UPDATED: Iraqis and Americans agree: get out within a year, even if it means more violence
February 27, 2007News & Politics
For the first time in a Washington Post-ABC News poll, a majority of Americans want a timetable for pulling our troops out of Iraq...
The Post-ABC poll found that 53 percent of Americans favored setting a deadline for troop withdrawals. Among those who favored a deadline, 24 percent said they would like to see U.S. forces out within six months and 21 percent called for the withdrawals to be completed within a year. The rest of those who supported a timetable said they do not support withdrawing all troops until at least a year from now. [...]
Some Democrats have called for cutting off money for the war. The Post-ABC News poll found that 46 percent of Americans supported restricting funding while a bare majority, 51 percent, opposed doing so.
There was clear support, however, for the kinds of conditions proposed by Rep. John P. Murtha (D-Pa.), who wants to establish requirements for the training and resting of military units that would have the effect of limiting the number of troops available to send to Iraq.
Murtha's plan has drawn fire in the House, including from some of his Democratic colleagues, after it was announced on a liberal Web site. The Post-ABC News poll, which did not associate the plan with Murtha, found that 58 percent of Americans said they support such new rules. Even some Americans, 21 percent, who supported the president's troop increase said they would favor rules for training and resting troops. [...]I should note here, as others have, that the WaPo has been editorializing against Murtha's plan. They first ran this article without mentioning that a majority of Americans favor the approach, and only added the preceding graph after bloggers called them on it.
