A majority of American adults (54%) lack confidence in President Bush’s ability as Commander in Chief of the U.S. military, a new UPI/Zogby Interactive poll shows. A majority (60%) said they do not trust the president’s judgment when it comes to the war, while 38% say they have faith in his military decisions.
Not good at all, but FAR better than Congress fairs:
Just 24% give the president favorable ratings of his performance in handling the war in Iraq, but confidence in Congress is significantly worse – only 3% give Congress positive marks for how it has handled the war. This lack of confidence in Congress cuts across all ideologies. Democrats – some of whom had hoped the now Democrat-led Congress would bring an end to the war in Iraq – expressed overwhelming displeasure with how Congress has handled the war, with 94% giving Congress a negative rating in its handling specifically of that issue.
(Continued from above)
Even more interesting, is the numbers that support what many of us have been saying for a while now... the silent majority, now that we have all decided to no longer BE silent, does not wish to for a premature withdrawal.
To best show support for the troops, 42% believe Congress should fully fund the war in Iraq to maintain current troop levels, while 34% would favor attaching requirements for phased withdrawal to Iraq war funding. Just 18% said cutting all funding for the war in Iraq to bring troops home would be the best showing of Congressional support. Congress has proposed a bill continuing funding the war in Iraq, but that would require the withdrawal of the majority of troops there by Spring of 2008 – a plan favored by 49% of Americans. But nearly as many (45%) are opposed to this plan.
We have said many times that the more America gets to see the progress and the good news, the more support Americans would give to our continuing efforts.
The numbers are still mixed, and the majority as of now still want a "phased" withdrawal in a timely manner but compared with previous polling, that number is decreasing while support is increasing as shown by the latest NYT/CBS poll that we showed you about a week ago that was done two times to assure its accuracy.
The kicker from Zogby:
More than half (55%) believe if the U.S. withdraws from Iraq that it will be considered a defeat, while 41% disagree.
The military does also acknowledge the mistakes that have been made in the war previously, but congress once again gets worse ratings.
Dissatisfaction with how the war in Iraq is being handled is also considerable among past or current members of the military and their families – nearly three in four (71%) give the president negative ratings on his handling of the war and than half (54%) said they don’t trust the President’s judgment when it comes to the Iraq war. Nearly half (47%) say they lack confidence in Bush’s ability as Commander in Chief – 41% said they have no confidence in him at all. The vast majority (96%) also have a negative view of how Congress has handled the war, but there is disagreement about what Congress should do to support the troops. While half said Congress should fully fund the war in Iraq to maintain current troop levels, 29% would favor attaching requirements for phased withdrawal to Iraq war funding and 16% believe Congress should cut all funding for the war in Iraq and bring the troops home.
The full polling results can be found here.
Interesting results, to say the least, and even more interesting when compared with the same organizations previous results.
Slowly but surely the tide of public opinion is turning and the more good news we continue to see about the progress in Iraq, the more I think these numbers will continue the trend we are beginning to see.
[Update] Don Surber is finding that 3% percent for Congress hilariously funny.
Bush’s Iraq policy has 8 times the support the anti-Bush policy of Pelosi-Murtha-Clyburn-Reid-Byrd.
Guy has a point.
.