One-in-three Americans hate America?

January 19, 2007

I posted this over at my other gig, but it’s probably worth taking a moment to consider in more detail.

Dean Barnett, filling in for Hugh Hewitt, highlighted the results of the latest Fox News poll (.pdf), which, among other things, asked respondents, “Do you personally want the Iraq plan President Bush announced last week to succeed?” The results were fairly surprising.

Overall: 63% Yes, 22% No, 15% Don’t Know
Democrats: 51% Yes, 34% No, 15% Don’t Know
Republicans: 79% Yes, 11% No, 10% Don’t Know
Independents: 63% Yes, 19% No, 17% Don’t Know

The responses led Barnett to label this the “most depressing poll ever.”

Friends, I’ll allow you a minute to wrap your minds around this, for we are truly through the looking class. Even though we have some 150,000 troops in harm’s way and we universally profess to “support the troops,” over 1/3 of our society either wants them to fail or doesn’t know if they want them to succeed. Even more chilling are the results regarding our currently dominant political party. 49% of Democrats either want us to lose in Iraq or “don’t know” if they want us to succeed.

At first blush, it looks like Barnett might have a point. If someone doesn’t “want” Bush’s escalation plan to succeed, he or she apparently wants it to fail, which would mean more casualties, more chaos, more bloodshed, and more disaster. More than a third of the country wants that?

It seems highly unlikely. Barnett can believe what he wants, but I’m inclined to give Americans a little more benefit of the doubt.

The question may seem fairly straightforward, but it’s a little too cute. “Do you personally want the Iraq plan President Bush announced last week to succeed?” Why even ask such a question, unless Fox News is hoping for a high traitor quotient in the results? The fact that this was even in the poll probably threw respondents, who likely assumed the question meant something different.

For that matter, there are nuances to public opinion. For those who said they don’t want to see Bush’s escalation plan succeed, it’s certainly possible they want to see an end of the war, and believe the so-called “surge,” if perceived as a success, could lead to an even longer conflict. It’s equally possible people began offering reflexive answers after a series of questions about the president’s policy, and started answering “oppose” to all questions, as a means of expressive blanket disapproval of Bush’s handling of the crisis.

Even taken at face value, the poll probably doesn’t mean what Barnett thinks it means. Is he willing to argue that one in five Republicans in this country are hoping for disaster in Iraq?

John Cole concluded, “Until a more reputable firm with a clearer question releases the poll, I will treat this as silliness.” I’m very much inclined to agree. Here’s a poll idea for Fox News: ask respondents, “Do you want to see the bloodbath in Iraq get worse?” If more than a third of Americans say “yes,” I’ll gladly retract this post.

Another way to look at it of course is that perhaps the respondents were assuming that the “surge” was not already a done deal. When asked “do you want his plan to succeed?” they may be answering, “no, I don’t want him to succeed in sending more troops.”

  • Right CB. For one thing not even Bush has defined success in Iraq. Succeed at what? Succeed for how long? Fixed question.

  • Respondents may have interpreted the question to mean “Do you want the plan to happen?” as Bush may “succeed” in getting what he wants by sending more troops….but with disasterous results.

    Or look at it this way… What if you asked “Do you want the impossible?” It’s just a stupid question. Fox News is stupid.

  • Consider me an echo. It seems a waste of time to even comment on such a loaded question. Would you like Bill O’Reilly to beat his girl friend less severely?
    A non-loaded wording would be: “If Bush’s plan is implemented, do you want it to be successful? “, although it’s an equally dumb question, since the answer is “duh”.

  • “Do you personally want the Iraq plan President Bush announced last week to succeed?”

    Personally? No. But in the interest of peace I sure hope it does.

    The only people sadder than the people on FOX are the sad sacks who watch and believe this fiction.

  • Consider this – this “surge” is being portrayed as essential to our being able to withdraw – a stage one of withdrawal. Now, consider yourself a red-blooded true-blue bomb-em-back-to-the-Stone-Age type who the last thing on earth wants is for a bunch of brown-skinned rug-roaches pulling one over on Amurca. Do we want to de-escalate and withdraw?? HELL NO!! If a “surge” has anything to do with de-esclationation and withdrawal, then do we want to have anything to do with such a shameful defeatist demo-pinko plan. HELL NO!! We won’t settle for anything less than NUKE BAGHDAD – and it’s the fault of the librul media that only 35% of the country (blue state pinkos!) agree with us!

  • I’m going to sacrifice for my country tonight (I mean “sacrifice peace of mind” by watching “terrible images of violence on TV”). Bye.

  • Last night I met my neighbors son, an army sergeant just back from Iraq and somehow found myself apologizing in case he felt that Americans weren’t behind them. He is young and proud of the job he is doing, and I found myself feeling his pride too. I ended up by explaining Americans don’t have a problem with what they are doing; the problem is with what they are being asked to do. He understood.

  • Anyone think this poll was freeped to make the Dems look like they want to lose?

    I ask because I have yet to hear/read/see a single person who wants us to lose.

    Expect to lose due to the current crop of idiots running the thing? Yes.
    Think its already lost? Yes.
    Disagree with the way in which some think it will be won? Yes.

    But not a soul who wants it to happen.

  • A totally slanted question. The honest way to phrase it would be “Do you personally agree with President Bush’s decision to send 20,000 more troops into Iraq?”. But of course Fox frames the question in terms of “succeed(ing)” — if you don’t want Bush to succeed, then you want him, & by implication, the war in general, to fail.

    The way the question is phrased doesn’t even address whether you think Bush should send more troops or not, but rather, once the troops are on the ground, do you want them to succed or fail. Also, the use of the word “want” is extremely pernicious. Replace “want” with “think” & it becomes a much fairer question. Personally, I want the plan to succeed, but I think it’s doomed to failure.

    The only surprise here is that as many people answered “no” or “don’t know” as did. Hell, I’d have answered “yes”. It’s a totally bullshit poll question that serves only as a talking point for Fox pundits (“30% of Americans want Bush’s plan to fail!”).

  • Personally, I think FOX hates America. They just don’t seem to understand that the majority of Americans do not drink the kool-aid, and a growing number have voluntarily committed themselves to an “anti-neocon 12-step program….”

  • You know how fucking stupid the Bush-Republican Right is these days?

    No, seriously, do you? I’ll show you.

    They think *WE* don’t want Bush to succeed. Bear in mind that *BUSH* has said we’ll be in Iraq as long as he’s president. Now, if we win the war, we can go home, right? And if Bush says that we have to stay in Iraq as long as he’s president, then… um…

    Well, to anyone who understands logic, that means we will not win this war on Bush’s watch. I’m not sure how I can make this simpler, but maybe a football analogy will help: When Bush says we are not leaving Iraq while he’s president, that means he is playing for a tie, until he can hand the coaching reins over to someone else. But he is not playing for a win. Bush himself has admitted that he’s not going to win the Iraq war.

    I don’t know why this isn’t a bigger deal. If “Man Bites Dog” is a big story, why isn’t “Bush Doesn’t Want America to Win Iraq War, So Bush Obviously Hates America”?

  • If “succeed” meant getting our people the hell out of that civil war, I would vote yes. But of course at Fox “succeed” means getting Bush out of a jam. They could care less what happens to our kids.

    But why don’t they run a poll that asks people if they want Fox and their pro-death propaganda to go to hell?

    Probably get more than 1/3 “hell yeahs”.

    Seriously, I think this kind of crap just reeks of fear. Fox knows that they suck as a real source of news, and that the American people closely associate them with the radioactive Bush regime. As Bush spirals down the comode, Fox will be sucked down with him.

    Good riddance.

  • Christ, some of the commenters over there are dumber than rocks.

    Of course, they are regular readers of Hugh Hewitt, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.

  • That was a pathetic ray of light in the poll for Bush apologists. Speaking of fluff, they also rated the favorability of Rosie O’Donnel and Donald Trump alongside, Nancy Pelosi and Dich Cheney. Dick is liked better than Rosie for those wanting trivial news. How about some real red meat:
    – Dems have a favorability rating of 51% to the Repubs 39%
    – 59% oppose sending more troops.
    – Only 27% feel the surge will lead to an improvement in Iraq, 15% say it will hurt and 52% say it won’t change a damn thing.
    -57% said if they were a member of Congress they would vote against funding for the surge.
    – 41% said if they were a member of Congress they’d completely cut-of funding for the Iraq war, 52% would maintain present funding, 6% didn’t know.
    – 61% said the surge represents no change at all for Bush’s strategy.
    – 52% said the surge was unlikely to succeed, 39% thought it might succeed, but most of those thought success was only somewhat likely.
    – 61% said this is Bush’s last chance to succeed.

    Where’s the reporting on that?

  • If the poll is asking for my personal feelings, I don’t want Bush to succeed at anything. The poll question is based on a false premise: that wanting the plan to succeed means that it will, in fact, succeed. Sort of like Bush saying “Because it has too!” when asked if why he thinks his plan will succeed in the face of evidence to the contrary.

  • Two possiblities as I see it, neither good…
    1. Whoever wrote the question doesn’t know what they’re doing
    2. Whoever wrote the question knew exactly what they were doing.

    Anyone who’s taken a course in surveys (or anyone with a brain, for that matter) knows that the way you ask a question affects the response. That’s why you test — to learn how people interpret what you’ve asked — and modify your questions before going into the field.

    If I had to guess, I’d say #2.

  • Why does this poll remind me of the jocular question you’d ask in high school: “Did your mom ever catch you masterbating in your bedroom?”

  • Personally, I do want to see the Empire defeated and the Imperial Wehrmacht thrown into confusion for a generation. They don’t seem able to cause as much trouble for everyone when they’re trying to rebuild the fort. Same way I’d like to have seen the Gauls defeat Caesar and think the victory of the Germans in the Teutoburg Forest was a good thing.

  • “Do you want Bush’s plan to succeed?”
    “Do you want your elephant to fart?'”
    “Do you want bananas to walk?”
    “Do you want a telephone to pee?”
    “Do you want my mountain to win?”
    Well.. Do you?

  • Many on the right think that Iraq is part of the war on terror. So, if one third of Americans want the US to fail in Iraq, they must all be “enemy combatants” I think by that logic, we may need a bigger detainment facility in than Guantanamo. Perhaps they all should be put into forced labor camps in Alaska. Hey, labor camps and gulags worked outwell for the Soviets, right?

  • I would love to believe that there is some way – any way – to bring peace and justice to Iraq.

    But that’s not what Bush’s plan is. He is not sending thousands more of our troops into harm’s way in order to bring peace and justice to Iraq, he is doing it for his own purposes.

    So, no, I do not want Bush’s plan to succeed.

  • It’s all about the oil, folks. They need more from the ME because they’ll never be able to get the ANWR crude down to the 48. Remember global warming? Those big fat pipelines don’t work very well when the permafrost they’re built on starts thawing. It’s like parking a Volvo on a big bowl of jello—everything just goes squishy underneath.

    So—Bush and his spinning machine (FOX) will continue to spout the completely senseless poll results—because their world will collapse rather quickly when the oil stops coming through those big pipelines, and the Army hasn’t secured enough of a substitute supply….

    • Comments are closed.