Poll: Support for Intervening in Syria Falls From Really Low to Mind-Bogglingly Low

[David__77]

That's some trendline in the Pew poll question about Syria. The pollster has been asking people, for 15 months, whether they're on board with sending aid to Syrian rebel groups. What started as a +34-point margin for "no" is now a +50 margin for no.



March 2012 was the escalation period that drove up American awareness of the situation Syria. December 2012 was a period of success for rebel groups—and more definitive criticism from the Obama administration. June 2013? Why, that's when the administration meandered toward a larger committment. And people don't want it.

Neither does the White House! If you parse what aides have been saying about the new aid, they don't even talk of a U.S.-boosted victory. They talk about an "even playing field" and a "settlement." How far we've traveled from 2003, when it was perfectly ordinary to hear the Bush administration chastise Syria for sending arms into Iraq and to let the impression of a "next war" hang in the air.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2013/06/17/poll_support_for_intervening_in_syria_falls_from_really_low_to_mind_bogglingly.html

(President Obama: please listen to the people!)

[Comrade Grumpy]

1. I think Obama has a bad case of Susan Rice whispering in his ear.

[nadinbrzezinski]

3. Nah, he has a bad case of the peasants revolting

Wag the dog s not having it's expected effect...

[allin99]

4. how susceptable he must be.

[Catherina]

2. Wow. Just wow n/t

[David__77]

5. People are listening to what the media couldn't cover up.

The barbaric acts of the insurgents are nearly beyond belief. I made a lot of comparisons over the past couple years between these insurgents (the 95% that are not "secular&quot and the Khmer Rouge. Perhaps they are worse than the Khmer Rouge: Khmer Rouge slowly killed "new people," whereas the insurgents kill as many Alawites and normal civil servants as they can, where they can: random shelling, disappearances, etc. People like this killer:

These are the type of people that make up the insurgents: the dregs of society, animals. The pride of that kid boasting of shooting his classmates was the same boasting of that cannibal posing for the camera. Gratuitous decapitation, sectarian cleansing, on and on.

The media doesn't want to focus on these things, but it comes through!

[Catherina]

11. It's no wonder the civilian population isn't rising up with these animals

as the script originally called for.

Sickening. Sickening!

[leveymg]

6. Most Americans intuitively understand we can only lose again, and lose bigger this time.

And, that this is headed toward a war with Iran, which will be our ruin.

There'd be rioting in the streets if this were happening under a Republican President.

[Purveyor]

12. "There'd be rioting in the streets if this were happening under a Republican President"...

Indeed there would and just imagine the outrage over the NSA if Romney was parking his ass at 1600 Penn...

[LearningCurve]

7. Syria strikes me as a No-win situation

Sometimes the best response, is no response at all.

[David__77]

9. "No response" is definitely a response.

The media kept harping "when will Obama decide?" As if the only possible "decision" would be to intervene.

Maybe he can send a few old guns to the "seculars" who are inept militarily in any case, and the media will shut up. But I'm sure they're be on to the next "decision wait" soon - "no fly zone."

[Puzzledtraveller]

10. Our proxy war with Iran waged with the blood of the innocent in Syria

and a humanitarian disaster as they flee.

[Puzzledtraveller]

8. He won't

listen to the people. But he will listen to Bill Clinton.

[frazzled]

13. Yet at its lowest, it's still twice the support that Congress gets

in the latest polls: 10%.

So sending small arms to Syrian rebels is yet another thing that is more popular than Congress. Like root canal.

[eridani]

14. This is one of those times when I am very glad that Obama--

--is not one of those macho shoot-from-the-hip CICs.

[Whisp]

15. yes. Charlie Rose was trying to put Clinton's words in Obama's mouth tonight

in that interview.

It is definitely not what Obama has on his mind, what those warmongers McCain and Clinton want.

[eridani]

16. Juan Cole: Obama Should Resist the Clintons & Europe on Syria

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/289-134/17932-obama-should-resist-the-clintons-a-europe-on-syria

Former president Bill Clinton criticized President Obama on Thursday for his inaction in regard to Syria. This step seems extraordinary and surely has something to do with positioning Hillary Clinton to run as a more hawkish New Democrat against anyone in the Obama circle in 2016. As Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton appears to have pushed for arming the Syrian rebels, but could not get Obama's backing for the move. Bill Clinton's criticism is extremely unfair, since there are many bad situations in the world in which the US cannot fruitfully intervene, and Clinton knows this sad truth all too well.

In 1992-2002 Algeria's secular generals, tied to France and fueled by petroleum, fought a bloody dirty war against the Islamic Salvation Front and other devotees of political Islam. The world watched in horror as an estimated 150,000 people died. And yet, Clinton never directly intervened. Behind the scenes France backed the generals, and the latter won. The terrorism produced by the bloody repression in Algeria spilled over onto France and even targeted the United States, when a member of the Algerian Armed Islamic Group attempted in 2000 to drive a car bomb from Canada to LAX (he was stopped at the border and arrested). Nobody remembers Clinton's paralysis in Algeria, contrary to what he is now predicting about Obama and Syria. This is because if you avoid a quagmire as president, no one holds that against you.

<snip>

In general Bill Clinton had few foreign policy successes. He had many more victories on the domestic front, fixing budget woes, getting more justice for workers, and fostering heightened productivity. One of his great failures was yielding to the pressure of the hawks around the Project for a New American Century and bombing Iraq in 1998, in preparation for which he forced the UN weapons inspectors to withdraw. Had they remained on the ground, they could have continued to certify that Iraq had destroyed its weapons of mass destruction. It was later falsely alleged ad infinitum by Bush and his stenographer press corps that Saddam Hussein kicked out the inspectors. The PNAC warmongers maneuvered Clinton into helping them blind US and world intelligence with regard to Iraq, thus allowing them to make the most outlandish and mendacious allegations without fear of contradiction, and to drag us into a quagmire. Bill Clinton was a patsy for the hawks, and now he is setting up Obama to be another one.

[davidn3600]

17. War fatigue definitely setting in...and on both sides of the aisle interestingly enough

[David__77]

18. Yes, Rand Paul is a notable Republican that is right on Syria.

Or, mostly right. The "Tea Party" types are generally right as well, but the McCainiacs and the country club types still run the Republican Party, so it's not too relevant. Only a few Democrats are strong and consistent in opposing US intervention - lots of weasel words out there.