[NYTr] Bush loses ground with military families

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Subject: Bush loses ground with military families

Los Angeles Times - Dec 7, 2007
http://www.latimes.com/news/custom/timespoll/la-na-militpoll7dec07,0,4843202.story?coll=la-home-center

THE TIMES/BLOOMBERG POLL

Bush loses ground with military families

A majority disapprove of the president's handling of the war in Iraq and
are more in line with the views of the general public.

By Faye Fiore, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

WASHINGTON -- Families with ties to the military, long a reliable source
of support for wartime presidents, disapprove of President Bush and his
handling of the war in Iraq, with a majority concluding the invasion was
not worth it, a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has found.

The views of the military community, which includes active-duty service
members, veterans and their family members, mirror those of the overall
adult population, a sign that the strong military endorsement that the
administration often pointed to has dwindled in the war's fifth year.

Nearly six out of every 10 military families disapprove of Bush's job
performance and the way he has run the war, rating him only slightly
better than the general population does.

And among those families with soldiers, sailors and Marines who have
served in Iraq or Afghanistan, 60% say that the war in Iraq was not
worth the cost, the same result as all adults surveyed.

"I don't see gains for the people of Iraq . . . and, oh, my God, so many
wonderful young people, and these are the ones who felt they were really
doing something, that's why they signed up," said poll respondent Sue
Datta, 61, whose youngest son, an Army staff sergeant, was seriously
wounded in Iraq last year and is scheduled to redeploy in 2009. "I pray
to God that they did not die in vain, but I don't think our president
is even sensitive at all to what it's like to have a child serving over
there."

Patience with the war, which has now lasted longer than the U.S.
involvement in World War II, is wearing thin -- particularly among
families who have sent a service member to the conflict. One-quarter say
American troops should stay "as long as it takes to win." Nearly seven
in 10 favor a withdrawal within the coming year or "right away."

Military families are only slightly more patient: 35% are willing to
stay until victory; 58% want the troops home within a year or sooner.

Here, too, the military families surveyed are in sync with the general
population, 64% of whom call for a withdrawal by the end of next year.

"You generally expect to see support for the president as commander in
chief and for the war, but this is a different kind of war than those
we've fought in the past, particularly for families," said David Segal,
a military sociologist at the University of Maryland.

Today's all-volunteer force is older and more married than any before
it. Facing a shortage of troops, the Army increased the maximum
enlistment age from 35 to 42 and called up reservists, who tend to be
older and more settled than recruits fresh out of high school. The
result is a fighting force that left thousands of spouses and children
behind.

At the same time, deployments have grown longer and more frequent as
troops rotate in and out of the war zone, sometimes three and four
times, with no fixed end date in sight, a wearing existence that has
contributed to opposition to Bush and his war strategy.

"The man went into Iraq without justification, without a plan; he just
decided to go in there and win, and he had no idea what was going to
happen," said poll respondent Mary Meneely, 58, of Arco, Minn. Her son,
an Air Force reservist, served one tour in Afghanistan. "There have been
terrible deaths on our side, and it's even worse for the Iraqi
population. It's another Vietnam."

The survey, conducted under the supervision of Times Poll Director Susan
Pinkus, interviewed 1,467 adults nationwide from Nov. 30 through Monday.
It included 631 respondents from military families and 152 who have had
someone in their family stationed in Iraq or Afghanistan. The margin of
error for the entire sample is plus or minus 3 percentage points; for
military families it is 4 percentage points, and for families with
someone in the war zone it is 8 percentage points.

Other surveys have shown an erosion of support for Bush and the war
among military personnel, including a 2005 poll by Military Times of
their active-duty readers.

Now the disapproval of Bush appears to have transferred to his party.
Republican leanings of military families that began with the Vietnam War
-- when Democratic protests seemed to be aimed at the troops as much as
the fighting -- have shifted, the poll results show.

When military families were asked which party could be trusted to do a
better job of handling issues related to them, respondents divided
almost evenly: 39% said Democrats and 35% chose Republicans. The general
population feels similarly: 39% for Democrats and 31% for Republicans.

"The Democrats are not seen as the anti-soldier group anymore," said
Charles C. Moskos, a military sociologist at Northwestern University. He
added that Bush's firm backing of the troops did not gain him any points
because the entire country was now viewed as supportive of the military,
even if not of the war. "He doesn't get extra credit for that."

"We support the troops; we don't support Bush," said respondent Linda
Ramirez, 52, of Spooner, Wis., whose 19-year-old son is due to be
deployed with the Marines early next year. "These boys have paid a
terrible, terrible price."

The carnage -- nearly 3,900 killed and 29,000 wounded -- is contributing
to the war's unpopularity, even though the number of dead is low
compared with previous wars, Moskos thinks.

Medical advances on the battlefield have saved more lives but sent home
more severely injured troops; for every soldier killed in Iraq and
Afghanistan, eight are wounded -- nearly triple the ratio in Vietnam.

Asked about the Bush administration's handling of the needs of
active-duty troops, military families and veterans, 57% of the general
public disapprove. That number falls only slightly among military
families -- 53% give a thumbs-down.

And most military families and others surveyed took no exception to
retired officers publicly criticizing the Bush administration's
execution of the war. More than half of the respondents in both groups
-- 58% -- say such candor is appropriate. Families with someone who had
served in the war are about equally supportive at 55%.