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Showing Original Post only (View all)9% approval for bombing Syria = suicide for Dems in 2014 [View all]
The pushback on White House plans to bomb Syria has been startling. Almost everyone hates the idea. With a 9-percent approval rating, bombing Syria is LESS popular than Congress. Unlike post-9/11 Afghanistan, and even Iraq, there's no rah-rah brigade cheering us into war. Instead there's a consensus against it.
This could be a reflection of the fact that the political stakes here couldn't be higher. With Congressional fundraising in the last weeks of recess, you have to imagine they're getting greasy earfuls on this. We've got another debt ceiling fight ahead of us, and we're about to put another war on the credit card. Americans are reeling from sequestration, and the Democratic president wants to cut a blank check for another war. This is not popular. Not when Grandma no longer has Meals on Wheels.
It's an outrageous proposition.
Also, there's too many unanswered questions:
-- People aren't buying the idea of "humanitarian air strikes."
-- No one is certain about *who* used chemical weapons.
-- We're highly suspect of intercepted phone calls provided to us by Israel, which is perceived as a less-than objective observer.
I expected air strikes to be started and finished by now, and I didn't expect mainstream media to be taking a critical view of the idea. The fact that it's dragged on is not strategically ideal. To say the least.
If Obama oversees an expansion of war in the Middle East...after promising to bring troops home, and promising focus on our economy and jobs... with a 9% approval rating, it's going to hurt Dems in 2014. And that's if everything goes well. If things go sideways, and Obama is blamed for a strategic error, we could see a resurgence of the discredited Neo Con brand.
New poll: Syria intervention even less popular than Congress
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/08/26/new-poll-syria-intervention-even-less-popular-than-congress/