Basically, majorities of the people in the military, and (separately) military families, found the administration had not put enough people in the field, and that the guard were being relied on too much.
There're lots of other statistics of interest there as well.
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quote:Even so, members of the military on active duty and their families favored President Bush over Sen. John Kerry by a nearly 3-1 margin, according to the National Annenberg Election Survey.
The poll did not ask the respondents whom they support for president. A 1948 statute prohibits asking members of the military about their voting plans.
quote:Even so, members of the military on active duty and their families favored President Bush over Sen. John Kerry by a nearly 3-1 margin, according to the National Annenberg Election Survey.
You have to watch out with that stat, though, there isn't a control group. If we had sampled the same group before the war, and to tell the truth, asked questions to determine why they supported the President, then I think we'd have a more accurate idea either way.
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posted
Well, we'd know if he lost support, and with the other stats I'd expect he has. But he hasn't lost that much support, obviously. Plus, it would have been hard to run this poll before Kerrey was the presumptive nominee.
I'd still like to know how it can possibly be considered good journalism to leave that stat out of the story, especially given the headline they chose to run.
posted
Dags -- not sure, I know I assumed similar, being familiar with how the military commonly aligns. This was the information that was abnormal, so it made it into the article. They did refer to it in a roundabout fashion (as quoted above), but I agree it should at least have been mentioned in the listing of statistics.
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posted
Yeah, but that quotation is from a different article. Unless I entirely missed it (possible, there was some sake drinking tonight), I didn't see it at all in the CNN article.
They link directly in that article to another article which talks exclusively about the fact that the military trusts Bush over Kerry. It looks like they simply wrote one article about who the military trusts and another article about what the military thinks of the Iraq strategy (parts 1 and 2) - and the first article is no more wrong for leaving out the facts about the Bush support than the second article is for leaving out the facts that the troops question Bush's tactics.
If anything, the pro-Bush article is worse becuase it doesn't even link to the article about the troops' dislike of our Iraqi strategy.
posted
Doh, for some reason I thought this para had been quoted:
quote:This critical view comes from a military group that has a more favorable view of President Bush, Iraq, the economy and the nation's direction than Americans in general.
That's what I was referring to.
Warm sake or chilled sake?
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posted
I don’t see how the results of this survey are unexpected in any way. Specifically, I don’t believe that the survey results support the conclusion that there is an erosion of support for the current administration’s handling of the military. For example:
quote:The poll found that 62 percent in the military sample -- 58 percent of troops and 66 percent of family members -- said the administration underestimated the number of troops that would be needed to establish peace in Iraq.
The United States hasn’t secured peace in Iraq. I’ll admit that it is possible that peace would not be secured no matter how many troops the US had put on the ground in Iraq. However, it is natural to assume that with more people peace would have been easier to achieve. So how is a respondent to this poll supposed to answer? I wouldn’t have been surprised to see 99% agreement that the US didn’t send enough troops to secure the peace. Look at the evidence of 18 months of effort. I would propose that the 38 percent who responded that there were enough troops in Iraq were probably just standing by their President, their military leadership, and their spouses and loved ones. But the facts don’t support any answer but “there weren’t enough troops”.
Another example:
quote:And 59 percent -- 56 percent of troops and 64 percent of family members -- said too much of a burden has been put on the National Guard and the reserves when regular forces should have been expanded instead.
The United States of America has been steadily drawing down its standing military since 1991. The people, through their representatives in congress and the White House, have made a considered decision that as a nation the US cannot afford to keep large standing armies when there is no immediate threat that would necessitate their use. Instead, the US will rely on call up of National Guard and Reserve forces in the event that an unforeseen threat rises that requires the use of military force. So how does one expect a respondent to this poll to answer? Again, I wouldn’t be surprised to see 99% agreement that the National Guard and Reserve forces were overused. Of course they were, that is the way the US National Military Strategy has been designed for more than a decade. Again, negative responses are most likely given out of loyalty rather than a firm reading of the facts.
So the CNN article attempts to connect the recognition of these “facts” by supporters of the current administration with an erosion of that support. There may be an erosion of support for the current administration, but I don’t think that this survey supports that conclusion.
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posted
Actually, I think this was part of the overall proposal - to downsize the standing Army and other branches of the armed forces in favor of a heavier reliance on Guardsmen and Reservists.
One cynic noted it was cheaper to field Reservists and Guardsmen than regular Army and certainly cheaper to bury them. (sic)
posted
It's a quasi-StockholmSyndrome. In the original, the hostages' emotional need to believe that the hostage takers in control of their fate would not harm them overwhelmed the rational observation that the hostage takers were the ones holding the guns on them, threatening their lives. Hence the StockholmSyndrome in which the hostage takers are the good guys cuz "the hostage takers aren't killing us" and the police trying to rescue them are the bad guys cuz "if the police let the hostage takers do what they want, we would not be in danger."
The military and families rational evaluation is: (1) Their economy is going well. Ain't gonna be downsized out of a job in the midst of war ; less likely to be released from service on the basis of job performance evaluations; upgrades in rank/pay will occur faster. Reenlistment bonuses will increase as the number of first-time volunteers decrease and the number of experienced personnel who wish to not reenlist and/or retire increases. For similar reasons, there will be greater pressure on politicians to increase basic pay, specialty bonuses, etc. (2) Planning&prosecution of the IraqWar has been and is fouled up beyond all recognition.
And the soldiers' and their families' emotional need is: (1) To believe that there is rational purpose in being at war in Iraq. (2) To believe that the leadership, especially the Commander-in-Chief has the soldiers' welfare in mind when making decisions. They need to believe that their Commander-in-Chief would not kill US soldiers merely to distract&entertain his political supporters.
And like in the Stockholm situation, since there is a disjunction between rational observation (2) and their emotional need (2), many soldiers and their families choose to disconnect the planning&prosecution from the leadership. And many choose their emotional need to believe "we have a good leadership, a good Commander-in-Chief" over their rational observation "the conduct of the war in Iraq has been hampered by extremely bad leadership."
Hence for many soldiers and their families: the Commander-in-Chief holding their lives hostage is the good guy; and those trying to rescue them from that bad leadership are the bad guys.
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