The Numbers
A Run at the Latest Data from ABC's Poobah of Polling, Gary Langer
Gary Langer is director of polling at ABC News, where he's covered the beat of public opinion for nearly 20 years - conducting and analyzing ABC News polls, evaluating data from other sources and setting the news division's standards for poll reporting. Langer is a two-time Emmy award winner, both for ABC's reporting of public opinion polls in Iraq.
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The View from Tbilisi
August 18, 2008 8:30 PM
A poll done in Tbilisi and Moscow finds sharp differences in the two capitals over their conflict – but a substantial sense in Tbilisi that the Georgian government shares some responsibility for it.
The poll, by the London polling firm ORB, was done by telephone last Tuesday through Friday in Tbilisi (home to about a quarter of Georgians) and Moscow (where about 9 percent of Russians live). It’s not reliably representative of the national populations of these countries, just those two cities.
With that proviso, the survey finds that barely over half of Tbilisi residents, 51 percent, say Russia is mostly responsible for the conflict, but nearly as many either say both countries are equally responsible (41 percent) or blame their own country (6 percent). In Moscow, by contrast, 67 percent blame Georgia.
Nonetheless 57 percent in Tbilisi support Georgia’s initial use of force in South Ossetia (though just 21 percent support it strongly) and 69 percent approve of Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili’s job performance. (More in Moscow approve of President Dimitry Medvedev, 83 percent, and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, 91 percent.)
Tbilisi residents, further, aren’t overwhelmingly behind South Ossetia being “fully part of Georgia.” Forty-five percent want that outcome, but 29 percent instead say the disputed region should remain part of Georgia but with some autonomy.
In Moscow, 80 percent say South Ossetia should become independent (46 percent) or unite with Russia (34 percent). (The questions aren’t comparable because Tbilisians weren’t offered the “unite with Russia” option.) Results were about the same for Abkhazia.
Seventy-nine percent in Tbilisi have an unfavorable opinion of Russia, hardly a surprise. That compares with overwhelmingly favorable views of the European Union (88 percent), NATO (86 percent) and the United States (also 86 percent). Eighty-nine percent in Tbilisi support its effort to become a full member of NATO; just 5 percent in Moscow agree.
Half in Tbilisi believe Moscow moved in because it’s angry about Georgia trying to join NATO; another 25 percent think it’s Russian expansionism. Six in 10 in Moscow, by contrast, think Russia is “protecting the residents of South Ossetia.”
Tbilisi residents are far more apt to support the involvement of outside players: NATO, 89 percent (vs. support for NATO involvement by 14 percent in Moscow) and the United States, 92 percent (vs. 8 percent in Moscow). There’s less overwhelming objection in Moscow to the involvement of the EU (93 percent in Tbilisi, 44 percent in Moscow) or the United Nations (92 percent in Tbilisi, 50 percent in Moscow).
ORB surveyed 500 adults in Tbilisi and 495 in Moscow through its affiliates GORBI and Russian Research.
August 18, 2008 | Permalink | User Comments (7)
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could not some of the poll be effected by fear in the Moscow poll?
but I wonder if john mcCain would say it had anything to fdo with georgia...or should I say his lead foreign policy guy...Sceunneman...you know the one...the guy who use to lobby for that governemtn of Georgia?
Posted by: dl | Aug 18, 2008 6:28:26 PM
What would the same poll in the US show? We've had a pretty steady flow of anti-Russian propaganda, I suspect that we would be more pro-Georgian than Georgia is.
Posted by: JR | Aug 18, 2008 6:28:31 PM
"the guy who use to lobby for that governemtn of Georgia?"
still does.
Posted by: JR | Aug 18, 2008 6:30:00 PM
I was wondering when we would hear the other side of the story.
Posted by: Ben Straub | Aug 18, 2008 8:09:26 PM
K thanks
Posted by: Ben Straub | Aug 18, 2008 8:21:31 PM
Canadian Reader's Comment on The US Missile Defense Shield located in Poland directed against Russia "The appropriate parallel would be for Canada to offer to have Russian missiles located in Canada to protect everyone from any possible Rogue States. We have one next door."
Posted by: Pickuls | Aug 20, 2008 2:20:56 AM
During the night of August 7, coinciding with the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics, Georgia's president Saakashvili ordered an all-out military attack on Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia.
The aerial bombardments and ground attacks were largely directed against civilian targets including residential areas, hospitals and the university. The provincial capital Tskhinvali was destroyed. The attacks resulted in some 1500 civilian deaths, according to both Russian and Western sources. "The air and artillery bombardment left the provincial capital without water, food, electricity and gas. Horrified civilians crawled out of the basements into the streets as fighting eased, looking for supplies." (AP, August 9, 2008). According to reports, some 34,000 people from South Ossetia have fled to Russia. (Deseret Morning News, Salt Lake City, August 10, 2008)
Posted by: jc | Aug 20, 2008 2:58:01 AM
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