Rowhouse Logic - Breathtaking Inanity

From Editor & Publisher:

(May 29, 2005) — There is a strange disconnect in America at the moment, with the press partly to blame but in the position to do something about it, or at least explain it. You may be surprised to learn that nearly 6 in 10 Americans feel the Iraq war is “not worth it,” according to a recent Gallup poll. Exactly 50% feel that President Bush “deliberately misled” them on the issue of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and virtually the same number call the war an out-and-out “mistake.” More than 56% now say the war is going badly for the United States. Gallup also recently found that 46% of those polled say we should start withdrawing troops.

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For months, E&P Online has tracked various Gallup polls on this subject, and watched the numbers rise and fall. After the Iraqi elections in January, public opinion briefly shifted in a more positive direction, but that was quickly reversed with a return of wide violence and a rising American death toll this spring. Yet despite all the front-page coverage and punditry in the papers, it still seems that the war, and any deep feelings about it, are stuck in slow motion, or in quicksand.

That’s why every week when we consult Gallup, I’m always surprised to find the growing public doubts about the war. Most of the time, in our work and play, you’d hardly know a war was going on. There is more opposition to this war than there was in 1968 with regard to Vietnam, yet far less public and editorial protest. That 57% of Americans say the war is “not worth it” is haunting: such clarity, and such acceptance.

But still, the media continue to look at opinion on the war in a black-or-white, red state/blue state way, when it is much more complicated than that…

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