[NYTr] NY Times Poll Misleads: The People Ain't So Dumb

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

sent by Ed Pearl

[After a full media blitz over the past month using monumentally
fake stats on civilian casualties, which several articles I've sent you
expose and belie, and predicting mass slaughter if the US military
withdraws, it makes sense that many people feel it's an act of humanity
for us to remain there.  

Despite that, the poll still shows a strong demand for us to get out.
They then use subtle to blatantly prejudiced language and questions
designed for the public to quiet/quit their own expressed opposition
and instead trust congress, Bush or the military. The poll throughout
limits possibilities this way.  

Think about this Psy-Ops as you read this.  Don't be fooled, don't give
in.  The contrary is clearly the ONLY WAY THIS WILL BE ENDED. Think
Nixon in 1968.  

Consider joining us on Wednesday, write letters, go to a meeting.  
Get mad. -Ed]


The New York Times - Sep 10, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/10/washington/10poll.html


Americans Feel The Military is Best at Ending the War

By STEVEN LEE MYERS and MEGAN THEE

Americans trust military commanders far more than the Bush
administration or Congress to bring the war in Iraq to a successful
end, and while most favor a withdrawal of American troops beginning
next year, they suggested they were open to doing so at a measured
pace, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News Poll.

On the eve of what is sure to be a contentious debate on Iraq, the
results underscored the benefits to the White House of entrusting the
top American commander in Iraq, Gen. David H. Petraeus, to make the
case that an increase in American forces this year had been successful
enough to continue into next year.

Today, General Petraeus will appear on Capitol Hill along with the
American ambassador to Iraq, Ryan C. Crocker, in what has become the
most anticipated testimony from a military commander in decades.

The poll found that both Congress, whose approval rating now stands at
its lowest level since Democrats took control from the Republicans last
year, and Mr. Bush enter the debate with little public confidence in
their ability to deal with Iraq. Only 5 percent of Americans - a
strikingly low number for a sitting president's handling of such a
dominant issue - said they most trusted the Bush administration to
resolve the war, the poll found. Asked to choose among the
administration, Congress and military commanders, 21 percent said they
would most trust Congress and 68 percent expressed most trust in
military commanders.

(This demands the American quiet/quit their own expressed opposition and
instead trust congress, Bush or the military.  The poll throughout
limits possibilities in the same way.  Think about this Psy-Ops as you
read the language and framing of the questions, clearly intended to
shake the public resolve to end the war or be part of the solution.  -
Ed)


That is almost certainly why the White House has presented General
Petraeus and Mr. Crocker as unbiased professionals, not Bush partisans.
President Bush has said for years that decisions about force levels
should be left to military commanders, although the decision to send an
additional 20,000 troops to Iraq this year and keep them there was not
uniformly supported by military leaders. It was primarily made in the
White House, and specifically by the president in his role as commander
in chief.

Some Democrats took issue with the characterization of General Petraeus
as operating free of influence from the administration, suggesting that
they would like to diminish his credibility heading into days of
intense sparring over how much more time Mr. Bush's strategy for Iraq
should be given.

"I don't think he's an independent evaluator," Senator Dianne Feinstein,
Democrat of California, said on "Fox News Sunday." A White House
spokesman, Tony Fratto, responded sharply, saying, "Attacking him in
this way is reprehensible."

Still, the poll showed how difficult the White House's task of
sustaining support for an unpopular war had become. There is a
deepening disillusion over the war's course and its purpose, with the
highest numbers of Americans, 62 percent, saying that the war was a
mistake, and 59 percent saying that it was not worth the loss of
American lives and other costs.

A majority, 53 percent, said they did not think that Iraq would ever
become a stable democracy. Still more, 70 percent, said they did not
think the Iraqi government, led by Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki,
was doing all it could to bring stability.

Nearly two-thirds of Americans said the United States should reduce its
troops in Iraq now or withdraw them. Asked if a timetable should be
established for a 2008 withdrawal, a position many Democrats in Congress
have advocated, 64 percent favored doing so.

But the sense that the country has come to a clear conclusion that the
war should come to a swift end was undercut to a degree by responses to
a number of other questions.

The poll's results encapsulated sentiments that at times seemed
contradictory, highlighting the complexity of a debate over how to win
a war that has had few easy answers. As a result, Americans reflected a
nuanced concern about the consequences of a withdrawal, even as they
fervently expressed hope for one. The consequences of leaving Iraq
hastily or prematurely has been one of the administration's recurrent
themes of late.

Presented with three possible plans, the poll found that Americans
favored a measured approach, with 56 percent supporting reducing troops
in Iraq, but leaving some in place to train Iraqi forces, fight
terrorists and protect American diplomats.

Twenty-two percent favored a complete withdrawal in the next year, and
20 percent favored keeping the same number of troops "until there is a
stable democracy in Iraq."

Just under half favored a decrease or withdrawal of all troops even if
the result was "more mass killings" among Iraq's ethnic groups. The
proportion favoring reductions or a withdrawal dropped to 30 percent if
Iraq would become a base of operations for terrorists as a result.

The poll was conducted nationwide by telephone from Tuesday through
Saturday and included 1,035 adults. The margin of sampling error for all
adults is plus or minus three percentage points.

The findings suggested that both parties were paying a price for the way
they have handled the war. Six in 10 Americans said in the poll that
administration officials deliberately misled the public in making a
case for the war; 33 percent of all Americans, including 40 percent of
Republicans and 27 percent of Democrats, say Saddam Hussein was
personally involved in the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

The poll found that the edge held by the Democrats this year on the
issue had diminished, perhaps because of the inability of the party's
leadership in Congress to push through measures that would restrain Mr.
Bush or mandate any steps toward ending the war.

What was an 18-point advantage in May for the Democrats on the question
of which party is more likely to make the right decisions about the war
has fallen to a 10-point advantage, 42 percent to 32 percent for
Republicans. The Democrat-led Congress also enters the debate in a
weakened position. The popularity of the current Congress reached a new
low, the poll found, less
than a year after the Democrats regained control of the House and
Senate. Only 23 percent of Americans approved of the job lawmakers were
doing.

While Congress has rarely scored highly in the public mind, the current
Congress's rating is now lower than that of its predecessor in the
months before the election swept the Republican Party from power.

"I think both parties will make the wrong decisions," one of those
polled, John Cross, a lawyer and a Democrat from Greensboro, N.C., said
in a follow-up telephone interview yesterday. "I just think they'll
make them differently."

With barely 16 months to go in his presidency, Mr. Bush has a popularity
rating that hovers nears its historic lows, with only 30 percent
approving of his handling of the job and 64 percent disapproving. That
level - essentially the reverse of his ratings when the war began in
2003 - has remained roughly the same since Mr. Bush announced in
January the increase in American troops that became known as the surge.

Only 26 percent approved of Mr. Bush's handling of Iraq and of foreign
policy generally, while only one in four Americans think the country is
generally on the right track.

Politically speaking, the poll indicated that Americans favored a
flexible approach to Iraq as opposed to unbending positions.

That could prove significant in this month's debate in Washington and in
next year's presidential election. A vast majority, 94 percent, said
that sharing a candidate's view on the war was important or very
important.

And 71 percent said flexibility in deciding on a withdrawal was more
important than demanding either an unqualified victory (Mr. Bush's
position) or an immediate withdrawal (that of much of the antiwar
Democratic base).

Over the summer, perhaps with such sentiment in mind, Democratic
candidates and lawmakers in Congress have softened their demands for a
hard and fast schedule for pulling out.