Public Attitudes Still Mixed Though Shifting About the War in Iraq, According to the Latest Harris Poll

For the past few months the American public’s attitudes to a number of key issues on Iraq have remained remarkably stable. Most U.S. adults, it seemed, had made up their minds and neither the recent news from Iraq nor the campaign rhetoric has had much impact on their opinion. However, that has changed in the past month.

While the public remains skeptical about a number of different aspects about Iraq, there has been a shift in attitudes. Given the emphasis that has been placed on the situation in Iraq during the presidential election campaign of recent weeks, on balance it would seem that more of the public is leaning toward a stance that favors President Bush.

By a slight 52 to 45 percent majority, the public now feels that the invasion of Iraq strengthened, not weakened, the war on terrorism. This is in contrast to the narrow 43 to 41 percent who felt this way back in September. In addition, almost half of adults (47%) now favor keeping a large number of troops in Iraq until there is a stable government there. This is the highest level of support Harris Interactive® has measured on this key issue and is up sharply since September when 38 percent felt this way.

These are the results of a nationwide Harris Poll of 1,016 U.S. adults surveyed by telephone by Harris Interactive between October 14 and 17, 2004.

Overall, the latest results find that support for the war is increasing:

• By 50 to 47 percent, U.S. adults now favor bringing most of the troops home in the next year. This three-point margin is a big change since September when, by 16 points (54% to 38%), the public more clearly wanted the troops brought home.
  
• While a small majority (52% to 47%) feels that the invasion of Iraq has not helped protect the United States from another terrorist attack, these results are closer than what has been seen in the past. Recently, in September, a wider 51 to 42 percent held this same position.

• Clearly a 59 to 39 percent majority believes that "what we were told by the government before the war about weapons of mass destruction and links to Al Qaeda" was "misleading," up from September when a 55 to 36 percent majority felt this way.

• But by 53 to 46 percent, a majority (albeit not large) believe that the U.S. government tried to present the information about weapons of mass destruction "accurately" and did not try to "deliberately exaggerate" the reports. This is a shift from the narrow 46 to 45 percent who agreed with this point of view in September.

Though the public is still somewhat divided and has mixed feelings about Iraq, the last few weeks of campaigning and media attention have perhaps triggered a need for them to take a closer look at events in Iraq. For now, it appears they have a slightly more favorable view of the government’s position on Iraq than they did earlier, which looks better for the President.

"Do you believe that what we were told by the government before the Iraq war about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and Iraq’s links to Al Qaeda, the terrorist organization, was generally accurate or misleading?"

Base: All Adults

NOTE: Percentages may not add up exactly to 100% due to rounding.

"Do you believe that the U.S. government deliberately exaggerated the reports of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq in order to increase support for war, or do you think it tried to present the information accurately?"

Base: All Adults

NOTE: Percentages may not add up exactly to 100% due to rounding.

"Do you favor keeping a large number of U.S. troops in Iraq until there is a stable government there OR bringing most of our troops home in the next year?"

Base: All Adults

NOTE: Percentages may not add up exactly to 100% due to rounding.

"Do you think the invasion of Iraq strengthened or weakened the war on terrorism?"

Base: All Adults

"Do you think the invasion of Iraq has helped to protect the United States from another terrorist attack or not?"

Base: All Adults

The Harris Poll^® was conducted by telephone within the United States between October 14 and 17, 2004 among a nationwide cross section of 1,016 adults (ages 18 years and over). Figures for age, sex, race, education, number of adults, number of voice/telephone lines in the household, region and size of place were weighted where necessary to align them with their actual proportions in the population.

In theory, with a probability sample of this size, one can say with 95 percent certainty that the results have a statistical precision of plus or minus 3 percentage points of what they would be if the entire U.S. adult population had been polled with complete accuracy. Unfortunately, there are several other possible sources of error in all polls or surveys that are probably more serious than theoretical calculations of sampling error. They include refusals to be interviewed (nonresponse), question wording and question order, interviewer bias, weighting by demographic control data and screening (e.g., for likely voters). It is impossible to quantify the errors that may result from these factors.

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