USA Today reports on a new poll:
The USA TODAY poll, taken Friday through Sunday, finds most Americans paying close attention to the unfolding debate, the first on the war since Democrats won control of Congress in November.
Among the findings:
•There is majority support for congressional action on Iraq: 51% back a non-binding resolution, 57% a cap on troop levels and 63% a timetable to withdraw all U.S. troops by the end of 2008. However, 58% oppose denying funding for the additional troops.
•The Senate’s failure to act last week rankled nearly two-thirds of those surveyed. By 51%-19%, they blamed Republicans. In a party-line vote, Senate Republicans refused to cut off debate and let action proceed on a resolution opposing the troop increase.
The article notes that the sentiment for an exit from Iraq is unchanged from that expressed in the 2006 midterms.
I was surprised that Kerry O’Brien didn’t put the obvious question to John Howard tonight. Howard keeps repeating that a “defeat for America” is a “victory for the terrorists”. But he seems oblivious to the fact that most Americans want their troops to come home, and that sentiment among the public is considerably ahead of that of Democratic pollies. While there’s a very small likelihood that Bush himself will withdraw from Iraq, there’s a very high chance that the next President (Democrat or Republican) will. Howard is ostensibly running for a three year term. Either he’s in denial about reality, or his argument about the vital Australian interest being served by the American presence in Iraq is just cynical political rhetoric.
While some pro-Howard pundits are claiming that Howard made his Obama remarks in an attempt to refocus public attention on national security and away from climate change, I doubt they were that considered. The guy is obviously rattled. His performance in Parliament today didn’t show him as a statesman and a safe pair of hands, but rather as a desperate politician ranting and raving. Rudd, by contrast, isn’t going to frighten any horses on national security.
I doubt there’s much left in the terrorism scare gambit. I haven’t seen any polling on current public attitudes about terrorism specifically, but I wouldn’t at all be surprised if the Coalition’s advantage on national security is about to disappear. Howard’s trump card of the US alliance is being exposed as a canard – in reality he’s Bush’s ally, not America’s, and that’s no sort of political positive these days. Bush himself is increasingly isolated from the mainstream of opinion in the US, the lamest of lame ducks. He’s being increasingly left hanging in the breeze while the Iraq situation deteriorates, and public opinion in America and Britain has gone far beyond tipping point.
Howard’s subtext was the predictable ploy he used with WorkChoices and the GST. He’s not poll driven, he knows public opinion is against him, but trust him as he has divined Australia’s true interests. It most likely won’t wash. His problem is that he’s fighting today’s war with yesterday’s weapons.
Elsewhere: Tim Dunlop points out that the “terrorists” are only a small percentage of those engaged in violence in Iraq, while Guy questions whether Howard is more concerned with his own self interest than the national interest.
Yep, you said it there, Mark.
APEC looms large in the calendar, you’d think, electorally speaking.
(And I hope the photographers manage to get a few choice shots of Cheney alongside Howard next week or whenever.)
I’m not sure he’s in denial.
Howard has not, as far as I can recall, ever explained how our interests will be served by the war in Iraq. Nor did he sway from that pattern tonight. I guess there was the threat of those WMDs initially, but I think we’ll file that under “Children Overboard”. Maybe we scored well on the FTA for our support…umm…or maybe Bush has promised us something before he leaves the White House. No obvious national interest strikes me here and I’m really surprised Kerry never probed him on this point because Howard’s position is curious when you think about it.
You are right about the polls:
The Australian has some other interesting numbers over here (Jan 2007) which generally show that support for the war is waning along with Howard on that issue. So, if some obvious national interest isn’t the issue and the polls don’t correlate with Howard’s position, then why is he still running with it?
I guess it’s pretty accurate your suggestion that Howard is exploiting the trust he has with the voters. Maybe he feels that reversing or changing his position will adversely affect that trust more than sticking to something unpopular. Actually, maybe he is in denial…
Abend, he claims that “a defeat for America” would “embolden the terrorists”. So our national interest is supposed to be twofold – standing alongside our ally in its “time of trial” and ensuring that terrorists in “the region” aren’t emboldened.
I think he’s making the best of it with his “Rudd, coward” line and “trust me, look I’ll do what’s unpopular in the national interest” stuff. He’s so identified with Bush he could hardly get himself off the hook, even if he wanted to.
Since Gordon Brown will almost certainly distance the UK from Bush (and British troops are going in May – already been announced), it’s fascinating to speculate whether a PM Costello would have “stayed the course”.
I agree.
The Obama outburst was a rather big stuff up on several levels.
If i was Howard i would cut and run (from office) very soon.
Retire gracefully-ish, and jump before i was shoved.
I saw a bit of Howard going beresque in parliament. It’s not a good look on him, that running amok like a red faced lathamesque berserker .
He looked to me as if he was mainly sending a message to Costello, Abbott and Turnbull (and assorted backfeckinbenchers – the gilded youths of the barber shop that is parliament) that he would hang on for grim death in the cabinet and they better watch out. They’ll dream of him running down the corridor to their office with a machette if they stir him up too much.
By the look on their faces he was certainly scaring them more than he was scaring Rudd or Gillard.
Well Howard may be back on his preferred turf, and he’s sticking to the same tried and tested marketing formula: Conviction politician standing firm against slings and arrows; and says Opposition leader lacks ticker is “gutless� and a “coward;� and mentions “terrorist� a lot.
Are people still buying it? I don’t know.
But I suspect he might have even more reason to play the card within the next Friedman Unit. It has escaped most people’s attention that the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Fuck this. WordPress isn’t posting my complete pearls of wisdom. Stupid intertubes!
Iran is a conundrum. There are signs pointing both ways. But I must admit that I found Ahmedinijad’s naivety that there were enough good people in the US who could stop any attack on his country rather touching. (Reminiscent of another (former) leader in that area of the globe.)
Sorry, Christine, I think I may have gone and deleted the wrong comment (the one above “delete the comment above”) coz it was longer than the penultimate one. What WP needs is an undo button!
Ah, Punter st reckons global warming is way more scary than terrorism. Fear will be on the ALPs side for once. Plus pics of Howard with Dead Duck Dubya are a plain electoral liability. Whoever wins Pres next, its a Dem congress and Senate – and Howard has managed to create a rod for his own back on the alliance.
In sum, this latest tirade of bollocks from Howard is going nowhere. The old grey mare aint what she used to be. And his front bench knew it too – slightly puzzled looks “has the old coot lost it for good? What are the implications for me?” etc.
I back Rudd to rip him to shreds on the issue. Both publics want their troops out, and the whole exercise has be a huge boon to international terrorists – whose greatest fear is that the US will leave, and the Iraqis will start seeing them as the foreigners. Cos the Iraqis actually know where they are. They’ll be face down in ditches 10 minutes after the last blackhawk crosses the horizon to Qatar.
wbb, you’ve got to admit this was hilarious from Bush:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/02/13/ap/politics/mainD8N8J3C00.shtml
Let’s rephrase that, shall we?
That’s OK Mark.
Anyway, my point was that it now seems pretty obvious that the US will lob missiles into Iran within the next six months, Australia may play a role (or at least is certainly being briefed by General Pace, and in a couple of weeks Cheney), and this is all Howard’s playground.
I just wonder whether the punters are sick enough of the evident bullshit surrounding the WOT, or whether JHo will be able to ramp up the jingoism yet again.
Maybe I’m wrong about Pace:
http://thinkprogress.org/2007/02/12/pace-iran-iraq/
Surely we have seen that ignoring the public opinion for what can only be described as “we know what is best for you”, has gone the way of the dodo. It is not enough for our poli’s to suggest that what we don’t understand is what they are protecting us from. How can it be that we elect these people to positions of trust, yet that trust is not reciprocated? They are answerable to us after all and yet we are made to feel as though we are not worthy of details that are critical to the actions that are being taken on our behalf. I’m not saying that we should risk national security for the sake of openess, but surely the time has come for the poli’s to stop playing game’s with our agenda.
Isn’t the discussion on Howard’s outburst missing the point? As Obama said, the problem with Howard is that he isn’t committed to Iraq either. What sort of presence is 1,400 personnel? The fact is that Howard is terrified of making the sort of commitment in proportion to the US and UK. Howard’s stance on Iraq is not conviction but grand-standing. Why is no-one calling Howard’s bluff on this?
It’s time for the big guns…bring on Gerry!
In response to cred, Gerry says:
Rather than address the issue of only having 1500 troops over there, which I would say was the point of Barak’s riposte, Gerry indulges in his usual bit of equivocation and exaggeration. Nice!
And, furthermore, Gerry tells us we are all wrong. Howard said what he did because he believes in his position:
…and wait! There’s more…
…and here are the steak knives…
According to Henderson, belief is enough to run the country, start a war and excuse Howard for his remarks. Why didn’t I think of that?
Paul Kelly in the Australian on this today: HERE
Remember, what Howard says has nothing to do with facts or with his beliefs.
His comments have taken global warming, drought and the crisis in the Murray-Darling of the front page. Mission accomplished.
I’m surprised that Kezza didn’t ask Ratty the following question:
“are the American people Al Qaeda’s allies?”
Spot on, Mark. If Team Ruddster have any nous at all, then they should pepper the vainglorious, warmongering and increasinly strident Howard, with this question and close variants of it, all the way to the election. This will focus voters in marginals with short attention spans on Howard’s Manichean mindlessness and nibble away at Johnny being perceived as strong on National Security.
In lockstep with The Imbecile, Howard slags considered debate about Coalition Forces withdrawing from Iraq as “cut and run”, refusing point-blank to consider a withdrawal timetable, thereby committing Australia to the insanity of “war without end”.
Howard once claimed;”I am not a zealot”. A substantial number of marginal seat voters, indeed, his own backbenchers, must surely be having serious doubts about Howard’s claim.
“Mr. Howard, are the Australian people who oppose your unquestioning committment to the Bush administration over the invasion and occupation of Iraq, all allies of Al Qaeda?”
“Do you consider these Australians in breach of your Sedition Laws?”
“Will agents of ASIO be sent to surveil, harass and arrest them?”
Yippee! Howard gets a gurnsey on the Colbert Report http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/02/13/colbert-on-the-dixie-chicks-douglas-feith-and-john-howard/
Can you embed this Mark?
Can you find me a YouTube link, Christine? I’ll need that to embed it.
Does this work?
http://www.crooksandliars.com/Media/Download/14368/2/Colbert-Dixie-Feith-Howard.mov
It’s not ROTFL, but humorous enough.
Youtube are taking down all the Daily Show and Colbert stuff because of Viacom’s demands.
Yeah, I thought that’d be the case. I don’t think I can embed it directly from Crooks and Liars and the file would be too big to sit in LP’s database.
Guess Washington wasn’t keeping the PM informed of how the talks with NK were going…
Pyongyang agrees to close nuclear reactor
Another link to the Colbert Report on John Howard is here:
http://www.comedycentral.com/motherload/index.jhtml?ml_video=82065
Thank God we now get BOTH Jon Stewart and Colbert in Australia … albeit via the Comedy Channel on Foxtel.
Shhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!! Can you all please pipe down about Johnny Howard’s gaffe? I know he’s a grandstanding war mongerer that’s out of touch with everyone except George Bush (and he’s been remarkably quiet), but I’m wanting to see Howard stay on the show until he dies a lingering death. If you all keep this hollering up, you’ll not only miss the best part, but they’ll take him off and bring on the understudy (Costello).
Now that the US Democrats have become Al-Quaeda stooges and therefore the enemy, what will this mean for the US alliance if and when they take the White House next year?
Surely we won’y be able to remain in ANZUS, not with Osama’s patsys running the show?
Were just gonna have to pull-out of the US alliance and find some new pals.
I have a few modest proposals for the PM to consider:
How about we cuddle-up to Serbia? On the positive side: They don’t like Osama and have certainly demonstrated the ticker to kill muslims, terrorist or otherwise, in very large numbers. On the negative: led by deranged psychopaths; don’t speak English. Perhaps the PM can convince them to sign-up on a mutual defence treaty and then join us in Iraq to fight the good fight after the US and Britain pull-out?
Or what about Fiji? On the positive side: They’re pretty good at coups and not averse to a good stoush now and again. They’ve got a strong leader who doesn’t have to worry about what the voters might think, having abolished parliament. Some of them used to be cannibals in the good old days, so mutual defence treaty and a Battalion or two of these blokes in Iraq could really chew-away at the terrorist power-base, if put to good use. On the negative side: wrong colour.
How about Isarel? On the positive side: Very good at fighting muslims and winning wars against them; Almost as good at pinching land as we were with the Aborigines. Close to the action and most of them speak English. On the negative: A long way-off and nobody likes them.
Colbert. heh. I liked it. Loved to have seen what Jon Stewart and co would have done but that was good enough.