NEW YORK – Nearly one out of every five Democrats thinks the world will be better off if America loses the war in Iraq, according to the FOX News Opinion Dynamics Poll released Thursday.
The percentage of Democrats (19 percent) who believe that is nearly four times the number of Republicans (5 percent) who gave the same answer. Seven percent of independents said the world would be better off if the U.S. lost the war.
Click here for results of the poll.(pdf)
Overall, 11 percent of Americans think the world would be "better off" if the U.S. lost the war, and 73 percent disagree.
Opinion Dynamics Corp. conducted the national telephone poll of 900 registered voters for FOX News from Sept. 25 to Sept. 26. The poll has a 3-point margin of error.
Praying for Peace
Large majorities of Americans say they have said a prayer for soldiers serving in Iraq and for the war to end, while just over half say they have prayed for President Bush.
Most people — 87 percent — say they have said a prayer for the troops, and another 77 percent have prayed for the war in Iraq to end. A much smaller 54 percent majority of Americans say they have prayed for the president.
Among groups, Democrats (80 percent) and Republicans (76 percent) are about equally likely to say they have prayed for the war to end, and women (80 percent) are only slightly more likely than men (73 percent) to have done so.
Republicans (74 percent) are twice as likely as Democrats (37 percent) to have included the president in their prayers, while just over half (52 percent) of independents have prayed for Bush.
Appealing to a higher authority on behalf of the president does not appear to be influenced by gender, as about as many men (51 percent) as women (56 percent) say they have prayed for Bush.
"It’s interesting to see the parallel between overall voter sentiment toward the president and the relatively reduced likelihood to pray for him," says Ernest Paicopolos, principal of Opinion Dynamics. "It’s also striking to see a more than 30-point gap between prayer for the troops and prayer for the commander-in-chief of those same troops."
In general, more Republicans (64 percent) than Democrats (53 percent) and independents (48 percent) say they pray every day. Southerners (66 percent) are 20 percentage points more likely than those living in the Northeast (46 percent) to pray daily.
Overall, a 56 percent majority of Americans says they pray every day, including 64 percent of women and 47 percent of men.
Another 17 percent say they pray several times a week and 7 percent several times a month. Few Americans — 7 percent — say they never pray.
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