Public Opinion on Afghanistan: All the Numbers Get Worse

NEW YORK-(Business Wire)-September 25, 2009 - A new Harris Poll finds that a 54% to 36% majority of adults now gives President Obama negative ratings on his handling of Afghanistan. Only 14% of adults feel confident that U.S. policies there will be successful and fully 55% are not confident. These numbers show a substantial decline in public support for the president’s policies since Harris Polls conducted earlier this year, and in previous years.

These are some of the results of The Harris Poll^® of 2,334 adults surveyed online between September 8 and 15, 2009 by Harris Interactive^®.

The main findings of this Harris Poll include:

The 54% to 36% majority that now gives the president a negative rating on Afghanistan compares with 51% to 36% majority who gave him a positive rating in April.
A third (35%) of Democrats and most (60%) Independents, in addition to 75% of Republicans, now give him a negative rating.
Only 8% of all adults now believe that the situation in Afghanistan is getting better, while 42% think it is getting worse. In April only 28% thought it was getting worse.
Only 14% of the public are now confident that U.S. policies will be successful, down from 27% in April; while almost a third (31%) are unsure, that leaves 55% who are not confident, up from 40% in April this year.
A 42% plurality of adults see no difference between the situation for U.S. troops in Afghanistan and in Iraq. Of the remainder who have an opinion, many more (36%) think the situation is worse in Afghanistan (than in Iraq) than those who believe it is better (10%).

A comparison of public opinion now and in earlier years

Several of these questions were asked when President George W. Bush was in the White House. The public’s pessimism now is somewhat stronger than it was in most of these surveys:

The 55% who are not confident that U.S. policy will be successful compares to 45%, 41%, and 54% in 2005, 2007, and 2008.
The 42% who believe the situation in Afghanistan is getting worse compares to 30%, 26%, and 37% in 2005, 2007, and 2008.

So what?

These new poll numbers put more pressure on President Obama to do something new in Iraq, at a time when the military commanders are asking for more U.S. troops and Vice President Biden has suggested cutting U.S. forces there.

On the other hand, the president has his hands more than full with health care reform and the nation’s economic problems and must wish that he could avoid taking an unpopular decision to increase troop levels, or the controversial step of reducing them. But doing nothing is not an attractive option either. He seems to be between a rock and two hard places.

The Harris Poll^® #106

By Humphrey Taylor, Chairman, The Harris Poll

Methodology

This Harris Poll was conducted online within the United States September 8 and 15, 2009 among 2,334 adults (aged 18 and over). Figures for age, sex, race/ethnicity, education, region and household income were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their actual proportions in the population. Propensity score weighting was also used to adjust for respondents’ propensity to be online. Full data tables and methodology are available at www.harrisinteractive.com.

These statements conform to the principles of disclosure of the National Council on Public Polls.

About Harris Interactive

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