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60 Minutes/Vanity Fair Poll: October Edition

Welcome to October, a month that evokes so many of the best things about America. The natural colors and beauty, the bountiful harvests, football games played on crisp sunny days. The World Series, Halloween and the final frothy month of political debates that will determine which direction a majority of American voters want the country to go in the next two years. In keeping with this autumnal imagery, please enjoy this month's cornucopia of thought provoking questions that should spur more than a few debates around the water cooler.

And now this month's 60 Minutes/Vanity Fair Poll results....


Only 2 in 10 Americans would go to war with Iran if they either tested a bomb or attacked Israel. A quarter would go if they attacked U.S. soil and another quarter would go if they attacked the U.S. Fleet. Finally, still another quarter of those asked possibly wearied by years of war would not support a war with Iran under any circumstance.



Most of the recent Republican Presidents did not receive much interest in a visit to their library-in fact the results are pretty disrespectful; George H. W. Bush 2%, Gerald Ford 3%, Richard Nixon 5%, George W. Bush 6%. Jimmy Carter, still in the news after his recent remarks on 60 Minutes, did a little better with 10%. But the two big winners, both with 31% were Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. How did two Presidents so seemingly at odds philosophically get such similar support especially among independents? They were both great communicators that could inspire the nation in causes greater than ourselves, a skill that never goes out of style.


(CBS)

By a margin of better than 2 to 1, Americans are siding against the developer of the proposed Islamic Center. They may feel that his constitutional right to build it should be trumped by the disrespect it would show for the memories of those who were killed. This poll was taken before 60 Minutes aired a segment on the controversy reporting that a multi-denominational space that includes daily Muslim prayer services was built at the Pentagon on the land where that attack took place.



How about "all of the above"? Our Puritan roots and culture still frowns on the perceived decadence of the European jet set. Only 1% think affairs are a good idea and 6% think Royal families would not be royal pains in the.... A skimpy 9% approve of topless beaches ( come on folks lighten up a little). 15% think we should adopt afternoon siestas (a sure way to reduce health costs for a myriad of afflictions). 23% voted none of these (these folks may need to get out a little more often). And finally an impressive 39% would emulate Europe's famous penchant for long vacations, a welcome realization that all work and no play makes Jack a very dull boy.



About half of those asked said seeing calorie counts on menus affects their eating habits either somewhat or a lot. The other half said the information affects them very little if at all. About 60% of women pay more attention and about 60% of men pay less attention. Short of watching The Biggest Loser, how many people really know what it takes to burn 500 calories? How about a new labeling system that says something like, if you eat this meal you will have to walk 8 miles to burn it off. Do you think the restaurant associations will go for that?



Despite the hundreds of millions of people using Facebook, 36% of Americans say social networking is their biggest waste of time. Next up are fantasy sports with 25% and watching T.V. with 23%. Less boring to people was shopping with 9%, and much less boring to people with only 2% are two activities that most of us used to take for granted, having time for reading and having a job. As Joni Mitchell sang, "you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone"....



15% think that same sex marriages would end in divorce at a higher rate and 13% think they would end at a lower rate. The majority of Americans think the divorce rate would be about what it is now. People are people and since human nature has changed little in the last 5,000 years, it's a pretty good bet they may be right.



Talk about a downer, so how do Americans think mankind will meet its demise? 41% think it will be a man made cause with 28% choosing nuclear annihilation and 13% going with global warming. 19% think it will be caused by natural means by disease, asteroid or genetic accident. Fully a third of Americans think that none of those fates will befall us. Man has made it for tens of thousands of years because we are resilient and adaptable and notwithstanding the asteroid theory, who really wants to bet against us?



73% of Americans say that top collegiate athletes should not be paid. ( Ask the parents and students that are shelling out over $200,000. For a diploma if sports "scholar"ships are a form of payment). 25% think
they should be paid. In some regions and conferences in the country college sports are a nice extracurricular diversion or activity, in others it's more of a religion with athletes being treated as disproportionately important like rock stars. Most people know which schools have legitimate scholar athletes and which ones don't.



It's quite a question when your choice of answers ranges from Osama bin Laden to The Octo-Mom! Osama wins with half of Americans saying they're surprised he's managed to evade capture and elude justice for over 9 years. Ozzy Osborne and his sex, drugs and rock n roll lifestyle is next with 19%, but his fellow rocker Keith Richards got only 9%. Lesser stars like Lindsay Lohan who looked young just a few years ago, Abe Vigoda who looked ancient 35 years ago and Mickey Rourke who we don't know what he really looks like got 5%, 4%, and 3% respectively. And the Octo-Mom got only 1%, very little support for her life threatening feat.



Just what does it mean to be the most eligible single woman in the world? 29% most likely presumed that Jennifer Aniston is most eligible to be married. But maybe 21% thought Halle Berry was most eligible for a second oscar, or 15% thought Elin Nordegren was most eligible for a marriage "Mulligan". 11% could have thought Betty White was most eligible for Medicare, 5% may have thought Lady GaGa was most eligible for the next big wardrobe malfunction and whatever Justice Elena Kagan was eligible for, it would certainly come with a lifetime tenure...



This poll was conducted at the CBS News interviewing facility among a random sample of 906 adults nationwide, interviewed by telephone September 6-8, 2010. Phone numbers were dialed from random digit dial samples of both standard land-line and cell phones. The error due to sampling for results based on the entire sample could be plus or minus three percentage points. The error for subgroups is higher.
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