By
Ed Kilgore,
political columnist for Intelligencer since 2015
It’s now very clear that Donald Trump’s war of choice in Iran is not going to be some temporary military adventure or a “watch and learn” demonstration of American power but a dubious exercise with no clear purpose and no definitive end in sight. As the war drags on, a serious escalation is on the table and gasoline prices are spiking once again. So it seems inevitable that the conflict will affect the midterm elections, at least on the margins. And as the polls show, that’s bad news for Republicans.
To be clear, the war has never had anything like majority support. Usually, in the wake of the onset of hostilities, particularly if they seem to be going well for the United States (as they tend to at first), there’s a spike of rally-round-the-flag sentiment. Not this time. Looking at Silver Bulletin’s polling averages on support for this war, it peaked at 40.5 percent on March 15. It’s now at 33.8 percent with disapproval at a near high of 58.3 percent. Generally speaking, opposition to the war has never flagged. It did abate a bit when shooting temporarily stopped and petroleum markets reacted positively, but the overall trajectory remains negative.
