January 22, 2012 | 1:30 pm

Is Nuclear Iran a ‘Weak Spot’ for Obama With the American Public?

Posted by Shmuel Rosner

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visiting the nuclear facility at Natanz. (Photo: Reuters)

A Washington Post-ABC News poll gave some analysts the impression that President Obama has a public opinion problem with Iran. “Obama’s Republican challengers see an opening and have already drawn parallels between weakness in the U.S. economy and Obama’s positioning with Iran”, Scott Clement reminded readers, as he was raising the possibility that Iran can be “a classic sleeper issue” that will be damaging to Obama come November.

It is an interesting suggestion, but basing it on one question in one survey can be problematic. Examining two recent polls, the one mentioned above and the even more recent PEW survey, gives one the impression that a lot depends on the way the question on Iran is framed. Take a look:

In fact, as one can learn from looking at the four recent PEW surveys in which the question on Iran was asked, Obama today seems a little bit stronger on Iran than he was earlier in this term:

So how does one reconcile Obama’s “problem” with his approval improvement? I’ve already hinted that it’s probably all in the question. When the public is asked about “Iran”, it is happier with the President than in the case it is asked about “nuclear weapons” in Iran.

In fact, most of the polling on American public opinion and Iran suffers from a similar problem: With such complicated policy question, the way the question is presented has huge influence on the outcome. To demonstrate this, I looked at two different groups of polls on Iran.

In the first group, there are two options - the interviewee can be for or against attack on Iran. In the second group, a third option - diplomatic efforts - is presented. Here’s a table with different questions, some giving respondents a three-option menu and others just two-option menu. The differences in responses can’t be starker: Presented with two options, Americans would choose attacking Iran, but presented with a third option, they’d choose diplomacy and sanctions.

What does this tell us about Obama, Iran and the 2012 elections? That it all depends on the President’s ability to convince the voters that a third option – namely sanctions and diplomacy – is a viable option. If they see such a third option, if they believe war can be averted, the voters would not much hesitate. They’d support the President’s decision to pursue the non-violent option.

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