Poll: U.S. Isolationism at Historic High

Poll: U.S. Isolationism at Historic High
Posted by David Paul Kuhn | Email This | Permalink | Email Author

The United States has taken a turn toward isolationism likely unseen in the post War World II era, according to a new poll by the Pew Research Center and historic Gallup polling.

For the first time in more than four decades a plurality, 49 percent, believe the United States should “mind its own business internationally and let other countries get along the best they can on their own,” Pew reported Thursday; only 44 percent of Americans' disagree.

Therefore, half the nation has turned inward at the very moment President Obama has ordered 30,000 more troops into the Afghan war zone.

A separate look at Gallup polling reveals how unique the Pew result is in the post-war era. Isolationism was the prevailing strain of U.S. thought following World War I. But Americans' views were reshaped with the United States rise as the world's dominate superpower following the second world war. In 1954, Gallup found that a majority, 53 percent, considered themselves an “internationalist” while only 13 percent said they were an “isolationist.”

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Commentary

I think isolationist is the wrong word to use here. That term seems more aptly applied when discussing people's ideas with restricting or diving groups of people up into groups.

That or isolating ones self from the world and not caring about their affairs.

Our issue seems to be that we care but we don't want to meddle. Meddling when unnecessary is a bad thing and we've been doing it for a while since Vietnam.

The only good that has ever come of it was the fall of the Soviet union, but that would have likely happened anyways thanks to Chechnya and Afghanistan.