I wasn’t sure where to put this, but it involves people expressing their opinions, so…
The relevent quote from this article:
I’m not sure about this but, my gut feeling is, if the anti-war types have lost the punk rock fans, they’ve lost the country…
Punk rockers aren’t what they used to be.
Anyway, the source is pretty suspect. It’s an editorial from an ultra-right-winger.
This article from the URL=http://abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s695435.htm]ABC seems to say that while most Americans wouldn’t mind if Hussein was deposed forcefully, they also think that the diplomatic route is preferable.
Anyway, it looks like the anti-war types haven’t become completely irrelevent yet. 
Yeah, having read the article, I think the views of the writer are pretty clear. A tad of exaggeration in the reporting I’d guess…
70% support the ousting of Saddam in theory. However, when the pollsters ask, “Should we attack Saddam, even if the UN is against it and we have to do it all by ourselves?”, public support drops to less than 30%.
These numbers were the ones cited by Steven Kull of the Program on International Policy at the University of Maryland’s School of Public Affairs and pollster Andrew Kohut of the Pew Center for the People and the Press on *The Newshour with Jim Lehrer on 7 October.
Arianna Huffington adds a bit of perspective to these poll figures in her column.
Basically, the polls that show 70% support do not mention the probable costs in American lives. When this is added, the figure drops to 39% in the latest Zogby poll.
As she mentions, sitting on a pentagon desk somewhere are printouts of projected American casualties for a range of scenarios. Not only are we being shown no proof of the need to go to war from the administration, there has been no discussion of the probable costs in American lives if we do.
When I was draft age and entered the armed forces during the Viet Nam war, I didn’t have the connections or resources to avoid serving or getting a cushy stateside assignment removing myself from harm’s way. I resent that a Commander in Chief, who used his connections to save his skin then, is so willing to send others into harm’s way now without even considering other options to avoid it. That he is not revealing the consequences of his course of action, which would force young Americans into a hellish war from which tens of thousands may come home in body bags, is particularly galling.
Let’s open the books! Show us the hard intelligence. Show us the invasion scenarios and their projected losses. Let’s base our decision to go to war on facts, not the results of pollsters calling us at dinner with a cleverly worded question designed to garner a black and white answer to questions in a very gray area.
If they had an Army recruitment booth at that concert, how many of those shouting at the Buzzcocks would have left concert to go enlist and really show their support?
I dunno. Somehow I just don’t think this guy is the authority on punk rock public opinion.
I’m just surprised that the Buzzcocks are still around. I remember them as being the least punky of the punk bands back in the old days, dunno what they’re like now.
I was a senior in HS during the gulf war. I remember looking around at my classmates & knowing that it would be some of them if the war didn’t go as quickly or as well as we were promised it would go (and as it turned out it did go.)
I also remember a writer for the local paper wrote a column that summer or fall - obviously false, obviously satire, obviously in the living arts section - the gist of which was that instead of drafting 18-25 year olds for the war, the government was planning on drafting the 35-50 year olds. (It included lines about Dan Quayle going back to his National Guard unit.) And from the letters that they got back, it was clear that some people hadn’t ever really thought about people dying in the war, until it looked like it might be their husband/brother/etc. (Of course, the same people couldn’t recognize satire, hence the vitriol in their letters) But yes, the questions in the polls & the information given to people before they answer is worth thinking about.
First of all, the USA has been in a state of war with IRAQ since 1993. We are spending a fortune flying patrols over Iraq, and destroying radar starions, AA sites, when their radar locks onto our planes. We might as well get it over with, as indications are that:
-any war with IRAQ will be over inside of 2-3 weeks
-the IRAQUI people deserve better than life under Hussein
-our so-called “allies” are worthless, they just get in the way
“World Opinion” will forget everything about the Hussein regime, within 60 minutes of his being gone (especially when heft reconstruction contracts are coming from the post-hussein government)!
do you see the problem with these two statements?
What, like the Canadian troops killed by American bombs in Afghanistan?
You Sir, are an idiot.
And some people wonder where the Ugly American stereotype comes from.
TwistOfFate: Being in a state of war and waging a full out war are not necessarily the same thing.
After working with Gallup several years ago my faith in such polls has descended to imperceptable levels, plus or minus a 4.5% margin of error, of course. The projected casualties in the 1991 ground assault into Kuwait were staggering, in my mind, and those numbers were very clear in my mind. I don’t know if those numbers were flashed across the screen at CNN right after I got them at a Division Briefing, I certainly hope not, they did not belong there. Those numbers were, of course, not realized.
To base the decision on popularity polls is ludicrous. Fibonacci, this is nothing aginst you at all, I thank you for your service. The power to wage war does not rest with the American People, thank goodness. Telling the Americam Public expected casualty rates, probable tactics, hard intelligence, and the like is telling the enemy. That is generally a BAD THING. Sure, let’s open the books on this. Open them to the decision makers who have been elected and appointed to those positions of responsibility. And keep it there. As I am not one of those people, I do not know for sure, but I’d bet a lot of money that the decision makers DO have that data.
I’m not suggesting that we let the public make the decision. I’m only stating that if you are using these polls to show support for attacking Iraq, there needs to be a less simplistic question than should we or shouldn’t we.
The point of these polls seems to be to rationalize taking the decision away from our elected decision makers and put in the hands of the president.
As far as hard intelligence goes, I’m not advocating complete disclosure. Hell, I worked at NSA and am fully aware of the “need to know” basis for dissemination of intelligence. However, I don’t feel that giving out information on how many Americans casualities could be expected is a bad idea if you’re using these polls to sway public opinion. Ask someone the same question with the caveat that they or someone they know and love could end up as one of these casualities and you might have a more realistic approval figure.
Discussing possible tactics is not something I would have open for public debate. However, I’d like to see some hard intelligence along the lines of the photos they released during the Cuban missile crisis to demonstrate the pressing need for an immediate unilateral invasion.
Speculation is not reason enough to give up the protections of the constitution and give the executive branch the power to declare war at will. Let our elected decision makers make these decisions.
Well it seems like the CIA are bit less hawkish than I would have expected Iraq attack likely ‘only if provoked’
vs.
“Discussing possible tactics is not something I would have open for public debate. However, I’d like to see some hard intelligence along the lines of the photos they released during the Cuban missile crisis to demonstrate the pressing need for an immediate unilateral invasion.”
in the words of TwistofFate, do you see a problem with these two statements?
showing satellite photos is akin to discussing tactics. every time we show a satellite photo of a WMD-development facility, we’re disclosing a target that we’re planning to attack. similarly, releasing projected casualty numbers for invasion scenarios is clearly discussing tactics. i would rather not give notice of such things.
http://www.bostonherald.com/news/international/ap_austria09062002.htm
http://www.space.com/news/iraq_satellite_020904.html
if you’re interested, you should be able to find others through a google search. but before you look at these, i should warn you that i couldn’t see any signs on buildings that said “weapons of mass destruction development facility,” so they may be useless to guys like you and me.
first of all, the President is an elected representative. second, i’m not aware of anyone actually suggesting that we give the President the power to declare war at will. the House and Senate are both debating the language for a War Powers Act. please read a newspaper.
if our “more accurate” public polling question is going to include projected casualty numbers for an invasion, shouldn’t it also include projected casualty numbers for inaction, whether by a terrorist attack sponsored by hussein, or another military invasion of kuwait in which hussein is supported by WMD? yes, we could include those numbers, but i think they’re implied in the question “should we or shouldn’t we?”
my brother, father, and best friend are all active military. i don’t need “projected casualty” numbers to personalize this conflict. to the extent that you feel that we should disclose such numbers to “balance” public opinion, i respectfully submit that i’d rather see my loved ones come home safe than see what you think are more accurate public opinion polls. if you served in vietnam, i would expect you to have more respect for the well-being of your comrades in arms.
i certainly appreciate your service to our country, but maybe you should do some more thinking on this issue.
My point is, we should ALL do more thinking on the issue.
The CIA report has made Bush’s case even less impelling.
http://www.salon.com/news/col/scheer/2002/10/09/cia/index.html
"However, a CIA report released late last week and designed to bolster Bush’s case for preemptive invasion instead provided clear evidence that Iraq poses less of a threat to the world than at any other time in the past decade.
In its report, the CIA concludes that years of U.N. inspections combined with U.S. and British bombing of selected targets have left Iraq far weaker militarily than in the 1980s, when it was supported in its war against Iran by the United States.
The CIA report also concedes that the agency has no evidence that Iraq possesses nuclear weapons, although it lamely attempts to put the worst spin on that embarrassing fact: ‘Although Saddam probably does not yet have nuclear weapons or sufficient material to make any, he remains intent on acquiring them.’
Of course, that is a statement about intent, not capability, and one that can be made about dozens of the world’s nations, many of them run by dictators as brutal as Saddam.
None of the unstable nations already possessing deliverable nuclear weapons are targets of Bush’s wrath."
We all need to look deeper and think before we send our troops into a dangerous situation. You may not need the numbers to personalize this conflict, but many others do. Let’s enable them to make an informed opinion.