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America's Voice: Attitudes on Iraq

Aired July 22, 2003 - 06:36   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Bad news out of Liberia, bad news out of Iraq, bad news at home on the economy all taking a toll on President Bush's popularity.
Gallup Poll editor-in-chief Frank Newport live with us now, and you have the latest numbers.

Frank, let's start first with Iraq. How do Americans think things are going there?

FRANK NEWPORT, GALLUP POLL EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: Well, certainly Americans are less positive, and rationally so, based on all of the news coverage about how things are going in Iraq than they were previously. I’ll show you the latest numbers. It's still over a majority who say at least moderately well -- we give them four choices in this question -- 48 percent moderately well, 6 very well. You put those together, that's a little over 50 percent -- about 54 percent. On the other hand, 45 percent say not well.

I should point out that this number was way up in the 80 percent -- that is, the two left-hand columns -- at one point right after the war was over. So, clearly, Americans' perceptions of how things are going have come down significantly over the last month or two.

Again, as I said, Carol, that's pretty rational based on the news.

COSTELLO: Well, let's talk about the weapons of mass destruction controversy. Is that hurting President Bush?

NEWPORT: Well, it's always unclear how you can disentangle the causes for people's views of the president, but when we asked very specifically: Did he lie? Basically that's the question: Did President Bush deliberately mislead the public about weapons of mass destruction before the war began? We haven't seen a lot of change -- 37 percent about three weeks ago in late June said he did; now, it's 39 percent. So, despite all of that intense media focus, not a lot of change, still a majority say no, he may have exaggerated, had inaccurate information, but didn't deliberately mislead the public -- Carol.

COSTELLO: OK, the big question now, because the presidential election is fast approaching: How is this or is it hurting President Bush's chances for re-election?

NEWPORT: Well, first and foremost here at Gallup, having monitored elections since Franklin Roosevelt, we say it's simply too early to predict what's going to happen, obviously. We do, however, track carefully George W. Bush versus a generic Democratic candidate, because we don't have a front runner yet. That's narrowed. He's only about, oh, four or five points now ahead. If we put that together of a Democratic candidate for president, right here, that's 46 to 42. That's a lot narrower than it was.

But you can see, Carol, if you go back prior to the war in February, it was 45-42. So, he's about where he was back then. So, that goes along with his approval rating falling some at the same time.

COSTELLO: Frank Newport with the latest Gallup numbers for us this morning. We appreciate it.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.







Aired July 22, 2003 - 06:36   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Bad news out of Liberia, bad news out of Iraq, bad news at home on the economy all taking a toll on President Bush's popularity.
Gallup Poll editor-in-chief Frank Newport live with us now, and you have the latest numbers.

Frank, let's start first with Iraq. How do Americans think things are going there?

FRANK NEWPORT, GALLUP POLL EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: Well, certainly Americans are less positive, and rationally so, based on all of the news coverage about how things are going in Iraq than they were previously. I’ll show you the latest numbers. It's still over a majority who say at least moderately well -- we give them four choices in this question -- 48 percent moderately well, 6 very well. You put those together, that's a little over 50 percent -- about 54 percent. On the other hand, 45 percent say not well.

I should point out that this number was way up in the 80 percent -- that is, the two left-hand columns -- at one point right after the war was over. So, clearly, Americans' perceptions of how things are going have come down significantly over the last month or two.

Again, as I said, Carol, that's pretty rational based on the news.

COSTELLO: Well, let's talk about the weapons of mass destruction controversy. Is that hurting President Bush?

NEWPORT: Well, it's always unclear how you can disentangle the causes for people's views of the president, but when we asked very specifically: Did he lie? Basically that's the question: Did President Bush deliberately mislead the public about weapons of mass destruction before the war began? We haven't seen a lot of change -- 37 percent about three weeks ago in late June said he did; now, it's 39 percent. So, despite all of that intense media focus, not a lot of change, still a majority say no, he may have exaggerated, had inaccurate information, but didn't deliberately mislead the public -- Carol.

COSTELLO: OK, the big question now, because the presidential election is fast approaching: How is this or is it hurting President Bush's chances for re-election?

NEWPORT: Well, first and foremost here at Gallup, having monitored elections since Franklin Roosevelt, we say it's simply too early to predict what's going to happen, obviously. We do, however, track carefully George W. Bush versus a generic Democratic candidate, because we don't have a front runner yet. That's narrowed. He's only about, oh, four or five points now ahead. If we put that together of a Democratic candidate for president, right here, that's 46 to 42. That's a lot narrower than it was.

But you can see, Carol, if you go back prior to the war in February, it was 45-42. So, he's about where he was back then. So, that goes along with his approval rating falling some at the same time.

COSTELLO: Frank Newport with the latest Gallup numbers for us this morning. We appreciate it.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.