War opposition hits all-time high

August 22, 2006

Just yesterday, the president was asked whether he cared about public support for the war, or whether he’s content with letting the results vindicate his strategy eventually. [tag]Bush[/tag] said, “Yes, I care, I really do. I wish — and so, therefore, I’m going to spend a lot of time trying to explain as best I can why it’s important for us to succeed in Iraq.”

He may want to consider a different tack. He’s been trying to explain this for years, and support for the war has never been this low.

[tag]Opposition[/tag] among [tag]Americans[/tag] to the [tag]war[/tag] in [tag]Iraq[/tag] has reached a new high, with only about a third of respondents saying they favor it, according to a poll released Monday.

Just 35 percent of 1,033 adults polled say they favor the war in Iraq; 61 percent say they oppose it — the highest opposition noted in any CNN poll since the conflict began more than three years ago.

And this isn’t a situation in which the president can just spin his way out of the problem. The same poll showed that most Americans (54%) don’t consider him honest, most (54%) don’t think he shares their values, and most (58%) say he does not inspire confidence.

First, Republicans are still planning to make Iraq a key part of the midterm cycle? Really?

And second, if the GOP’s plan is to smear war critics as unpatriotic terrorist-sympathizers, are they really poised to condemn three-fifths of the country?

So Bush plans to spend “a lot of time” trying to explain “as best I can” why it’s important for us to succeed in Iraq.

Judging from his stuttering, slurring, herky-jerky responses to the questions at yesterday’s press conference, he will indeed have to spend a lot of time trying to explain . . . and explain . . . and explain again. His “best” just isn’t good enough (because he has never taken the trouble to think anything through) and it appears this has become increasingly clear even to former supporters.

  • Yay, let’s hear it for campaigning on Iraq! Another genius idea from the GOP just like their idea of campaigning on social security privatization.

  • if the GOP’s plan is to smear war critics as unpatriotic terrorist-sympathizers, are they really poised to condemn three-fifths of the country?

    If you’re not with us, then you’re against us, right?

  • Bush can’t explain anything. Every time he tried to talk about Social Security, he deepened the opposition; in three and a half years now, he hasn’t been able to clearly articulate the importance of Iraq, much less change anyone’s mind about it.

    There are many reasons why Bush is a failed president. But his near-total inability to lead and shape public opinion through honest and clear advocacy is one of the biggest. The contradiction with his supposed political hero Ronald Reagan couldn’t be more vivid.

  • dajafi, you beat me to my point, and you said it perfectly. bush confuses the obedient way the republican party and his cabinet accept his every passing thought and whim as an outgrowth of his powers of explanation rather than his audience’s well-schooled habit of hierarchical obedience. as a result, he thinks he’s a great explainer….

  • There are times when I just hate polls. 61% ‘oppose’ the war in Iraq. What the hell good is that. Do 61% want to end the ‘war’ now? Do we leave? Do we admit defeat? Who exactly are we going to surrendar to?

    Rove smirks at our 61%. Opposing Boy George II’s war is not a positive solution. Once you try to actually put together some solution to the war, the numbers rapidly fall below 50%. And thus, Boy George II’s muddle through and stay the course and destroy the U.S. Military policy wins by default.

    My solution, by the way, is to pull back into Kurdistan to protect their automony and their minorities while also stopping the cross-border attacks of the PKD, and to retreat to Kuwait and a strip along the bottom of the country where we can occupy and control the Persian Gulf coast and the oil facilities there. Then I’d just say to the Sunni autocracies, you want to protect your co-religious, then move in.

    Let the Iraqis see what a full out civil war looks like.

  • The Repubs will point to the war dead and say we have to finish the job for them … a tactic which will pull on the heart strings of plenty of voters.

    What the Dems need to address is you never win an occupation, you just keep occupying the area. There will never be victory in Iraq because foreign nations never completely bow to the will of a foreign occupier. There will always be an insurgency as long as their are foreigners to resist.

    The Dems should play to the security moms and tell them that the babies in their arms will be needed to indefinitely continue securing Iraq in support of the president’s policies and that the steady stream of body bags home is just the cost of “not letting down the Iraqis.” Not to mention the economic costs or the increasing cost of oil because we destabilized the world’s leading oil-producing region.

  • I still cannot for the life of me understand why the professional military continues to stand for this president’s incompetent leadership. Iraq is turning into a meatgrinder. We don’t even have control over Baghdad, for crying out loud; the troops are garrisoned in the “green” zone, and make their little forays out into the streets during broad daylight only. I guess it’s not strategically profitable to show off our military prowess to the Iraqis when they’re asleep. We have become the Hessian soldiers-for-hire; the Iraqi now plays the role of Washington crossing the Delaware.

    Consider also that, no matter how obvious it is that Sunnis are killing Shiites, and that Shiites are killing Sunnis, the survivors on both sides are incessantly blaming the Americans for the carnage. The solution is simple—pull all coalition forces from the urban areas, and redeploy to the frontiers. go after anything that tries to sneak in; search every vehicle crossing the borders. Sooner or later, this “insurgency” will run out of ammunition, ordnance, supplies, and manpower—and a lot less Americans will die on the altar of Iraq’a civil war….

  • re#9 (Tom Cleaver):
    NYTimes also saw things dfferently from the commenters here; when I read the article, I could hardly belive I was reading about the same event. Even the “complete the mission” — the phrase that CB found as coming from Bush’s mouth repeatedly — was mentioned once only… as a quote from Pelosi.
    http://tinyurl.com/ktdxl

    As for the poll numbers… While 60% of the population is now against our continuing the occupation of Iraq indefinitely, the numbers for the architect of this fiasco are climbing. In 3 different polls, he’s now firmly at 42%; a remarkable rebound from the low thirties he enjoyed a month ago. Can anyone explain what’s going on here?

  • “Can anyone explain what’s going on here?” – libra

    He backed the Israeli position on their little war on Hezbollah. I doubt the bounce will last now that Isreali reservists are camping outside the prime minister’s office demanding his resignation.

    Isn’t that amazing, members of a military actually demanding accountability of their political and military leadership for screwing up a war?

  • Hey Good News!
    A quiet but important project is underway aimed at extricating Bush from his wreckage in Iraq. The project is under the direction of James A. Baker, former secretary of state, Bush family butt kisser, valet and toilet unplugger. Baker is a skilled lier and supreme political manipulator. Since March, he’s headed a bipartisan commission innocuously called the Iraq Study Group. In the September issue of “Washington Monthly,” Robert Dreyfuss wrote a revealing piece on the work of the group, whose task is to “devise a fresh set of policies to help the president chart a new course in — or, perhaps, to get the hell out of — Iraq.”

  • […] a bipartisan commission innocuously called the Iraq Study Group. In the September issue of “Washington Monthly,” Robert Dreyfuss wrote a revealing piece on the work of the group, whose task is to “devise a fresh set of policies to help the president chart a new course in — or, perhaps, to get the hell out of — Iraq.”

    Comment by K-Man — 8/22/2006 @ 5:36 pm (#12)

    Yeah, well… One of the possibilities of the “new course” has just been reported on Think Progress. With so many on the right (including Lieberloser) trying to distance themselves from Bush by criticising *the way the war has been conducted* (God forbid they’d criticise the war itself), Pentagon has announced the stepping up of the backdoor draft (Marines only. So far)

    Personally, I don’t think that’s going to “play” very well with the voters, but, who knows; the numbers of the “involuntarily recalled” might not be big enough to fuel major fury.

  • And yet that same Gallup poll shows:

    “The poll asked Americans to judge Bush’s performance on each of seven issues.

    ‘Do you approve or disapprove of the way George W. Bush is handling — [RANDOM ORDER]? ‘

    2006 Aug 18-20
    (sorted by “approve”)

    Approve(%) Disapprove(%)

    Terrorism 55 43
    Foreign affairs 39 55
    The situation in the Middle East 39 56
    The economy 39 57
    The problems caused by Hurricane Katrina 37 56
    The situation in Iraq 36 61
    Energy policy 30 61

    “Of these issues, Bush is rated most highly on terrorism, with a 55% approval rating, and worst on energy policy, at 30%. His ratings on the other five issues range between 36% and 39%. Terrorism is the only issue that exceeds Bush’s overall 42% job approval rating.”

    Interestingly enough, more people had a negative view of Bush’s handling of Iraq than of terrorism. Which means most Americans see no connection between Iraq and the war on terror, or there is a lot of people with multiple personality disorder in this country.
    I going to go out on a limb, and pick the former.

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