The latest Gallup survey of public attitudes about major American institutions is out, and the results are instructive. There?s good news and bad in the poll, from my perspective, but the headline most are taking away from it is that ?despite? the prisoner-abuse scandal in Iraq and questions about military planning and objectives, the public still offers overwhelming confidence in its armed forces at around 75 percent. This is far higher than public confidence in other institutions.
For example, the media. Only 30 percent of Americans have confidence in it, the same as for the U.S. Congress. I?m not sure which should be insulted by that.
My guess is that the media?s bad-news fixation, built-in to some extent but also accentuated by recent trends, is coming back to bite them in Iraq. When you look more closely at declining public optimism about the campaign in Iraq (not in this poll but others) you find that the increase is likely due to hawkish Americans becoming less convinced that the U.S. will fight to win there, rather than due to a decrease in support for the campaign itself.
