Only 26% Think U.S. Will Be Safer At Year’s End

Wednesday, January 07, 2009

Just 26% of Americans think the United States will be safer at the end of Barack Obama's first year in office than it is today, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.

Forty-two percent (42%) say the country will not be safer at the end of 2009, and one-third of Americans (33%) aren’t sure.

Many Americans hope that Obama’s presidency will help calm much of the anti-Americanism that has arisen worldwide as a result of the Iraq war. But these new findings suggest that Americans are still worried about threats from abroad.

While Russia was the first country to challenge President-elect Obama right after his election with a threat to deploy new missiles facing Europe, most U.S. voters expect terrorists or Iran to provide the new president’s first international test in office.

However, 44% of Americans now say it is likely that Russia will provoke a major international challenge to the United States over the next year, including 16% who say it is Very Likely. Seven percent (7%) say a challenge from Russia is not at all likely.

Fifty-one percent (51%) of voters rate Obama good or excellent on national security issues while 22% view his performance as poor.

But most Americans say it is at least somewhat likely that U.S. combat troops will still be in Iraq at the end of Obama’s first term in office. Seventy-one percent (71%) say Obama is likely to send more troops to Afghanistan in his first year in the White House.

In mid-December, President Bush gave a speech in defense of his national security record as president, but at that time just 46% of voters said the nation was safer than it was before the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

Forty-three percent (43%) of Democrats believe the United States will be safer at the end of this year that it is today, while 20% disagree and 37% are undecided. Republicans think just the opposite, with 67% saying America will not be safer and just eight percent (8%) disagreeing. Twenty-four percent (24%) of Republicans are unsure.

Adults not affiliated with either party by a two-to-one margin say the United States will not be safer, but 37% are not sure.

Americans who earn more than $60,000 per year are more skeptical about a safer nation than lower income Americans.

In a survey just after the Thanksgiving week terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India, 59% of voters said a similar attack in the United States is at least somewhat likely in the next year. Twenty-three percent (23%) said it is Very Likely.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_ ... year_s_end