AP: State Department Poll - Iraqi Youth Want U.S. To Leave

[Hissyspit]

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/S/SURVEYING_IRAQ?SITE=FLTAM&SECTION=INTERNATIONAL

Poll: Iraqi Youth Want U.S. to Leave

By KATHERINE SHRADER
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Majorities of Iraqi youth in Arab regions of the country believe security would improve and violence decrease if the U.S.-led forces left immediately, according to a State Department poll that provides a window into the grim warnings provided to policymakers.

The survey - unclassified, but marked "For Official Government Use Only" - also finds that Iraqi leaders may face particular difficulty recruiting young Sunni Arabs to join the stumbling security forces. Strong majorities of 15- to 29-year-olds in two Arab Sunni areas - Mosul and Tikrit-Baquba - would oppose joining the Iraqi army or police.

The poll has its shortcomings; regional samples are small and the results do not say how many people refused to respond to questions. The private polling firm hired by the State Department also was not able to interview residents of al-Anbar, a Sunni-dominated province and an insurgent stronghold.

But the findings of the summer survey - circulated to policymakers last month and obtained by The Associated Press last week - nevertheless provide a solemn reminder of the difficulty that the U.S.-backed Iraqi government faces as it tries to add ethnic diversity to its security institutions.

[Hissyspit]

1. .

[sabra]

2. k & r

[acmavm]

3. Why is something not 'reality' or 'true' unless confirmed by a poll? Did

anyone really think the young people of Iraq wanted to live under a foreign occupation? Didn't the flying bombs and bullets tell anyone, even the dolts in Washington, pretty much how things stand?

[Cocoa]

4. polls are very important

without polls, people would just put their own opinions in the mouths of the Iraqis.

[acmavm]

5. A poll can say whatever you want it to say. Just study Gallup, Zogby,

whomever.

[Cocoa]

6. that's exaggerated

The RWers have an antagonistic stance toward the press, toward polls and toward science. None of those is perfect, and in fact they all have mechanisms to address bias. But the RWers sieze on the imperfections as proof they are useless.

Imagine a world where no one believed in the press, the polls, or science. Then all you'd have to go on, if you wanted to know what is happening in the world, what public opinion is, or how the world works, is the word of the opinionmakers. Which opinionmakers are heard in our society?

[rocktivity]

7. Just because there's a silly little civil war on? Slackers.

Maybe we can offer them citizenship in exchange for joining the U.S. military instead of the insurgency. Then afterwards, we really COULD deport the twelve million illegal ailens!

:eyes:
rocknation

[MonteSano]

8. k&r

[krispos42]

9. They've been telling us for years with the bullets and bombs

What makes anybody think this poll will sink into BushCo's brain anytime soon?

[arewenotdemo]

10. What? Sunni teenagers don't want to die for Bush's puppet government?

Slackers.