DOI: 10.3886/icpsr03917.v3
title: CBS News Monthly Poll #1, August 2003
title: Version 3

description: This poll, conducted August 11-12, 2003, is part of a
continuing series of monthly polls that solicit opinions on political
and social issues. Respondents were asked to give their opinions of
President George W. Bush and his overall job performance, as well as
his handling of the situation with Iraq, foreign policy issues, and
the economy. Questions related to the United States involvement in
Iraq addressed whether removing Saddam Hussein from power and the
result of the war with Iraq was worth the human and economic costs,
how well things were going for the United States in its efforts to
bring stability and order to Iraq, whether the United States was in
control of events in Iraq, respondents' level of confidence that the
United States would eventually find weapons of mass destruction in
Iraq, whether it mattered if weapons of mass destruction were found,
respondents' level of confidence in the United States' ability to
capture or kill Saddam Hussein, and whether the United States had won
the war if Hussein was not captured or killed. Views were also sought
on whether respondents considered Saudi Arabia to be an ally, friendly
but not an ally, unfriendly, or an enemy of the United States.
Respondents were asked about the most important issue facing the
United States, the condition of the national economy and whether it
was improving, getting worse, or staying the same, whether the economy
and job market were better or worse than two years ago, the degree of
progress made by the Bush administration on improving the economy and
creating new jobs, whether the respondent's financial situation was
better or worse than two years ago, the condition of the respondent's
own state's economy, and how concerned respondents were that a member
of their household would lose his or her job in the next year.
Specific questions concerning the economy addressed the overall
condition of the stock market, expected changes in the stock market,
the impact of the stock market on the condition of the national
economy, the effects of the new tax cuts on the stock market, the
likelihood that the new tax cuts would create more jobs, whether the
respondent had received a tax rebate check for the current year,
whether the tax rebate money was spent, used to pay bills, or saved or
invested, and whether the respondent and his or her spouse currently
had any money invested in the stock market. Additional questions
addressed whether the respondent would vote to recall his or her
state's governor if given the chance, and whether Hollywood
celebrities should become involved in politics. Background variables
include age, sex, ethnicity, marital status, religion, education, 2002
household income, political orientation, political ideology, whether
the respondent voted in the 2000 presidential election, and for whom
they voted (Al Gore, George W. Bush, Pat Buchanan, or Ralph Nader).
description: A variation of random-digit dialing using primary sampling
units (PSUs) was employed, consisting of blocks of 100 telephone
numbers identical through the eighth digit and stratified by
geographic region, area code, and size of place. Within households,
respondents were selected using a method developed by Leslie Kish and
modified by Charles Backstrom and Gerald Hursh (see Backstrom and
Hursh, SURVEY RESEARCH. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press,
1963).
description: Datasets: 
DS1: CBS News Monthly Poll #1, August 2003
description: Adult population of the United States aged 18 and over
having a telephone at home.
description: This collection has not been processed by ICPSR
staff. ICPSR is distributing the data and documentation for this
collection in essentially the same form in which they were
received. When appropriate, documentation has been converted to
Portable Document Format (PDF), data files have been converted to
non-platform-specific formats, and variables have been recoded to
ensure respondents' anonymity.The ASCII data file may have been replaced if the previous version was formatted with multiple records per case. A frequency file, which contains the authoritative column locations, has been added to the collection.