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Wednesday, July 27, 2005

Americans still can't face how their leaders have screwed up
Posted by Jill | 6:58 AM
USA Today:

Most Americans don't believe the United States will succeed in winning the war in Iraq or establishing a stable democracy there, according to a USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll.
But an ambivalent public also says sending troops to Iraq wasn't a mistake, a sign that most people aren't yet ready to give up on the war.

"There's a lot of conflicting impulses here," says Andrew Kohut, director of the non-partisan Pew Research Center. A Pew poll last week also showed crosscurrents in attitudes toward the Iraq war. "People are giving bleak assessments on the one hand, and on the other hand (they're) saying maybe it was still the right thing to do."

[snip]

For the first time, a majority of Americans, 51%, say the Bush administration deliberately misled the public about whether Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction — the reason Bush emphasized in making the case for invading. The administration's credibility on the issue has been steadily eroding since 2003.

By 58%-37%, a majority say the United States won't be able to establish a stable, democratic government in Iraq.

About one-third, 32%, say the United States can't win the war in Iraq. Another 21% say the United States could win the war, but they don't think it will. Just 43% predict a victory.

Still, on the question that tests fundamental attitudes toward the war — was it a mistake to send U.S. troops? — the public's view has rebounded. By 53%-46%, those surveyed say it wasn't a mistake, the strongest support for the war since just after the Iraqi elections in January.


I think Kohut is misreading the public here. Those 53% who say the war wasn't a mistake (and I'd want to know what the exact questions was) may not be saying that the war was the right thing to do, but may instead be reflecting the inability or unwillingness of Americans to face the incredible fuckup that the Iraq war is.

When the threat of terrorist attack is once again at the forefront of people's minds in the aftermath of the London attacks, people need to believe that their leaders are on the ball; that they know what they're doing. It's a child's need to trust that daddy will take care of them.

If people start facing just HOW big of a botch job this Administration has made of everything it touches, well, where does THAT leave them in terms of dealing with their fears? It's far easier to trust; to rely on the notions of Inherent American Goodness in justifying a policy for which there IS no justification.

In fact, this Administration may have realized that there is a "threshhold of heinousness" and once you go beyond that threshhold, you can do whatever you want, no matter how ghastly, and the public will go along with it because no one wants to face that the country is being run by the kind of people who would lie to Americans and then send their children to die in a war based on that lie. Because if that's the case, what on earth can we do?
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