Americans Praise Media but Still Back Censorship, Postwar Poll Says : Public opinion: TV news and the military got a big popularity boost from the Gulf conflict, the survey finds.

An overwhelming majority of Americans now heartily approve of how the media covered the Persian Gulf conflict, but at the same time they favor government censorship, according to a new nationwide survey to be released today.

The survey, by the Times Mirror Co., also discovered that two institutions enjoyed significant boosts from the war--the military and television news organizations.

Seventy-three percent of Americans felt that television reporters dug harder into the war than their print competitors.

As for the military, nearly nine in 10 Americans expressed a “great deal or fair amount” of confidence in the accuracy of the military’s reports of the war--more than did so while the war was going on.

Also, H. Norman Schwarzkopf, U.S. commander of Operation Desert Storm, and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Colin L. Powell were shown to be remarkably popular. Each outscored every other person ever rated in the six-year history of the poll by a comfortable margin.

Sixty-two percent of Americans rated Schwarzkopf “very favorable,” while Powell was rated “very favorable” by 51%. Both outranked the late President John F. Kennedy, who four years ago scored the previous high of 39%.

The survey also suggested that some of the military’s use of language to mask the horrors of war can be very effective.

Half of those surveyed were asked if they were concerned about the amount of “collateral damage” caused by allied bombing. When the question was asked using this military euphemism for civilian casualties, 21% responded that they were very concerned and 34% said that they were fairly concerned.

But the wording was changed for the other half of the sample, and the contrast in answers was striking. Asked if they were concerned about “the number of civilian casualties and other unintended damage” in Iraq, 49% reported being very concerned and 33% fairly concerned.

The survey was conducted by Times Mirror’s Center for the People and the Press, which interviewed 1,857 adults between March 14 and 18. The findings have a margin of error of plus or minus two percentage points. Times Mirror is the parent company of the Los Angeles Times and other newspaper, broadcasting and publication enterprises.

Asked about the media, more than eight in 10 Americans rated the coverage of the war good or excellent--a marked increase from late January, the survey found.

Seven in 10 Americans gave the press good grades for coverage from Baghdad, including that of the bombing of a structure identified by Iraq as a civilian bomb shelter and by the allies as a military command-and-control center, the survey found. Further, a majority of 52% now approve in general of the idea of the press’ staying in Baghdad, while 38% disapprove.

“We won big, and now everybody associated with the conflict, including the media, is basking in the afterglow,” said Bob Lichter, director of the Center for the People and the Press.

Even Cable News Network correspondent Peter Arnett, called “Baghdad Pete” by some right-wing media groups and decried as an Iraqi sympathizer by one now-apologetic U.S. senator, won the approval of the majority of Americans, 53% to 13%. Seventeen percent could not identify Arnett, and another 17% could not decide.

But the war apparently has shifted long-held public sentiment, persuading many to look more favorably on government censorship in general.

The survey found that a majority of nearly 2 to 1 felt that military censorship is more important than the media’s ability to report important news. Among Republicans, the margin was even higher--70% to 22%.

A 58% majority also felt journalists went “too far” when they struck out on their own to cover the war rather than remain with their military chaperons.

The public continues to think that press criticism of the military does more to strengthen the nation’s defense than weaken it, the survey found. And a 3-to-1 majority said they would prefer coverage of war to be neutral rather than pro-American.

There appeared to be a link between approval of the press and approval of the way the military conducted the war.

Those who approved of military censorship, for instance, were more prone to like the media coverage. Those who disliked the military censorship were more likely to say the press did a poor or, at best, fair job.

Overall, eight in 10 approved of military restrictions on the press--roughly the same as did so during the war.

People supported the military restrictions even though they believe the military concealed information from the public--36% saying the military kept a lot hidden and another 36% saying the military kept at least some information hidden.

But the popularity of individuals running the war remained high. Although Defense Secretary Dick Cheney could not compete with Schwarzkopf’s 62% “very favorable” rating and Powell’s 51%, he weighed in with a respectable 33%.

One year ago, only 3% of Americans gave Cheney a “very favorable” rating. President Bush, who was not rated in this survey, had a “very favorable” rating of 24% when last surveyed in May, 1990.

Such highly favorable public attitudes about the military and the war can create “a cultural framework” that can have a marked effect on how the press covers “what happens now and on wars in the future,” said Penn Kimble, professor emeritus at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

For instance, was it possible that the allies were deliberately overestimating the strength of the Iraqi army? Against such support for the war, it becomes more difficult for the media to explore that.

The poll also found that 67% of newspaper readers felt television gave them at least as deep an understanding of the war as did print media or that the print media covered the same ground that TV did.

A majority of college-educated readers, too, said that the print media, at best, covered the same ground as television (57%).

Lichter said such a movement toward television is typical of crises.

“People were anxious. They wanted to feel they knew what was going on. And TV gives you that feeling in a more visceral way,” he said.