On July 6 of this year, I pointed to a survey showing that 60 percent of Americans opposed a war with Iran. I also noted at the time that given "the substance of the left/libertarian opposition to a more confrontational approach in dealing with Iran," I wouldn't be "too surprised when that 60 percent opposing a war with Iran starts to dwindle--it has dropped five points in just the last six months."
Well, today we have new poll from Zogby showing that a majority of Americans now favor military action against Iran:
A majority of likely voters - 52% - would support a U.S. military strike to prevent Iran from building a nuclear weapon, and 53% believe it is likely that the U.S. will be involved in a military strike against Iran before the next presidential election, a new Zogby America telephone poll shows.
Remember when Barnett Rubin "reported" in August that:
They [the source's institution] have "instructions" (yes, that was the word used) from the Office of the Vice-President to roll out a campaign for war with Iran in the week after Labor Day; it will be coordinated with the American Enterprise Institute, the Wall Street Journal, the Weekly Standard, Commentary, Fox, and the usual suspects. It will be heavy sustained assault on the airwaves, designed to knock public sentiment into a position from which a war can be maintained. Evidently they don't think they'll ever get majority support for this--they want something like 35-40 percent support, which in their book is "plenty."
The unsourced rumor was picked up by George Packer at the New Yorker, among others. Now if anyone from Cheney's office was giving "instructions" on how to roll out a war with Iran, I didn't get the memo, so I'm going to stick with my previous explanation for the increased support--the left has done a terrible job of laying out their case against a strike, or maybe it just isn't possible to lay out a persuasive case against a strike. In any case, if 35-40 percent support was considered "plenty" by the veep, what do you think he'll make of an outright majority? And what does George Packer make of it?
