Three in Five Americans Give President Obama Negative Ratings on Afghanistan

/PRNewswire/ -- With the recent change in military leadership for Afghanistan there is a hope by the White House and others that this will help to change the direction of the war as well as attitudes toward it. President Obama probably also hopes this helps change opinions on his handling of the situation in Afghanistan, as just three in ten (29%) have a positive opinion of how he is handling it, while six in ten (59%) have a negative opinion. In January, almost four in ten Americans (38%) had a positive opinion of President Obama's handling of the war while 53% had a negative opinion.

These are some of the results of The Harris Poll of 2,227 adults surveyed online between June 14 and 21, 2010 by Harris Interactive.

The general sense toward the situation in Afghanistan is also negative. Just one in ten Americans (10%) think the situation in Afghanistan is getting better, almost the same as in January (11%). Three in ten (29%) believe the situation is getting worse while half of Americans (49%) say there is no real change. And President Obama cannot count on people within his own party to support him on this issue. Half of both Republicans (51%) and Democrats (50%) say there is no real change in Afghanistan.

There is also a lack of confidence in long term success. Over half of Americans (55%) are not confident that U.S. policies in Afghanistan will be successful. One-third (34%) are not sure if these policies will be successful and only 12% are confident in the success in Afghanistan. Democrats are slightly more confident than both Republicans and Independents (17% vs. 10% and 8%).

Bringing troops home from Afghanistan

The timeframe for when U.S. troops should come home has been debated since American forces were first sent to Afghanistan. After the surge of troops was implemented, President Obama announced that some of those troops would begin coming home in the summer of 2011. American opinion is divided on this timetable. One-quarter of U.S. adults (25%) say all U.S. troops should come home now while 22% believe there should be no timetable for troops to come home. One in five Americans (19%) believe this is a good timetable for U.S. troops to come home, while 17% say some troops should come home before 2011 and 14% are not sure.

There is a slight shift of opinion in this since the beginning of the year. In January, over one-quarter of Americans (27%) believed there should be no timetable for U.S. troops to come home, while less than one-in five (18%) believed all U.S. troops should come home now.

There is also a large difference of opinion by political party. More than two in five Republicans (43%) believe there should be no timetable for troops to come home while 17% believe all troops should come home now and 9% believe summer of 2011 is a good timetable. One-third of Democrats (33%) believe summer of 2011 is a good timetable for troops to come home while one-quarter (26%) say all U.S. troops should come home now and 7% say there should not be a timetable.

Osama bin Laden

One view that hasn't changed so far this year is the belief that Osama bin Laden is still alive. Almost four in five Americans (78%) believe he is still alive with almost one-quarter (23%) saying he is definitely alive and 55% saying his is probably alive. The same number of Americans believed this in January of this year. Just one in ten U.S. adults (9%) say he is not alive while 13% are not at all sure.

So What?

The situation in Afghanistan is one other issue the Obama White House has on its plate for the unforeseeable future. When the focus shifted to Iraq, a lot of attention slipped away from Afghanistan and it became the "forgotten" war. With the situation in Afghanistan becoming more unstable, attention is now refocused there and Americans are going to expect something to change. If not, the same negative feelings they once felt towards Iraq will continue to emerge, and deepen, towards Afghanistan.

TABLE 1
                   PRESIDENT OBAMA AND AFGHANISTAN
  "Now turning to Afghanistan, overall, how would you rate the job
   President Obama has done in handling Afghanistan over the last
                          several months?"

  Base: All Adults

                     April  Sept  Nov   Jan   June       Political Party
                      2009  2009  2009  2010   2010
                                                     Rep.    Dem.   Ind.
                       %      %     %     %     %      %       %      %
  Positive (NET)        51    36    31    38     29     12      47     27
    Excellent           10     5     4     7      3      1       7      2
    Pretty Good         41    32    26    30     26     11      40     25
  Negative (NET)        36    54    60    53     59     79      41     62
    Only fair           26    35    33    31     33     36      32     32
    Poor                10    19    27    22     26     43       9     31
  Not sure              13    10     9     9     12      8      12     11


  Note: Percentages may not add up exactly to 100% due to rounding.



                                  TABLE 2
                         SITUATION IN AFGHANISTAN
          "Do you think that the situation in Afghanistan is...?"

  Base: All Adults

                 July May August April Sept Nov Jan June    Political Party
                 2005 2007 2008 2009 2009 2009 2010 2010
                                                         Rep.   Dem.   Ind.
                   %    %    %     %     %    %   %   %    %      %      %
  Getting better   17   12    11    12    8    6  11   10    9     11     11
  Getting worse    30   26    37    28   42   47  32   29   34     24     34
  No real change   37   36    35    45   41   39  46   49   51     50     45
  Not sure         16   26    18    16    9    8  11   12    7     14     10


  Note: Percentages may not add up exactly to 100% due to rounding.





                                TABLE 3
                 CONFIDENCE IN POLICIES IN AFGHANISTAN
   "How confident are you that U.S. policies in Afghanistan will be
                             successful?"

  Base: All Adults

             July May  August April Sept Nov  Jan  June     Political Party
             2005 2007   2008  2009 2009 2009 2010  2010
                                                         Rep.   Dem.   Ind.
               %    %     %     %     %    %   %     %     %      %      %
  Confident    25   22     17    27   14   12   15    12    10     17      8
  Not
   confident   45   41     54    40   55   61   53    55    65     44     61
  Not sure     30   37     29    33   31   28   32    34    26     39     31


  Note: Percentages may not add up exactly to 100% due to rounding.



                                  TABLE 4
                         TROOP SURGE IN AFGHANISTAN
   "President Obama recently announced that some of the troops that were
       part of the surge in Afghanistan will start coming home in the
                     summer of 2011. Do you think...?"

  Base: All Adults

                                              Jan June      Political Party
                                              2010 2010
                                                        Rep.    Dem.   Ind.
                                               %    %     %       %      %
  All U.S. troops should come home now.         18   25    17      26     31
  There should be no timetable for U.S.
   troops to come home.                         27   22    43       7     24
  This is a good timetable for U.S. troops to
   come home.                                   20   19     9      33     15
  Some U.S. troops should come home before
   2011.                                        18   17    15      21     14
  Other                                          4    3     4       1      3
  Not sure                                      12   14    12      12     13


  Note: Percentages may not add up exactly to 100% due to rounding



                          TABLE 5
                      OSAMA BIN LADEN
  "Do you believe that Osama Bin Laden is still alive?"

  Base: All Adults

                              Jan   June      Political Party
                              2010   2010
                                           Rep.   Dem.   Ind.
                                %     %      %      %      %
  Alive (NET)                   78     78     86     77     75
       He's definitely alive    23     23     22     24     22
       He's probably alive      55     55     64     53     54
  Not alive (NET)               10      9      7      9     11
       He's probably not
        alive                    8      8      6      8     10
       He's definitely not
        alive                    2      1      1      1      1
  Not at all sure               12     13      7     14     14


  Note: Percentages may not add up exactly to 100% due to rounding.

Methodology

This Harris Poll was conducted online within the United States between June 14 and 21, 2010 among 2,227 adults (aged 18 and over). Figures for age, sex, race/ethnicity, education, region and household income were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their actual proportions in the population. Propensity score weighting was also used to adjust for respondents' propensity to be online.

All sample surveys and polls, whether or not they use probability sampling, are subject to multiple sources of error which are most often not possible to quantify or estimate, including sampling error, coverage error, error associated with nonresponse, error associated with question wording and response options, and post-survey weighting and adjustments. Therefore, Harris Interactive avoids the words "margin of error" as they are misleading. All that can be calculated are different possible sampling errors with different probabilities for pure, unweighted, random samples with 100% response rates. These are only theoretical because no published polls come close to this ideal.

Respondents for this survey were selected from among those who have agreed to participate in Harris Interactive surveys. The data have been weighted to reflect the composition of the adult population. Because the sample is based on those who agreed to participate in the Harris Interactive panel, no estimates of theoretical sampling error can be calculated.

These statements conform to the principles of disclosure of the National Council on Public Polls.

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Senator Collins to Oppose Treasury Secretary Nominee's Confirmation

/PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- U.S. Senator Susan Collins today announced that she will oppose the confirmation of Timothy Geithner, who was nominated to be U.S. Secretary of the Treasury. The Senate is expected to vote on the confirmation tonight circa 6:00 p.m.

Senator Collins placed this statement in the Senate Record:

Mr. President, I rise today to state my opposition to the confirmation of Timothy Geithner to be Treasury Secretary.

Our current economic crisis is, in part, a crisis of confidence. If we are to return to prosperity, the American people must have confidence in those who would chart our course. Mr. Gauthier's professional background and experience should inspire that confidence. They are overshadowed, however, by the personal issues regarding his own tax returns.

When these issues first arose, they were cited as examples of the baffling complexity of our tax code and of the need for reform. They were described by the nominee himself as "careless mistakes." As more details have emerged, it has become clear to me that this is not merely a matter of complexity leading to mistakes, but of inexcusable negligence.

Mr. Geithner failed to pay self-employment taxes while working for the International Monetary Fund. He failed to make these tax payments despite the fact that the IMF repeatedly reminded him of this obligation. He signed paperwork acknowledging this obligation. He received extra compensation that he acknowledged at the time was for the purpose of paying this obligation. Yet when he filed tax returns for the years he was employed at the IMF, he did not pay self-employment taxes.

After working for the IMF for three years, Mr. Geithner was audited by the Internal Revenue Service in 2006, which discovered that he had failed to pay his self employment taxes. Mr. Geithner was ordered to correct his tax returns for 2003 and 2004, and he paid the amount that he owed for those years.

But Mr. Geithner had made the same omission in 2001 and 2002, years that were outside the scope of the audit. Yet having been informed by the IRS of his omission for 2003 and 2004, Mr. Geithner took no action to correct the deficiency from 2001 and 2002 -- years for which the statute of limitations had already run. In fact, Mr. Geithner chose not to make the payments until he was being considered for this position at the end of 2008.

A similar failure to correct omissions when informed of them occurred when the accountant who prepared Mr. Geithner's tax returns in 2006 informed him that certain deductions Mr. Geithner had taken for three earlier years were not allowed. These deductions involved writing-off overnight camps as child care expenses. Mr. Geithner did not attempt to claim the deduction for 2006, but did not correct his returns for the previous years. And again, this deficiency was not addressed until late last year, when Mr. Geithner was being considered for this Cabinet position.

Mr. President, throughout the State of Maine and indeed throughout the nation, millions of hard-working Americans pay their taxes on time and in full. Our taxation system is essentially an honor system that depends on self-assessment and honesty. When taxpayers make mistakes, they are expected to correct them promptly and completely. How can we tell the taxpayers that they are expected to comply fully with our tax laws, when these laws have been treated so cavalierly by the person who would lead the Treasury Department and, ultimately, the Internal Revenue Service, when he was applying them to himself?

Therefore, Mr. President, I must oppose this nomination.

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