Yep. Opinion polls aren't a great tool for everything. Some views shift with the wind. Others have staying power, like the desire of many Moslems to inflict sharia on people everywhere. The Gallup numbers recording Moslem opinions are the result of polling covering years and thousands of people.
"The book draws on a mammoth, six-year effort to poll and interview tens of thousands of Muslims in more than 35 countries with Muslim majorities or substantial minorities. The polling sample, Esposito and Mogahed claim, represents "more than 90 percent of the world's 1.3 billion Muslims." To back up the claim, the book bears the name of the gold-standard of American polling firms, Gallup. The answer to that all-important question, the authors say, is 7 percent. That is the percentage of Muslims who told pollsters that the attacks of September 11, 2001, were "completely" justified and who said they view the United States unfavorably--the double-barreled litmus test devised by Esposito and Mogahed to determine who is radical and who isn't." http://www.weeklystandard.com/article/16160
So much for that. Americans, meanwhile, were actively misled by the US government about who conspired to bring down the towers. Somehow they implied collusion between groups that were obvious enemies. Once the Iraq war started going badly, Americans turned on their government, which is, of course, where one is looking for the quality in a people of being resolute.
Bush had poor judgement, but at least he was steadfast. He ended his oversight of the Iraq war better than he began it.
In the choice between evils that were on offer, how folks would prefer pre-civil war Assad and Saddam over AQ and IS.
Another interesting observation about Moslem views of 9/11:
"A very large Pew poll of Muslim world opinion in 2006 reported the following:
"In one of the survey’s most striking findings, majorities in Indonesia, Turkey, Egypt, and Jordan say that they do not believe groups of Arabs carried out the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The percentage of Turks expressing disbelief that Arabs carried out the 9/11 attacks has increased from 43% in a 2002 Gallup survey to 59% currently. And this attitude is not limited to Muslims in predominantly Muslim countries—56% of British Muslims say they do not believe Arabs carried out the terror attacks against the U.S., compared with just 17% who do.""
http://martinkramer.org/sandbox/2008/04/dr-esposito-and-the-seven-percent-solution/
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