.US public losing interest in Iraq as news coverage wanes: report
WASHINGTON (AFP) — A sharp fall in US media coverage of the Iraq war has left Americans less interested in and knowledgeable about the conflict, a report by the independent Pew Research Center showed Wednesday.
"The drop in awareness comes as press attention to the war has waned," the report said.
A scant three percent of news stories in February were devoted to the Iraq war, compared with around 15 percent in July last year, and the US public has not perceived the war, which began nearly five years ago, as a top news story since October, the report noted.
Meanwhile, 28 percent of 1,003 adults polled last month for Pew correctly estimated the number of US military fatalities in Iraq at around 4,000, compared with 54 percent who got the figure right seven months ago, the report said.
More than one-third -- 35 percent -- estimated that 3,000 had been killed, 11 percent put the toll at 2,000 deaths, and just under a quarter said the number of fatalities was closer to 5,000.
The Department of Defense confirmed the deaths of 3,974 US military personnel in Iraq as of Monday, according to Pew.
"As news coverage of the war has diminished, so too has public interest in news about Iraq," the report said.
And with the waning interest in news about Iraq, there has been a "significant increase in the number of Americans who believe that military progress is being made in Iraq," it said, citing another poll.
That poll, which surveyed 1,508 adults between February 20-24, showed that nearly half of Americans -- 48 percent -- felt the US military effort in Iraq was going well, compared with 30 percent who thought so in February 2007, when the war was consistently one of the top news stories in the United States.
"Iraq was the public's most closely followed news story in all but five weeks during the first half of 2007," but lost power after July and fell out of the top stories in mid-October, the report said.
AFP
"The drop in awareness comes as press attention to the war has waned," the report said.
A scant three percent of news stories in February were devoted to the Iraq war, compared with around 15 percent in July last year, and the US public has not perceived the war, which began nearly five years ago, as a top news story since October, the report noted.
Meanwhile, 28 percent of 1,003 adults polled last month for Pew correctly estimated the number of US military fatalities in Iraq at around 4,000, compared with 54 percent who got the figure right seven months ago, the report said.
More than one-third -- 35 percent -- estimated that 3,000 had been killed, 11 percent put the toll at 2,000 deaths, and just under a quarter said the number of fatalities was closer to 5,000.
The Department of Defense confirmed the deaths of 3,974 US military personnel in Iraq as of Monday, according to Pew.
"As news coverage of the war has diminished, so too has public interest in news about Iraq," the report said.
And with the waning interest in news about Iraq, there has been a "significant increase in the number of Americans who believe that military progress is being made in Iraq," it said, citing another poll.
That poll, which surveyed 1,508 adults between February 20-24, showed that nearly half of Americans -- 48 percent -- felt the US military effort in Iraq was going well, compared with 30 percent who thought so in February 2007, when the war was consistently one of the top news stories in the United States.
"Iraq was the public's most closely followed news story in all but five weeks during the first half of 2007," but lost power after July and fell out of the top stories in mid-October, the report said.
AFP
posted by madtom at 7:54 PM
3 Comments:
I wish I could ask this reporter how many US soldiers have been killed in Iraq to date. From this disingenuous AFP article (redundant, I know), you might think the number is almost 4,000 today instead of less than 3,300, wouldn't you? They indicate that those who estimated the troops killed to be 3000 were wrong, and those who guessed 4000 were right. I would bet that it never occurred to the reporter or editors to consider that about 20% of the deaths suffered by US forces in Iraq are not combat related, or that the death rate for those in uniform today are about the same as they were during the dovish years of James Earl Carter. I don't remember a lot of outrage about the higher death rate that resulted from neglect of the military at that Noble Peace prize winner's hands. They would probably be surprised to know that the death rate due to self inflicted causes was also significantly higher under the Carter Administration, too. All this might surprise them, but you can bet your ass they would never report it.
Can I ask you a stupid question, What difference does the number make?
Lets say the number is between 1 and 10
If only one had died, no one would care?
If it's 10 that died we should riot?
Will we know when we reached 5?
You know full well it makes a difference. The first 10 days of this month there were 0 hostile deaths, I believe. Not a word in the press. Then a terrible day wherein 10 died. Then we see articles questioning whether the surge was a failure. The numbers shouldn't matter, I agree. If the cause is just, it is worth as many as it takes. If not, it isn't worth a single life. But in the public arena, which is the only arena in which the US can lose a war, it is one of the biggest weapons the anti-war crowd carries. So when I see the press lie or mislead on the numbers, I notice. The number also matters to me in this way: if the numbers were much higher, I would be even more certain that tactics were wrong. That wouldn't change my opinion of the correctness of the cause, though.
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