Why Are We Back In Iraq?

(UPDATE: Armando at Daily Kos absolutely eviscerates WaPo and the poll here!)

Via a Daily Kos diary, a new poll cited by The Washington Post in Sunday's edition shows that the problems at the paper don't begin and end with Bob Woodward's role in the Plame leak nor WaPo's dumbass refusal to publish the names of countries identified in their "exclusive" CIA secret prisons stories unless they appear under an Associated Press byline.

From "Sympathetic Vibrations" by Chris Cillizza and Peter Slevin:

Democrats fumed last week at Vice President Cheney's suggestion that criticism of the administration's war policies was itself becoming a hindrance to the war effort. But a new poll indicates most Americans are sympathetic to Cheney's point.

Seventy percent of people surveyed said that criticism of the war by Democratic senators hurts troop morale -- with 44 percent saying morale is hurt "a lot," according to a poll taken by RT Strategies. Even self-identified Democrats agree: 55 percent believe criticism hurts morale, while 21 percent say it helps morale.

The results surely will rankle many Democrats, who argue that it is patriotic and supportive of the troops to call attention to what they believe are deep flaws in President Bush's Iraq strategy. But the survey itself cannot be dismissed as a partisan attack. The RTs in RT Strategies are Thomas Riehle, a Democrat, and Lance Tarrance, a veteran GOP pollster.

The stupid poll doesn't rankle me...it's the reporting of the poll that should rankle everyone.

This is the "morale" question from the poll:

Thinking about the war in Iraq, when Democratic Senators criticize the President’s policy on the war in Iraq, do you believe it HELPS the morale of our troops in Iraq or HURTS the morale of our troops in Iraq?

How in God's name would criticism help troop morale?

That's got to be the dumbest polling question I've ever seen in my life.

But it doesn't matter to WaPo's Chris Cillizza and Peter Slevin, who are just out to "rankle."

Despicable.

# posted by Ron Brynaert : 11/27/2005 07:38:00 PM