This explains why people still support Bush.

It also explains why people believe in Creationism or 9/11 conspiracy theories despite overwhelming evidence that debunks both.

We're all just political hacks.

Cheers!

Well before I spend a lot of time on the results of this study, I’d like to know a little more about who conducted the study and how it was conducted. As far as I know this could be just yet another piece of junk science served up by academia to be used as a convenient excuse by democrats. So instead of actually addressing any critiques or criticisms, they can just dismiss them all as partisanship.

So instead of actually addressing any critiques or criticisms, they can just dismiss them all as partisanship.

I agree. Let's get the backgrounds of those who did the study. There could be a partisan agenda here...

I took an entire class last year on Public Opinion, and we talked about almost this very topic. I find it interesting that both sides of the aisle react the same way. GOPers judge the economy under GOP presidents much better than under DFL presidents, regardless of how good the economy actually is. (For example, GOP rated the ecnomy under Clinton much worse than it really was, and the DFL rated the economy under Reagan much worse than it really was.) On the flipside, they rate the economies higher under candidates of their own party. I guess it goes the same for corruption, too! Makes perfect sense. Sometimes I think the parties band together a little too much, and they toss their morals and consciences to the wind a little too easily.

no more is this made more evident than on the pages of this blog everyday.

"Tom Hanks" is not politically neutral. He is a rabid Bush-biting liberal. Shame on this study! Has the whole world gone mad?

"no more is this made more evident than on the pages of this blog everyday."

Especially with all the liberal trolls here who couldn't care less about facts.

right-o KCJ, i'll just file that one under "grandiose command of hypocrisy"

happy 'mission accomplished day' btw.

"This explains why people still support Bush."

LiberalMind, you're little comment proves the results of the study are true. Your comment can equally be reversed, "This explains why people still support Democrats."

Instead of being a dumbass partisan, why don't you admit that you, yourself, are guilty of letting your liberal partisanship cloud facts.

Good, subtle eye-opener for your class...Lindsey. And I think most would agree, however, the economy and the GWOT--which 1/3 of the Dem presidential candidates believe exists--are two entirely different issues, politically. The diametric opposition by both parties leave the Democrats in a less than enviable position of defending their cowardess ways and Republicans are left to fight off the "warmonger" title. Personally, I'll suffer the latter.

BTW anyone that doesn't believe the GWOT exists, is smokin crack. Simply do the math and you'll see terrorist attacks are up, and not just in Iraq or Afghanistan, but worldwide.

Simply do the math and you'll see terrorist attacks are up, and not just in Iraq or Afghanistan, but worldwide.

Wait, I thought our glorious war was working like a charm?

And yes, the writers/faithful peanut gallery on this blog pretty much exemplify the findings of that study. No matter how much you put the facts in front of them, they just ignore them because they'd rather not believe them.

Simply do the math and you'll see terrorist attacks are up, and not just in Iraq or Afghanistan, but worldwide.

glad you pointed that out navy. thank you george bush - indeed your policies are working, just not for the right constituencies.

Glad to see the lobotomy hasn't been reversed con.

It's also just like a blinded Bush-hater to lay the blame at the feet of a sitting Republican President...one you hate.

Just to let you know that your process for digesting the GWOT is flawed.

"In 1999 (no GWB back then) the State Department said Colombia was one of four nations (along with Greece, Nigeria, and Yemen) seeing a sizable increase in terrorist attacks against Americans. In 1999 (oh..did I already mention, no GWb back then?) there were 91 attacks on U.S. targets, including bombings of an oil pipeline. That year, three Americans working with U'Wa Indians in northeast Colombia (Columbia? But I thought you kooks said there was no GWOT?) were abducted and killed.

FARC finances its operations partly through ransoms paid to kidnappers. There were 3,000 kidnappings reported in Colombia in 2000. Since 1990, 35,000 people have died in Colombia's civil war."

"Two Americans visiting the Bwindi Impenetrable National Park in Uganda were killed in 1999. They were part of a tour group captured by members of the Interahamwe, the Hutu force battling the Tutsi-led government in Rwanda. Americans were killed because the U.S. is perceived to be friendly to the present Tutsi regime.

In 1994, the then Hutu-led government of Rwanda launched a genocide that killed some 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus. In response, a Tutsi army toppled that government, prompting some two million Hutus, including the Interahamwe, to flee to neighboring countries. Sporadic fighting has continued ever since."

So what about Rwanda? Was that GW's fault also?

Hmmm.....conscriptor, I don't think GW was in office back then...moron.

conscriptor writes:
"glad you pointed that out navy. thank you george bush - indeed your policies are working, just not for the right constituencies."

And this is a perfect example. There are many different ways to interpret this information (terrorists are scared we'll kill them so they're striking out more, terrorists are scared they're going to lose Iraq so they're attacking more, etc) and conscriptor finds an interpretation that fits with his point of view. If he was not able to explain away the increase in terrorism in a way that fit with his point of view, his head would hurt, physically, because as this study says, the mind resists what doesn't fit.

This doesn't just work for politics. That is, if you go to a restaurant and the food's bad, then you go back and it's good, then you go back and it's bad again, you're mind decides to simplify the matter, that restaurant is bad. It wouldn't matter if you went there with friends ten times with friends in the next month, having 8 good meals and 2 bad meals, because your mind filters out what doesn't fit with the mental picture you've formed. That is, your mind doesn't like ambiguity so it forms a mental picture quickly, then it filters out what doesn't fit while focusing on the 2 meals in which your mental picture is confirmed.

This is simply how the mind works, which is the reason it's important to make an effort to keep an open mind (that politicians of both parties may be hypocrites, and McCain isn't any better in that regard than Kerry). And it also gives lie to the idea that evolutionists opposed to the teaching of intelligent design or other alternatives regarding origin are not as rigid because they're not religious. That is, the mind is just as good at filtering out what doesn't fit with someone who's afraid of a religion as it is at filtering out what doesn't fit with someone who's afraid of a political party.

In truth, there is information to support almost any idea or identification with any group. And my frustration with the anti-religious is that they won't even consider the research which says whether or not we can actually prove a higher power's existence, belief in a higher power correlates with happier people. There is evidence to support it, and there's evidence to support the athiest, so why don't we recommend the belief in a higher power when we recommend diets and other healthy behaviors when they're supported by research?

Navydad,

What the balls are you talking about? The fact that terrorists attacks during the 1990s were not Bush's fault has no bearing on whether our foreign policy has been effective in reducing the growth of terrorist attacks since 9/11.

Also, trying to lump Colombia in the GWOT makes no sense. The GWOT is a euphemism for the war against Islamic radicalism. Until we understand that we need to persuade people to avoid Islamic fundamentalism, instead of blowing up every place that kills Americans (for whatever reason), we're going to lose the war.

Gar Wood

navydad,

" in December 2006, U.S. Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, as he prepared to end his tenure, expressed regret over the Bush Administration's use of the phrase "War on Terror," saying the phrase had created unattainable expectations and that "it's not a war on terror. Terror is a weapon of choice for extremists who are trying to destabilize regimes and impose their — in the hands of a small group of clerics — their dark vision on all the people that they can control."

Maybe you didn't get the memo or Rumsfeld is smoking crack!

This study is interesting but nothing new. Hypocrisy is bad but it does not affect the substance of one's argument. For example, I say "Wow, Scooter Libby really should not have lied under oath." And then someone responds by saying "B-b-b-but Clinton did the same thing. Why didn't you say anything back then? LIBERAL BIAS!" Who knows what the hell I said back then? Whatever happened with Clinton has no effect on the fact that Scooter Libby shouldn't lie under oath. The same goes for the reverse...Tom Delay's indictment does not diminish whatever is in Caucus of Corruption. Anyway...my two cents.

rwanda navy? RWANDA? let me try to trace the dots here. WTF are you talking about?

please don't disingenuously try to muddy the waters by bringing up decade-old isolated incidents that have ZERO bearing on the events that have spawned over 14,000 attacks in 2006 alone. that you are blaming clinton for the rise in terror attacks today is so patently ridiculous, i'd venture to guess you'd be laughed right of a second grade current events class.

and you call me a moron. some people are fairly intelligent around here, and then you have dolts who can't construct a simple debate response without leaving the impression of tragic incoherence.

Settle down now gar!

"It is the eradication of a mind-set that is the objective, not specific groups."

"What the balls are you talking about? The fact that terrorists attacks during the 1990s were not Bush's fault has no bearing on whether our foreign policy has been effective in reducing the growth of terrorist attacks since 9/11."

Really look at what you've said here and you may want to retract the statement. Because you really don't get it.

The growth of terrorist attacks have increased, yes, but "why" is the question and for you to insist that the sleeping dog would not have bit when woken is a bit naive. Eventually, someone would have been bitten and if not us, then who?

Additionally, the naivete by the anti-war crowd is disingenuous to say the least. Especially when you have 1/3 of your presidential candidates that agree that the GOWT exists and the other 66% disagree. So, which percentage is correct gar. Is it the 33% or the 66%. You know damn well that terrorist activities would not have stopped if we hadn't taken the fight to them first.

The GWOT is exactly that...a Global War on Terror, and for anyone to think for a second that this GWOT does not include "all terrorist activities" they're only fooling themselves. I guess you've been fooled.

If you and your ilk prefer to think of "it" as only a war between radical Islam and the west....you're wrong and you'll ultimately lose the debate, or your life which ever comes first.

Past administrations--including GW's Dad--are all guilty of "not doing enough" and for the left to cherry-pick which terrorist act/group necessitates the greater importance, is like saying that Al Qaeda wasn't in Iraq pre-invaison....it's political blindness.

No con, what I'm trying to say is that terrorists have been lurking in the shadows for decades and that our actions to confront them are justified. Conversely, the left believes the actions were not justified and left untouched, they'd simply go away. Rwanda is a prime example of our "do nothing" policies in the past and the instant a Republican president finally takes action, your pathetic party runs and hides.

An argument I'm sure we'll have for many years but both parties were remiss in their duties to the free world.

BTW, you really are a moron con, and I'll need to lump Garwood in on the name calling. Neither of you seem to understand or care to understand the history leading up to the present GWOT and if you did, you'd recognoize the significance of our actions. It appears that both of you are near-sighted.

The Oklahoma City bombing, the Columbine High school shootings, and most recently the Virginia Tech shootings were all “terrorist attacks” committed against Americans.
No clear thinking individual would ever consider using the military to fight this WOT.
Yet, it makes perfect sense to you to use the military to fight the WOT overseas.

"What the balls are you talking about? The fact that terrorists attacks during the 1990s were not Bush's fault has no bearing on whether our foreign policy has been effective in reducing the growth of terrorist attacks since 9/11."

So Gar, if a Dem wins the WH in '08 and he/she/it pulls out of the ME, and we get hit again on the home front, will it be GW's (I'll assume that you'll say yes) fault or the foreign policies of the incoming administration? You can't have it both ways.

Your rationale is mind-boggling and evades the truth.

mary m

Go home from your pre-school, have a granola bar, help mommy wax her mustache and get a koolaid enema.

WTF are you saying? These were all mentally insane people that committed insanely destructive acts and two of the three could possibly have been prevented.

As far as the GWOT goes, yeah right, try to police Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan...good luck with a Crown Vic and a swat team.

Geez lefties, if mary m is indicative of the level of intellect in your party.....!

"So Gar, if a Dem wins the WH in '08 and he/she/it pulls out of the ME, and we get hit again on the home front, will it be GW's (I'll assume that you'll say yes) fault or the foreign policies of the incoming administration? You can't have it both ways."

Navydad,

It would totally depend on the specifics of the attack (whether the administration knew about it or should have known about it, and what they did in response). I, apparently unlike you, am not willing to lay blame based on whether a Democrat or a Republican is in the White House.

Extending the GWOT to Rwanda and Colombia is not reasonable simply because America should not be the world's police, unless it is in our national interest or requires an absolutely minimal effort (e.g. Kosovo). The war on terror is centered on Islamic fundamentalism. The big picture mentality of people like you, that see a pattern in every conflict, has proven to be a complete failure. The rise of Islamic fundamentalism and the increased number of terror attacks around the world prove that we need to change our approach, and that starts with withdrawing from Iraq and opening up dialogue with Iran and Syria.

Gar Wood

mary m is right. What if 9/11 had been prevented by the FBI / police work / whatever? How different would the landscape look? There would have been no national appetite to dislodge Saddam, that's for damn sure.

William F. Buckley Jr. admits the Iraq war is a lost cause. If even that diehard deserts the "conservative" cause, what chance do the rest of you nuts left clinging to the Bush have?

OK Gar, good enough. If this is your theory of the GWOT..so be it, and there's no use arguing cause I won't change your mind nor do I care to. However, have you ever heard of MS 13?

Here's a tip: "Mara Salvatrucha 13 (MS-13) is unfortunately becoming everybody’s problem. This plague that came to Long Island (and America in general) from El Salvador by way of the streets of Los Angeles follows the same migratory patterns as the Salvadoran immigrant community that it preys upon, fanning out across the United States from ethnic enclaves in California."

Now, I'm gonna hear WTF navydad are you talking about? But just STFU and read.

There are parallels between the MS-13 mentality and other terrorist groups worldwide. For example: MS-13 has grown rapidly and has put down roots in cities in America where they know they'll have save haven. They then organize--like mafia families--by moving into a community and announce its presence with violence.

Sound familiar? Because, although the radical Islamic extremists use Allah to defend their actions, they continue to operate in a similar fashion. Move in to a community, intimidate and threaten violence and take over.

Hmmm... the Taliban and Al Qaeda have operated the same for over a decade. As did the Abu Sayyaf Group in the Phillipines, Al Qaeda in the Sudan, Hezbollah and Hamas in Lebannon and...

"The National Islamic Front, the strict Islamist party that governs much of Sudan, does not consider any of these groups terrorist organizations."

This tells a different story garwood. A story that should put us and the free world on the offensive, not the defensive.

Yeno2, mary m, and the other kook libs that come here.

I thank God you're on the left side of the aisle!!

Thank you God!

These two are living proof that God did not create all humans equal.

Many on the left, to be sure, are unswayed by facts that challenge what they want to believe.

But for Mark Noonan, certainly one of the most partisan people in the blogosphere, to post this is laughable. There are countless facts regarding the war, corruption, etc. that Mark refuses to acknowledge because he is blindly loyal to Bush and Co. And this blog, as with others, doesn't help anything in that regard. When challenged on his accuracy, he will ignore the question or delete the post to protect himself. There's no standard of truth at all. Someone challenges a conservative, they are dismissed as a moonbat or called a traitor. No debate. Nothing. Pitiful. Let's see how fast he deletes this post.

Simon and Garfunkel had this figured out 40 years ago, lol!

(from The Boxer)"A man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest."

Many on the left, to be sure, are unswayed by facts that challenge what they want to believe.

But for Mark Noonan, certainly one of the most partisan people in the blogosphere, to post this is laughable. There are countless facts regarding the war, corruption, etc. that Mark refuses to acknowledge because he is blindly loyal to Bush and Co. And this blog, as with others, doesn't help anything in that regard. When challenged on his accuracy, he will ignore the question or delete the post to protect himself. There's no standard of truth at all. Someone challenges a conservative, they are dismissed as a moonbat or called a traitor. No debate. Nothing. Pitiful. Let's see how fast he deletes this post.

"mary m is right. What if 9/11 had been prevented by the FBI / police work / whatever? How different would the landscape look? There would have been no national appetite to dislodge Saddam, that's for damn sure."

I have to second Navy on this one, WTF are you talking about? Regime change was the policy of the United States towards Iraq before Bush took office. Now, maybe you want to argue that Clinton was acting like a dictator without representing the true will of American people democratically, and that's your prerogative.

"No clear thinking individual would ever consider using the military to fight this WOT.
Yet, it makes perfect sense to you to use the military to fight the WOT overseas."

Mary,
We do use force to fight these people. The reason that the VTech shooter was a lone gunman and didn't join an organization devoted to the destruction of rich kids and Christians is that our FBI and NSA roots out these characters, using force. Do you really want to make the argument that we should stop using force to disband domestic terrorist organizations like the Klan, etc?

Back to the post's original point, this is confirmation of the conservative position on the war on terror. That is, when terrorists have fixed their mind to a certain belief system, that America and Israel are the world's problems and must be destroyed, they're not open to other points of view. It doesn't matter if it's Kerry or Madeleine Albright talking with NK or Iran, the greatest persuader would have no influence on the point of view of those who are rigid, such as terrorists who make up for their alienation from society by rigidly identifying with terrorist ideology, be it religious, patriotic, or otherwise.

When it comes to actually fighting terrorism, there's a discernable difference.

The GOP: GRRRR!!!
The Dems: Meooow!!!

You think we could go through six years of the Bush regime and not know this already? Come on!

ThELefTYFoOL

Strangely enough, this is one of the few times that the comment thread actually proves the post...

Normally I think that political polling is marginally useful at best, but this actually answers the question of "why" instead of "what." Also, it makes perfect sense... if you believe something strongly enough, you won't stop believing it no matter what evidence is presented to the contrary.

I try to be open minded, but even I have my lapses...

I find it not surprising that people on their respective sides are not swayed by facts. People are stubborn, and have already established their world views. It takes a lot of facts to change an overall world view.

Also see Confirmation bias: "Dr. Westen summarised the work: 'None of the circuits involved in conscious reasoning were particularly engaged. Essentially, it appears as if partisans twirl the cognitive kaleidoscope until they get the conclusions they want, and then they get massively reinforced for it, with the elimination of negative emotional states and activation of positive ones.... Everyone from executives and judges to scientists and politicians may reason to emotionally biased judgments when they have a vested interest in how to interpret 'the facts'.'"

Another kind of related phenomenon that one should be aware of when dismissing the perceived left wing bias of the MSM (or the perceived right wing bias of "Faux News") is: the Hostile media effect. "Instead, when viewing identical news clips, subjects differed along partisan lines on simple, objective criteria such as the number of references to a given subject. The research suggests the hostile media effect is not just a difference of opinion but a difference of perception."

Interesting stuff. No matter what side you're on you should turn a critical eye on yourself to make sure you're being objective with the facts. I know that over the last few years as I've really paid attention to this that I have discovered my side's politicians and my side's media to be just as obnoxious and loose with the facts as I used to only find the other side's politicians and media.