Scant US Public Support for Israeli Strike on Iran

[marmar]

Published on Wednesday, March 14, 2012 by Common Dreams

Scant US Public Support for Israeli Strike on Iran
Despite misinformation campaign and misleading polls, Americans don't seem to want another Middle East war

- Common Dreams staff


Only one in four Americans favors Israel conducting a military strike against Iran's nuclear program, according to a new poll conducted by the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) and the Anwar Sadat Chair for Peace and Development at the University of Maryland. Nearly 70% of those polled favor the continued pursuit of US and other major powers to negotiate with Iran, a position that is supported by majorities of Republicans (58%), Democrats (79%) and Independents (67%).



"Meanwhile," reports Jim Lobe at Inter Press Service, "a second public opinion poll released Tuesday by the New York Times and CBS News found a slight majority (51 percent) of 1,009 respondents who said they would support the U.S. taking military action in order to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons." Thirty-six percent of respondents would oppose such a strike.

However, The NYT/CBS poll, notes Lobe, "did not offer an option for continued diplomacy or negotiations." And as Think Progress' Eli Clifton points out, this poll makes misleading assumptions about the existence of an Iran nuclear weapons program, by casually asking if the respondent would support “U.S. military action against Iran to prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon” even though no evidence exists that Iran has such a program. ..............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/03/14

[Comrade Grumpy]

1. No, thank you.

I hope Obama is serious about deterring the Likudniks from such idiocy. If not, they can handle the consequences on their own.

[denverbill]

2. I wish the press would push Rmoney and Santorum on this.

The teabaggers are practically demanding the US attack Iran, so Rmoney and Santorum have to play up to them. Get them to the point where people think if they are elected, it practically guarantees war with Iran and they'll go down like lead balloons come November.

[woo me with science]

3. We seem to have very little to do with what they decide.

That's what happens when governments are purchased.



"Why don’t the American people have anything to say about what we’re doing?” Cafferty added. “We have no voice in any of this stuff any more. They go into Iraq, they go into Afghanistan, they might go into Iran. We got nothing. We’re just kept in the dark and the government does whatever the hell it feels like doing, or preferably what it is being told to do by the people who pay the politicians’ bills. Remember that warning from Dwight Eisenhower about the military-industrial complex? It’s got this country by the throat.”
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002421818

[Lil Missy]

4. I say fine, as long as U. S. doesn't have to pay for it in aid, weapons, support, etc.