Americans do not agree on the basic meaning of the last seven years.
I think Americans have a pretty clear idea about the last 7 years. Here are just 2 indications from Polling Report:
CBS News Poll. Oct. 12-16, 2007. N=1,282 adults nationwide. MoE ± 3 (for all adults). LV = likely voters
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"Do you approve or disapprove of the way George W. Bush is handling his job as president?"
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Approve 30%
Disapprove 61%
Unsure 9%
CNN/Opinion Research Corporation Poll. Oct. 12-14, 2007. N=1,212 adults nationwide. MoE ± 3.
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"Do you favor or oppose the U.S. war in Iraq?"
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Favor 34%
Oppose 65%
Unsure 2%
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13 comments:
The majority of the German people followed Hitler. A majority of people in this world believe in some form of diety, but that does not mean that a God, or Gods, exist. I never follow the majority. If the majority believes it, it's probably wrong.
So Miss Carnivorous thinks that Bush is doing a good job just because a majority of people think otherwise. Interesting logic.
Who is going to answer some tendentious series of poll questions taken by liberal media outlets? Answer: People who want to be heard, who feel self-righteous and want to read what they already think.
I've been asked countless times to participate in these polls. The questions are always worded in a leading way when I do agree and I end up ending disengaging from the poll. And now I just say, "If you want me to participate in your poll, pay me."
The idea that polls have any merit in a discussion of serious matters demonstrates part of the problem.
ANON -
The issue is whether Mr. Steyn was correct.
Read any Left blog like Think Progress, DK , etc and read the comments....
Don't tell me there ISN'T a war going on. The Left's hatred of their own countrymen is in plain sight.
The Left's hatred of their own countrymen is in plain sight.
The hatred comes mostly from the Right, which has a long tradition of demonizing anyone they disagree with.
If 30% of people believe that the Earth is flat, and 60% believe that it is spherical, and 50% of the latter believe that it rotates, and 50% - that it is unmovable, I would say, that there is not concensus on the very basic ideas. So Steyn is perfectly right.
President Bush has been steadily trashed by the major media in this country and abroad for the past seven years. No wonder his poll numbers are low. So would Jesus Christ's, though, these days, maybe not for the same reason.
ANON -
Don't blame the messenger. The media is not responsible for Bush signing the Schiavo bill or vetoing the stem cell research bills.
You are leaving out the fact that the approval rating of the current congress is even LESS than the low approval rating for George W. Bush.
Tell the whole truth.
Steve J... I do believe Steyn is Correct about the disagreement about the meaning of the last 7 years. Polls notwithstanding. Although I think there is wide agreement on the Abramoff scandal... which is why Republicans lost the last election. But that's not really the topic du jour.... despite Democratic and Media effots to paint the administration with the taint of Ambramoff.
On Stem Cells... I'm afraid you've been played. Federal Funding for Stem Cells in 2000 was, get this, zero. Bush is the first President to fund this research nationally, albeit in limit lines (which I personally would like liberalized). And, from what you hear on the news, you'd think ESC research is illegal in the country. Ain't so. Untold millions in private sector money is being poured into this reasearch. And this research is, from my understanding, unrestricted as to stem cell line. An added benefit of the slight restrictions on Federal funding of ESC, has been the discovery of "slightly" differentiated stem cells throughout the body in muscle and bone and elsewhere, that still may differentiate further. Not to mention the miraculous successful attempts to de-differentiate some cells back to states resembling embryonic stages.
So you see, certain information has not made it to your ears that would allow for an informed opinion. Why is that? How many other stories that you currently believe are similarly "controlled" for political reasons? When you start to comprehend the enormity of the answers to these questions, it will change your mind about politics.
All to say, the sad fact is the media is not an intellectual organ, it is an emotional one. And the emotional transmission of information fairly readily results in propagand. So the next time you hear Teddy Kennedy blustering in rage in some senate hearing or other, realize... its fake. He's performing for votes.
Best to you,
A former liberal
I think anyone that has doubts as to whether what Steyn said is true or not should step outside their bubble, and realize something consequential about their neighbors. Numb skulls.
I laugh when Leftists cite opinion polls as being instructive on the best course of action in Iraq.
Oh it's such a sophisticated model... call some random houses at a time when peolpe are probably at work , ensuring, that if someone does answer, it's probably a Democrat slacker. But also you're ensuring that you'll never get to talk to folks who only have a cell phone and no land line.
So now that you captured the demographic you were after, lets ask these little einsteins what they think is the best course of action in the war that the Islamic Jihadists have declared on us.
Speaking of demographics:
http://www.dailymail.com/story/Opinion/Johanna%20Maurice/2007110290/Reflections-on-a-Halloween-night/
The highest fertility rate in Mediterranean Europe is slightly less than 1.3 births per couple, "which is what demographers call the point of lowest-low fertility from which no human society has ever recovered."
In Italy, the fertility rate is 1.2. In Spain, it was 1.1. (In the United States, the fertility rate at the time was 2.1.)
"There's no need to extrapolate," Steyn said, "and if you do it gets a little freaky, but, just for fun, here goes:
"By 2050, 60 percent of Italians will have no brothers, no sisters, no cousins, no aunts, no uncles.
"The big Italian family, with papa pouring the vino and mama spooning out the pasta down an endless table of grandparents and nieces and nephews, will be gone, no more, dead as the dinosaurs."
Columnist Maggie Gallagher noted last year:
"As European demographer Francesco Billari has explained, at the European average of 1.5 children per woman, the population will be cut in half every 65 years. At a birthrate of 1.3 children per woman (think Austria, Italy, Spain, as well as Greece and Japan), the population will be cut in half every 32 years."
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