We suggest that the 2003 war in Iraq received high levels of public
support because the Bush administration successfully framed the conflict
as an extension of the war on terror, which was a response to the
September 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Our
analysis of Bush's speeches reveals that the administration
consistently connected Iraq with 9/11. New York Times
coverage of the president's speeches featured almost no debate over
the framing of the Iraq conflict as part of the war on terror. This
assertion had tremendous influence on public attitudes, as indicated by
polling data from several sources.Amy
Gershkoff (agershko@princeton.edu) and Shana Kushner
(skushner@princeton.edu) are graduate students in the Department of
Politics, Princeton University. The authors thank Larry Bartels, Gary
Jacobson, Douglas Foyle, seminar participants at Princeton University, and
three anonymous reviewers for helpful comments and suggestions. An earlier
version of this paper was presented at the 2004 annual meeting of the
Midwest Political Science Association. Authors' names listed in
alphabetical order.