Muslims in U.S. optimistic about future, poll finds
Posted in Main Blog (All Posts) on August 3rd, 2011 4:35 am by HL
Muslims in U.S. optimistic about future, poll finds
Ten years after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Muslim Americans are more optimistic than other major faith groups about their future, even as they report greater discrimination and less confidence in the FBI and the U.S. military, a new poll has found.
In the report by Gallup, which measures American Muslims’ political, social and spiritual engagement, almost two in three Muslims said their standard of living is improving, up 18 percentage points from 2008 and higher than any other faith group surveyed. This is the same period that Muslim leaders say has been the most oppressive for Muslims in this country, with rhetoric against their faith group appearing to rise.
Erosion in the Rust Belt for President Obama?
New polling numbers out of Pennsylvania suggest that President Obama’s bid for a second term could be on somewhat shaky ground in the industrial midwest — aka the “Rust Belt” — as his support in the region has eroded in recent months.
In a Quinnipiac University poll conducted late last month, just 43 percent of Pennsylvania voters approved of the job Obama is doing in office while 54 percent disapproved.
In a head-to-head matchup, Obama and former Massachusetts governor and 2012 presidential candidate Mitt Romney are in a dead heat — 44 percent Romney, 42 percent Obama —, which is a significant change from a June Quinnipiac poll that showed the president leading Romney by seven points.
Freelance journalist scores coup with account of bin Laden raid
It’s a remarkable story about a remarkable episode. Three months after Navy SEALs raided Osama bin Laden’s hideout in Pakistan and killed the terrorist leader, the New Yorker magazine has a gripping account packed with new and compelling details.
The mission’s planners considered tunneling into the compound but abandoned the idea early on because of the high water table surrounding the area, writes Washington journalist Nicholas Schmidle in “Getting bin Laden.” President Obama and his advisers never saw what happened inside the house in which bin Laden was killed; the only live feed of the raid was from a drone circling overhead. Afterward, Obama’s chief counterterrorism adviser, John O. Brennan, offered bin Laden’s body to the government of Saudi Arabia for burial; he was rebuffed, and the body was dumped into the Arabian Sea.
Congress heads home without extending FAA funding
A last-minute Obama administration effort to get the Senate to accept a funding extension that would have returned 4,000 Federal Aviation Administration employees and about 70,000 others to work failed Tuesday as Congress headed home until September.
With House members already departed and senators packing their bags for the summer recess, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood pressed hard in a final round of meetings and calls with Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) and other key senators.
LaHood implored them to accept a funding extension sent over by the House that contained provisions some senators found unpalatable, but he told them it was the only avenue left that would return people to work and avert the lost of $1.2 billion in ticket tax revenue.
