Posted on 07/12/2004 7:33:16 PM PDT by Former Military Chick
San Antonio Express-News July 9, 2004
Military Vote Gap Might Be Closing
By Peggy Fikac, Chief, Express-News Austin Bureau
AUSTIN — Faced with the possibility of being recalled to Iraq, Capt. David Harris of the U.S. Army Reserve said he's ready to "walk away from it" after a dozen years in the military.
But that doesn't stop the Democrat from citing his military experience to bolster his call for President Bush's ouster.
"My resignation's already typed up. ... It's hard. I love what I do. I love my country," Harris, of Arlington, said at a news conference this week on the Texas Capitol steps, where he urged voters to hand Bush an involuntary resignation at the polls in November.
A majority of the mostly male military tends to favor Republicans, as do male voters in general, experts said. But with U.S. policy in Iraq an issue in the race between Bush and John Kerry, veterans are a source of votes and testimonials for both sides.
Political scientist Peter Feaver of Duke University said factors including Kerry's military service and issues in Iraq have positioned the Democrat to snatch some of that support.
He said it's difficult to quantify, in part because there's no firm data from the 2000 presidential race to compare veterans' voting behavior.
"But I think it's reasonable to expect that Kerry is eating into the Bush advantage in this area," said Feaver, whose specialty is the politics of the military.
Rep. Frank Corte, a lieutenant colonel in the Marine Corps Reserve who most recently was on active duty in South Korea, said he "wholeheartedly" supports Bush.
"If anybody can handle the foreign matters ... it would be him," said Corte, a San Antonio Republican.
White House spokesman Taylor Gross said Bush retains military support.
"I think men and women who serve our nation serve proudly and they know that ours is a just and noble cause," he said.
A poll conducted April 17-29 for Duke found Bush with 57 percent support among veterans and active duty military personnel to 36 percent for Kerry, Feaver said.
Two months later, the gap apparently had narrowed.
A poll conducted June 18-28 for the university found veterans and military personnel divided 53 percent for Bush to 39 percent for Kerry.
Both polls surveyed 900 adults nationwide and had margins of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points, but the margins were higher for veterans and military, who made up only 17 percent of the samples.
Of interest, Feaver said, is a jump in veterans and military personnel who said they definitely supported Kerry, instead of just "leaning" toward him. That group grew from 24 percent in April to 35 percent in June.
"There hasn't been a sharp movement in overall numbers," Feaver said. "On the other hand, looking more closely at the numbers, it looks like there's a hardening of the support Kerry already had among veterans."
But very few polls count veterans as a separate category to compare to overall results.
A CBS News poll conducted May 20-23 found veterans favoring Bush over Kerry by 54 percent to 40 percent, with the overall sample favoring Kerry over Bush by 49 percent to 41 percent.
Michael Dimock, research director of the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, said a Pew survey conducted June 3-13 found 50 percent support for Bush and 45 percent for Kerry among male veterans and non-veterans alike.
"We haven't found military service to be a real factor in shaping people's views that much," Dimock said.
Feaver said he doubts veterans vote as a bloc, because they come from "a wide swath of America and, secondly, they haven't been mobilized in the same way that other groups have been mobilized."
Still, both sides reach for those voters.
"The veterans are 26.5 million people, which is a sizeable chunk of the voting population, so it's not inconsequential," Feaver said. "And especially in a close election, every subgroup is important."
Seeking to mobilize public opinion against the war from the Capitol steps, Harris was joined by retired Lt. Col. James C. Berbiglia of Helotes, a Vietnam veteran who served as a military chaplain, and Marine Lance Cpl. Michael Hoffman, a veteran of Iraq.
The news conference was sponsored by Veterans for Peace, Vietnam Veterans Against the War and Military Families Speak Out.
"Peace is what makes sense," Berbiglia said. "Not the deaths of young American girls and boys."
Corte said Americans get to question the commander-in-chief.
"But I think it's also counterproductive as a veteran to go out and do something and then say, 'I didn't really support what I did.'"
David Cohen of the Austin Bureau and News Researchers Julie Domel and Kevin Frazzini contributed to this report.
The media is in full tilt mode trying to paint GW as disliked by the troops. They're shaking the tree to get every Democrat in the service on the record as opposing Bush. They then act as if the anti-Bush people in the military were ardent Bush supporters in 2000.
Hard duty separates the sheep from the goats.
Veterans for Peace and Vietnam Veterans Against the War are phony organizations. Military Families speak out probably just another front org. with one military mother and a hundred young single college socialsts.
"The media is in full tilt mode trying to paint GW as disliked by the troops. They're shaking the tree to get every Democrat in the service on the record as opposing Bush. They then act as if the anti-Bush people in the military were ardent Bush supporters in 2000."
What you said!
Three green suitcase...
"But I think it's also counterproductive as a veteran to go out and do something and then say, 'I didn't really support what I did.'"
He was for the war before he was against it.
Gotta love an article where it's conceded that the entire premise is "hard to quantify."
The media is truly pathetic. I bet you no more than 5 people showed up at this news conference in Austin.
No officer with a shred of dignity, decency, and love of country would still be a Democrat. Those days are long past. The Democrat Party today will sell out America in a heartbeat. There were 8 years of the Clintons where we were infiltrated and some sold their souls to get ahead.
All B/S the gap is as wide as ever.
Absolute bullsh*t. The military is 70% plus for Bush. So, keep on spinning you liberal ahole jerks in the media. Only one outta a hundred of you have ever even been near the military.
Dream on, you deluded 'rats!
The soldier that Kerry backshot should get the silver star. After all he took a hit from a 50 calibur round and he was still fighting according to our future fearless leader.
Does anyone know what Kerry's SAT scores were. I understand that they were abysmal.
'Fahrenheit 9/11' Has Recruited Unlikely Audience: U.S. Soldiers
So 1 Dem (who won't stick to his duty and do his job...guess it was easier to just take the money and not be deployed) compared to 100s of Republicans for each dem in the military means the gap is closing????
The media is desparate.
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