrogant, ignorant, and wilfull president.

NEVER AGAIN!!!

Gonzalo

THE COMING DEMOCRATIC PARTY CIVIL WAR

By DICK MORRIS & EILEEN MCGANN

January 11, 2006 -- Iraq is not the only place that is threatening to dissolveinto the anarchy and bloodletting of a civil war. It’s about to happen to theDemocratic Party. Reacting to Bush’s planned “surge” in troop strength, theDemocratic leaders in Congress, savoring their victory, are contemplating takingonly symbolic steps to protest Bush’s war policies, a timidity that will highlydisplease their leftist boosters. The liberal activists who funded and impelledthe Democratic victory in 2006 did not focus on winning a Congressional majorityso that it would take merely symbolic action. Symbolic action would have beenappropriate for a minority party, but the backers of a party in the majorityexpect something more. So the Democrats are about to form their customary firing squad – a circular one– and begin again the battles that ripped their party apart in the late 1960s. The battle lines are the same: The New Left vs. The Party Establishment. Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid are about to squander their credibilitywith their supporters on the left by failing to cut back – or cut off entirely –funding for the war.

Proposed 28th Amendment to the US Constitution: Recall of the President

Enough is enough. The political process in this country is broken and it is time for us, the People, to take back our country. The first thing we must do is to pass an amendment to the Constitution allowing us to recall a President. We cannot wait for another 4 years when a President is pursuing a policy that (1) the majority of the People believe is wrong; (2) most experts think is wrong; (3) the majority in Congress think is wrong, yet the President mulishly insists on pursuing it, i.e., George W. Bush in Iraq.

Here is a first draft. Please comment, revise, criticize, add, delete, etc.

Proposed XXVIIIth Amendment to Recall the
President of the United States

SEC 1. All political power is inherent in the people. Government is instituted for their protection, security, and benefit, and they have the right to alter or reform it when the public good may require.

SEC. 2. Recall is the power of the electors to remove the President of the United States from office.

SEC. 3. (a) Recall of a President is initiated by the xxxx delivering to the Federal Elections Commission (?) a petition alleging reason for recall. Sufficiency of reason is not reviewable. Proponents have xxx days to file signed petitions.

(b) A petition to recall the President of the United States must be signed by electors equal in number to 12 percent of the last vote for the office, with signatures from each of 50 states equal in number to 1 percent of the last vote for the office in that state. Signatures to recall the President must equal in number 20 percent of the last vote for the office.

(c) The Secretary of State for each state shall maintain a continuous count of the signatures certified to that office.

SEC. 4. (a) An election to determine whether to recall the Presidentand, if appropriate, to elect a successor shall be called by thexxxx and held not less than xx days nor more than xx days from the date of certification of sufficient signatures.

(b) A recall election may be conducted within 180 days from the date of certification of sufficient signatures in order that the election may be consolidated with the next regularly scheduled election, or upon a special election for the sole purpose of selecting the successor.

(c) If the majority vote on the question is to recall, the officer is removed and, if there is a candidate, the candidate who receives a plurality is the successor.

SEC. 5. The Congress shall provide for circulation, filing, and certification of petitions, nomination of candidates, and the recallelection.

Equality under the Laws?

Laws are like spiders' webs: if some poor weak creature come up against them, it is caught; but a bigger one can break through and get away.

Solon

Letter to UC Colorado re Ward Churchill

Dear Chancellor DiStefano:

I take issue with your recommendation to fire Prof. Ward Churchill over his stupid article on 9/11 equating the victims to Adolph Eichmann. While I find Prof. Churchill's article to be monstruously offensive and outrageous--and consider Prof. Churchill to be an infantile boob--I find that your well-intentioned attempt to fire Prof. Churchill, however justified, to be improper.

The real issue here is one of academic freedom. However unpopular a view may be, we ought not to silence it through implicit censorship--the remedy for Prof. Churchill's malady of cranial rectitis is too dangerous a cure.Through his article, Prof. Churchill made a fool of himself before the nation and is the laughingstock of every thinking American. That is sufficient. To fire him over the article is to make him a martyr over First Amendment rights; not good.I urge you to reconsider your position.

Very truly yours,

Gonzalo Vergara

Why Are Democrats Wondering What They Stand For?

I am posting this post directly, not because I am lazy, but because I cannot improve on it in any way; I am merely shifting the focus. So rather than reinventing the wheel, I post it as it appears in http://blogolodeon.blogspot.com/2006/05/when-democrats-ruled-earth.html

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It's kind of funny (except that it isn't) to see Republicans and media whores hyperventilating over the dire consequences to ensue if Democrats take over the House or Senate after November's election. I know what the Bushies are afraid of -- and it's not jail. It's losing out on all those future Halliburton and Carlyle Group government contracts. I don't understand the media types, though, unless it's just they've all realized they really do work for General Electric, not the public interest.Anyway, pondering this great issue, my mind wandered over to the area of "What would it be like if the Democrats were in charge again?" Thinking of the DLC and pols like Joe Lieberman and Chuck Shumer, I couldn't imagine anything much different. So I slipped backward mentally to the past, to my childhood, an ancient time When Democrats Ruled the Earth. And I remembered:

On minimum wage, you could rent an apartment and go to a state college without going into debt.

A family could support themselves on one income.

Workers did not live in fear of their jobs being shipped overseas.

You could buy toys for children, confident of their safety.

Food and drugs were less likely to kill you.

You didn't have to sit through as many minutes of commercials in your television-watching hour.

You didn't have to sit through ANY erectile dysfunction commercials.

People who wanted the government in charge of women's bodies were considered crackpots.

People who wanted the church making political decisions were considered crackpots.

People who wanted schools to teach that God made the world in seven days were considered crackpots.

People who thought the government should be able to spy on citizens without a warrant were considered loony bird crackpots.

The head of the Environmental Protection Agency was someone who cared about protecting the environment.

The president spoke intelligently and in complete sentences on a variety of subjects.

Americans who traveled abroad were not ashamed of their country's government.

American sports teams who traveled abroad were not afraid to put the Stars and Stripes on their vehicles.

Libraries were open seven days a week.

You could eat the fish you caught without getting sick.

Sheesh, I'm so depressed, I have to stop. I hope, with all my heart, there is a strong and unfaltering basis for the freaking out of the Republicans and their cheerleaders. Because, you know what? There are still real Democrats in the world. People like Barbara Boxer, Russ Feingold, Howard Dean. New candidates like Ned Lamont, Charlie Brown -- a whole crop of them who hold progressive, traditional Democratic ideas in their heads. There is a chance.Will the sun come out in America in November?

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My answer to the last question is NO if Democrats continue to talk and act like Republicans.

Equality for All Under the Law?

They [the poor] have to labor in the face of the majestic equality of the law, which forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread.

Anatole France in Le Lys Rouse