Interesting. I thought it was just the opposite. I have always worried about my INability to become too emotionally involved in anything. Yet for purely intellectual reasons, I oppose this war (not war in general). In fact, I believe that most people who study history oppose this war. I believe the level of education and background people have in historical, political and social issues is directly related to the percent of people who oppose the war. So far, even on this very forum, the people who have made the most pro-war statements seem to have the least understanding of Kurds, Iraqis, al-Qaeda, Islam.
How many pro-war people on this forum know why Al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden refers to Saddam as The Infidel?
Political polarization is very high right now, and it's difficult to make much of the attempts to publicize pro-war or anti-war sentiments. Democratic leaders have already "unpolarized" because the smart ones know better than to speak out against war when we are in the midst of it, even if they dead set against it 5 minutes before. There's a voice that comes out of academia and Hollywood that tends to favor an anti-Republican stance. Many in business are republican and there are well educated people in both categories. I was interested in how well the last two attempts to get a huge pro-war rally out of Long Island, NY would go. Long Island, NY is primarily Republican with a base nearly as large as Manhattan's Democrats. I believe they were able to get about 1,500 to their rally in NYC, even though the anti-war rally drew hundreds of thousands, and, if all the permits had been issued, it could easily have been over 1,000,000 as it was in most large cities throughout the world. Republicans were truly embarrassed, and it showed in the partisan flyers both before the NYC rally and the flyers and advertisements to promote a secondary followup pro-war rally last week on Long Island proper. (That one barely drew 200 people). Still the Long Island news sources treated it as if it showed that pro-war folks had an "equal" voice. Pathetic.
I do believe that in areas where the demographic is less educated, more Democrats and Republicans both will show themselves to be pro-war.
I have access to education demographics for advertising purposes, and I think anyone else can get them with just a little effort. It is easy to show from them that the "The Rush Limbaugh" type demographic which many pro-war pro-Republican talk radio hosts will go for, is not the prime "educated" business market but is known consistently to attract less educated, less intellectual buyers. Advertisers tweak their messages accordingly.
I used to do statistical analysis of demographic data from the US Census which we would then relate to surveys or other databases. I'm wondering what other people who have done these surveys for sociological research or advertising would think.
I wouldn't know for sure, but I'd bet that in general your hypothesis works out quite differently in real life.
Gamaliel
