Support for war slips as fear of US deaths grows

The Times
November 01, 2002
By Bronwen Maddox

Bad news for George Bush and for Republicans on Tuesday. Just as he seems to be getting the United Nations on his side, support for a war on Iraq is slipping away at home.

We have been told since the controversy of Bush’s election that America is now a “50-50” nation, politically bisected on every issue which conventionally decides elections. That is certainly how politicians have campaigned for the congressional elections next week, and why the outcome remains so hard to judge.

The surprise of the latest opinion polls is that this division now extends to war on Iraq, it seems. Just over half of Americans now support the notion of a war, sharply down on the summer, as fears about what could go wrong have grown. Meanwhile, on other issues where Republicans once had a solid advantage a new vulnerability is apparent.

The latest research comes from the respected pollsters Pew Research, who have been good at tracking the nuances of attitudes to war and terror.

Just 55 per cent now support a war in Iraq, against 64 per cent in late August, according to the survey in the second half of October. Those supporting an attack without backing from allies has slipped by several points. At the same time, those opposed to the war have grown from 21 per cent to 34 per cent. Last weekend’s anti-war march in Washington hardly ranks as one of the great protests seen on the Mall, but is a sign that opposition is becoming more vocal, and more organised.

Why the change? The survey clearly attributes the growing doubts to what you might call self-interest. That is, Americans are increasingly worried that troops would be killed by biological and chemical weapons, as well as the risk that an assault will provoke even more terrorist attacks in the American homeland.

The polls were mainly taken before the bloody end to the Moscow theatre siege, and so that seems unlikely to be the source of the new focus on the biological and chemical threat. More probable, it stems from the attention given by Bush and Tony Blair to the risk, as they listed what they believe to be the contents of Saddam Hussein’s arsenal.

It is not surprising, perhaps, that those concerns seem to rank higher than other possible consequences of an attack on Iraq. People were less worried, on the whole, about the conflict spreading through the Middle East, the difficulty of stabilising Iraq after the fall of Saddam, or the prospect of many Iraqi civilian casualties.

There is no question that the national preoccupation with the War on Terror has been helpful to Republicans in this election campaign. Republican candidates have grumbled bitterly that Bush has no “coat tails” on which to drag them towards victory, and little sign until recently of developing them. But they are unfair; the Republican party generally, according to the polls, is seen as the best at handling terrorism by 44 per cent, compared with just 27 per cent for the Democrats.

Most important, however, is the way that the War on Terror has kept the electorate’s mind off the economy and other issues closer to home. Those are points where Republicans are now looking vulnerable.

Agreed, many of the issues on which individual races are being fought are entirely local, a world away from the mountains of Afghanistan or the deserts of Iraq. True, too, that despite heavy campaigning, perception of the two parties across the country has barely shifted in months on many issues, to a comical degree.

But all the same, the threat of terrorism and war ranks very high among issues which have caught people’s attention this year, judging by the most popular news stories. They were outranked only by the Washington sniper, the top story of the year so far.

If that had not been the case, it is easy to imagine that fears about the weakening economy might have played a bigger part in these elections, to Republicans’ disadvantage. As it is, the signs of vulnerability are showing clearly.

At the starkest, Republicans are losing their reputation for handling the economy well. In January Republicans had 12 percentage points lead over Democrats, when voters were asked who could handle it best (45 per cent to 33 per cent).

By the end of October that had turned into a 3-point advantage for the Democrats (40 per cent against 37 per cent). That shows little change since the late summer, when the stock market dominated national news. But it is comparatively rare that Democrats are credited with the greater skill in economic management, and shows that fears about job losses are beginning to bite.

More than for candidates on Tuesday, that represents trouble for Bush. It has become commonplace to note that he is afraid of suffering his father’s fate — winning the war, and damned by the electorate for the stalling economy — but it is true all the same.

The other unexpected shift on the home front is on gun control. Two years ago, Democrats were widely thought to be tougher; now the parties are seen as almost the same. That is an entirely accurate reflection of the way many Democratic candidates have moved rightwards on this issue, seeing the casualties which liberalism on this one question brought to their ranks in 2000.

Tuesday will show how well candidates have managed to bridge the “50-50” nation — and the nature of the problem facing Bush in 2004. But these polls show that Bush’s one clear advantage — the War on Terror — is losing its potency.

Original link

 
_____
Nieuwe Oorlog 2002 | Ander Nieuws week 45