Public Opinion

At one of the innumerable news conferences during the Middle East peace conference in Madrid, an Arab journalist asked a question of a Jordanian official in Arabic. "Do you mind if we conduct this in English?" the Jordanian replied. The journalist paused, then rephrased the question in English so that a worldwide television audience could understand the answer.

Those who take polls say they capture public opinion at a given moment in time. But there is reason to doubt whether what they give us is reality at all. In fact, Americans hold inconsistent and often contradictory positions on public policy questions. Today, fewer than half of Americans can even name their representatives in Congress, with barely one in 10 able to say what policies and programs that person backs.

Cal State Northridge Athletic Director Bob Hiegert said Friday that he believes the Faculty Senate's request to shift funds from athletics to educational programs is inappropriate and contrary to public opinion. Hiegert was responding to a Faculty Senate vote Thursday to ask the CSUN Foundation to hold a public hearing to reconsider its decision to grant $4.

Antiwar activists marched through London on Saturday in a protest that was angrier but smaller than past demonstrations, while polls showed public opinion shifting to the government now that British troops are fighting and dying in Iraq. More than 100,000 marchers denounced the invasion of Iraq, which has claimed the lives of 14 British soldiers in two helicopter accidents.

And now for some good news. The economy looks great. The stock market is shrugging off the Asian flu. The crime rate is down. The price of oil is at a 25-year low. Most of the world is at peace. On top of all that, summer's here. So it should be no wonder that public opinion polls are finding Americans in an optimistic mood--more confident about the future, by some measures, than at any time in 30 years.

Syria, Israel's most formidable adversary and the gatekeeper of hard-line Arab politics, had figured to dominate the landscape at the Middle East peace conference. Instead, Syria proved to be a paper tiger, outmaneuvered by Israel in the theater of public opinion and helpless to control the Arabs' slow movement toward the peace table. As Arabs and Israelis sat down for their first face-to-face talks in 43 years of turbulent history, all the lessons of the new Middle East came sharply into play.

A majority of Americans favor setting a fixed timetable for bringing troops home from Iraq, and just 12% would support a plan to increase troop strength, an option under serious consideration by the military, a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has found. A month after a watershed election that switched control of Congress to the Democrats, respondents expressed low confidence in President Bush's ability to resolve the conflict in Iraq.

There are two Rodney G. King civil rights trials taking place at the Edward R. Roybal federal courthouse. One is being held in the stately eighth-floor courtroom of U.S. District Judge John G. Davies. This proceeding is governed by exacting rules of evidence designed to prohibit the admission of information that is irrelevant, hearsay or likely to unfairly inflame the passions of the jury.

Haltingly, after nine weeks of investigation and despite opinion polls showing him to be one of the nation's least popular figures, independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr is gaining traction. Starr at minimum has gathered circumstantial evidence to support allegations that President Clinton twice committed perjury in sworn testimony earlier this year: Audiotaped conversations and the testimony of several witnesses clash with Clinton's sworn denials that he had intimate contact with Monica S.

Religious institutions in this country that object to homosexuality have nothing to fear from the gay-rights movement. Freedom of religion constitutionally protects them from having to perform same-sex marriages or elevate gays and lesbians to the clergy. Yet as society opens itself to new viewpoints over time, those perspectives influence people of faith. So it was that the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) this week voted to allow the ordination of gay ministers, elders and deacons.