Posted under Conservatism & Interventionism & Subsidiarity
We, the People, are fed up with the Feds. We’ve had enough of their lying, their cynical manipulation, and their outright theft. In the past, when our temperatures started to rise, a nice little war would distract us from our REAL enemies, and we’d aim our outrage at the scapegoats our handlers had selected for us.
But it’s not working anymore. This Gallup poll reveals there’s little of the usual “rally ’round the flag” effect in reaction to Obomba’s Obama’s unconstitutional and cowardly attack on Libya:
The 47% of Americans approving of the action against Libya is lower than what Gallup has found when asking about approval of other U.S. military campaigns in the past four decades.
Americans showed the highest level of support for the 2001 military action in Afghanistan that was a response to the 9/11 terror attacks. Americans also widely supported U.S. airstrikes against Iraq in 1993 and the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003.
Support for the current involvement in Libya is also much lower than support for U.S. airstrikes against Libya in 1986 in response to the Libyan bombing of a German nightclub that killed two American servicemen.
The “rally ’round the flag” strategem is an old trick that once worked like a charm. For example, look how successful George W. Bush was in his use of 9/11. He picked Saddam Hussein as the target for the Empire’s collective two-minute hate. The new authority and prestige that resulted were quickly translated into the USA Patriot Act, which gave DC wonderful new powers to police and subdue its citizens, as well as other Federal power grabs, including the Prescription Drug Plan. And Bush came dangerously close to ramming through his beloved amnesty for illegal aliens.
As Steve Walt has warned, the neocon-liberal alliance is powerful. But this latest poll shouts loud and clear that more Americans have seen that that power is based on pure fraud. The party is just about over. Good riddance.
Brock Townsend on 23 Mar 2011 at 8:06 pm #
As I remember, Rasmussen had approval at 37%,
HarrisonBergeron2 on 23 Mar 2011 at 9:05 pm #
Brock Townsend,
Americans didn’t want to get involved in this mess, but once again, our rulers deemed otherwise. The piddling budget cuts the Republicans made will easily be wiped out by this idiotic adventure.
Kirt Higdon on 24 Mar 2011 at 12:40 am #
There has been some rally round effect although not nearly as much as usual. This could be because people are finally getting tired of all the crying wolf or because the rulers have become overly complacent and skipped the usual hysteria of “another Hitler” propaganda build-up. Or the rulers may also think that they no longer need such a rally effect. As long as the voters make no move to punish intervention, who needs their approval ot it? Better if they take little notice of it at all. With no draft and US wars increasingly waged by machines rather than humans, the warlords can be flippantly casual about it.