AP: Nobody Cares. Pull-out OK!
The Associated Press went looking for it, and they found what they wanted. AP Poll: Few expect victory in Iraq. The rule of governance by poll, popular in the Clinton years, dictates that the discussion is now officially over: Time to get out of Iraq. Devil take the hindmost. The resulting peace and stability deficit will just have to be fobbed off on another generation.
“Support is continuing to erode and there’s no particular reason to think it can be turned back,” said John Mueller, an Ohio State University political scientist and author of “War, Presidents and Public Opinion.” Mueller said that once people “drop off the bandwagon, it’s unlikely they’ll say ‘I’m for it again.’ Once they’re off, they’re off.”
There’s no point in trying to do anything about it! Just run! Sort of like … Vietnam.
The latest numbers evoke parallels to public opinion about the war in Vietnam four decades ago. Just 9 percent expect the Iraq war to end in clear-cut victory, compared with 87 percent who expect some sort of compromise settlement. A similar question asked by Gallup in December 1965, when the American side of the war still had eight years to run, found just 7 percent believed the war in Vietnam would end in victory.
AP wants to make sure we know that Lee Hamilton wants the abandonment to responsible.
Hamilton, one of the co-chairmen of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, took note of growing impatience with the war’s direction and with the commitment of U.S. troops when he told senators Thursday: “There are limits to the American patience. There are limits to American resources.”
“You want to get out in a way that is responsible,” he added.
The Daily Kos is enthused.
The Moderate Voice thinks this is a poll that must be governed by.
So why doesn’t the Chimp in Chief get it? Instead, an undoubtedly piqued NYT reports, “Bush Backs Away from 2 Key Ideas of Panel on Iraq.” His dad didn’t like broccoli but Bush likes “fruit salad.” What he doesn’t like in his fruit salad is pulling combat brigades out of Iraq and talking with terrorist nations.
Poll harder, AP!
Parapundit may not be entirely clear on the separation of powers, and also doesn’t get that the Dem Cong lacks the stones to undercut funding as long as military commanders say they need troops on the ground, no matter what some old has-beens who went to the Green Zone once have to say about it.
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Posted by Jules Crittenden at 11:18 am on Friday, December 8, 2006
2 Responses to “AP: Nobody Cares. Pull-out OK!”
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December 8th, 2006 at 1:43 pm
They’ve wanted all along for Iraq to be Vietnam, and they’re working hard to get it. If, after a long hard slog, America succeeds in helping Iraq become a peaceful, working member of nations, then people might start questioning what went wrong in Vietnam all those years ago. And that must be avoided at all costs.
December 8th, 2006 at 1:57 pm
The difference between this and Vietnam is that Vietnam was legitimately classifiable as a “win” when we pulled out in 73′. The ARVN was in a good shape to hold the lines and keep the peace. We HAD won that war.
The betrayal came 18 months later when the US congress strangled the ARVN.
Here, the dems want to run without having even established a win — IOW, they want to move directly to the betrayal phase ;->