“Support Our Troops” and “No More War” are popular messages that many Americans are seeing these days, given the situation with Iraq.
According to a FOX News/Opinion Dynamics Poll taken March 26, 78 percent of those polled support the United States taking military action to disarm Iraq and removing Iraqi President Saddam Hussein from power.
Here at OSU, the percentage of those supporting military action may not be that high in some student’s opinions.
“I would say the majority of OSU students are against the war,” said Matt Lefferts, a senior in family resource management. “There are definitely a wide variety of opinions given the diversity here at OSU.”
People in the OSU community and surrounding areas are more likely to see people protesting the war than supporting it. Anti-war protests have been held on the corner of 15th Avenue and High Street, Indianola Avenue and in Clintonville.
Paul Gilligan, a graduate student in English, doesn’t see an urgency for war.
“I really don’t think we should be over there, because there is no clear reason,” he said.
There are also students who support taking military action against Iraq.
“I agree with what we are doing, and I am ready to go if I have to,” said Andy Badgley, a senior in finance.
Badgley is a two-year member of the Army Reserves and OSU’s ROTC program.
Badgley said many individuals in his unit have been deployed and more are set to leave today.
Another poll conducted by FOX News on Wednesday showed that 69 percent of those asked approved of the job President Bush is doing in handling the situation with Iraq.
“Nobody wants to be the president right now,” said Amy Wood, a junior in political science, “but I think that people should be protesting against Saddam Hussein and not President Bush.”
Wood said she thinks the situation with Iraq is going to last longer than what many people initially thought, so the opinions of the American people may in fact change.
“Nobody likes war, but we should support our president and we should support our troops,” Wood said.
