Free Republic

WASHINGTON, June 13 — As the war in Iraq continues for a fourth year, the global image of America has slipped further, even among people in some countries closely allied with the United States, a new opinion poll has found. Favorable views of the United States dropped sharply over the past year in Spain, where only 23 percent said they had a positive opinion, down from 41 percent last year, according to the survey. It was done in 15 nations, including the United States, this spring by the Washington-based Pew Research Center. Other countries where positive views dropped significantly include...

About 65% of US residents support the Supreme Court's decision in... Roe v. Wade -- the 1973 decision in which the court struck down state bans on abortion -- but 73% support some restrictions on abortion rights, according to the results of a study released on Wednesday by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, the Long Island Newsday reports (Eisenberg, Long Island Newsday, 8/4). According to the study, which was based on the responses to a July 13-17 survey of 1,502 U.S. adults and a July 7-17 survey of 2,000 adults, 35% of respondents believe abortion...

Last week the Pew Research Center came out with a study of the American electorate that crystallized something I've been sensing for a long time: rich people are boring, but poor people are interesting. The Pew data demonstrated that people at the top of the income scale are divided into stable, polar camps. There are the educated-class liberals - antiwar, pro-choice, anti-tax cuts - who make up about 19 percent of the electorate, according to Pew. And there are business-class conservatives - pro-war, pro-life, pro-tax cut - who make up 11 percent of voters. These affluent people are pretty well...

President George W. Bush holds a slight edge over Senator John Kerry in the final days of Campaign 2004. The Pew Research Center's final pre-election poll of 1,925 likely voters, conducted Oct. 27-30, finds Bush with a three-point edge (48% to 45% for Kerry); Ralph Nader draws 1%, and 6% are undecided. The poll finds indications that turnout will be significantly higher than in the two previous presidential elections, especially among younger people. Yet Bush gets the boost Republican candidates typically receive when the sample is narrowed from the base of 2,408 registered voters to those most likely to vote....

Organization Will Rely More on Polls Than on Expert Opinions The Pew Charitable Trusts is getting into the think tank business. The group, which has become increasingly influential in public policy debates, will announce a major reorganization today that will bring seven of its public information projects under one roof and a new name: the Pew Research Center. The center will host various ongoing Pew projects examining, among other topics, the significance of the Internet, the role of religion in public life, the growing Hispanic population, the news media and the way in which the rest of the world views...

Growing gaps found from county to county in presidential race By Bill Bishop AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF Sunday, April 4, 2004 The assumption since the 2000 election has been that the United States is evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats. Nationally, this is still true. At the local level, however, that 50-50 split disappears. In its place is a country so out of balance, so politically divided, that there is little competition in presidential contests between the parties in most U.S. counties, according to an Austin American-Statesman study of election returns since 1948. American democracy is based on the continuous exchange of...

The percentage of Americans who say Jews were responsible for Christ's death is rising according to a poll taken since the release of Mel Gibson's film "The Passion of the Christ." The poll released by the Pew Research Center in Washington is the first statistical evidence that the film's box-office success may be associated with an increase in anti-Jewish feeling, although social scientists cautioned that cause and effect are not clear. As Christians prepare to celebrate Easter week and the Jewish holiday of Passover also approaches, the poll could sharpen the focus on what some perceive as the film's anti-Semitism....

<p>This country is divided along lines over how we live, love, tax, vote -- and pray. And now that we are about to enter a political year in which we will help decide how we will live, love and tax, there's increasing attention on how we pray.</p>

Every great enterprise has a natural competitor. Hertz has Avis. Coke has Pepsi. GM has Ford. And the Gallup Poll has ... well, we’re not sure. But last week, a potential competitor staked its claim to being the rightful alternative to Gallup. Once, the Harris Poll constituted the requisite competition for Gallup in the field of public polling. But Lou Harris’s organization has gone headlong into Internet-based polling and lost its competitive edge. The major news-organization polls, such as those by The New York Times, offer an alternative perspective, but other media don’t like to give them widespread coverage, limiting...

THE MEDIA Americans want facts and flagsBy Mark Jurkowitz, Globe Staff, 7/14/2003 The American public may want its coverage of the war on terror straight down the middle, but it wants it delivered by people who share its patriotism. That's the finding of a new Pew Research Center survey of 1,200 Americans and their media habits and views. It comes amid an ongoing debate within journalism circles about whether embedded reporters, flag logos on TV screens, and the undiscovered weapons of mass destruction in Iraq suggest American news organizations were too jingoistic or complacent in their coverage of the war...