"Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast" -Oscar Wilde |
"The liberal soul shall be made fat, and he that watereth, shall be watered also himself." -- Proverbs 11:25 |
The strong focus on news from abroad is having little impact on the public's political opinions. President Bush's job approval rating stands at 37%, virtually unchanged from July. His personal image continues to be far less positive than it was about a year ago about half the public says he is not a strong leader, not trustworthy, and unable to get things done. Moreover, the renewed emphasis on terrorism has done little to boost the president's standing on that issue. The survey, which was largely conducted after the Aug. 10 revelations of the terror plot against airliners, shows that 50% approve of the president's handling of terrorist threats, little changed from June (47%).
The severity of the president's image problem is reflected in the fact that while many Americans (49%) feel the level of U.S. involvement in resolving the Lebanon crisis has been appropriate, far fewer (36%) say they approve of Bush's handling of the issue.
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The news that British officials had stopped a terrorist plot to blow up planes flying to the U.S. drew higher public attention than have most other terror-related news stories since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. Fully 54% say they followed this news story very closely, compared with 48% who tracked last summer's London bombings very closely, and 34% who paid close attention to the Madrid rail bombings in 2004.
The extensive public attention did not result in a spike in concern about terrorism, however. In interviews conducted after the story broke (Aug. 10-13), a quarter of respondents said that they were "very worried" that there will soon be another terrorist attack on the United States. By comparison, 17% of respondents interviewed on Aug. 9 before the announcement reported that level of concern. This small rise in public concern is similar to those measured in previous terrorist events. In the wake of last summer's London bombings 26% of Americans expressed high concern about terrorism hitting the U.S., up from 17% in late 2004. And the 2004 Madrid bombings caused a similar seven-point jump in terrorism concern, from 13% before the bombings to 20% after.