Approval of President Bush's handling of Iraq dipped to 33 percent, a new low. His overall job approval was 35 percent, statistically within range of his low of 33 percent last month. The poll of 1,003 adults has a sampling error margin of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Among other findings:

- More than half, 54 percent, said it's unlikely that a stable, democratic government will be established in Iraq, a new high in AP-Ipsos polling. The survey was completed before Iraq's parliament approved three key new government ministers. Just 67 percent of Republicans, 63 percent of conservatives, and 57 percent of white evangelicals believed a stable, democratic government is likely.

- Only 68 percent of Republicans, 57 percent of white evangelicals and 51 percent of self-described conservatives - key groups in Bush's base of support - approved of his handling of Iraq. Those most likely to disapprove are Democrats (89 percent), women (70 percent), minorities (84 percent), city dwellers (72 percent), those with household incomes under $25,000 (71 percent), and unmarried men (70 percent).

- Those most likely to believe the war in Iraq was a mistake are Democrats (84 percent), women (63 percent), especially suburban women (67 percent), minorities (76 percent), city dwellers (66 percent), self-described liberals (82 percent), moderates (64 percent), and Catholics (62 percent).

Some 76 percent of those questioned said they were following reports about allegations that U.S. troops killed unarmed Iraqi civilians.

The military is investigating reports that a small number of Marines murdered 24 Iraqi civilians - including unarmed women and children - in the town of Haditha on Nov. 19. It also is conducting a probe of an incident in Hamdaniya following allegations that Marines pulled an unarmed Iraqi man from his home on April 26 and shot him to death without provocation.

Regardless of whether the allegations turn out to be true, 63 percent of those surveyed said they thought the killings of civilians were isolated incidents. That view was especially true among Americans over 35, whites and those living in the South, where the military has a strong presence.

"I think they're doing everything possible to avoid such things," said Christine Berchelmann, a retired nurse and Republican-leaning independent from San Antonio. "The people they are seeking out, they are in dwellings right in the middle of all these civilians. There are always going to be casualties."

Sixty-one percent in the survey said the military is doing all it can to avoid killing Iraqi civilians.

While the AP poll found that most Americans are willing to give U.S. troops the benefit of the doubt, their misgivings about the war and the prospect of Iraq establishing a stable, democratic government are growing.

Fifty-nine percent said the United States made a mistake in going to war, a new high and a significant jump from the 34 percent in December 2004.

"The biggest mistake was going into Iraq," said David Smith, 38, a salesman from Springfield, Mo., and Democrat who leans independent. "If hindsight was 20-20, they should have thought about the repercussions."

Despite President Bush's pronouncements about Iraq setting up a viable government, only 44 percent of those polled said it was likely they would see a stable government in Baghdad. It was a new low in the survey.

"I think this is the first time in recorded history where the American people wholeheartedly support the troops and support for the mission is waning," said Rep. Ike Skelton of Missouri, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee.

The 15-term lawmaker cited the greater involvement of the National Guard and Reserves in the war. Some 25,000 members of the Guard and Reserve are in Iraq among the 132,000 U.S. troops.

"People have a neighbor or a cousin," Skelton said.

During Vietnam, growing opposition to the war paralleled disenchantment with American forces, many of whom had been drafted to serve. The conflict dragged on more than a decade, more than 50,000 Americans were killed and the U.S. departed Saigon in April 1975 as the communists prevailed.

Capturing the public consciousness during Vietnam was the My Lai massacre, in which U.S. soldiers killed hundreds of innocent civilians in 1968.

In Iraq, the military has relied on an all-volunteer force of trained professionals.

Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania, said it is possible to oppose the war but "nonetheless see the military as divorced from that. The military is our sons and daughters and, of course, we wouldn't systematically engage in something that defiles American values."

Rep. John Kline, R-Minn., said he was not surprised "that the American people believe in the fundamental goodness of the American soldiers." Kline, a member of the Armed Services Committee, described the current troops as the "best we've ever had."

The survey also found that the war continues to take a toll on the public's view of Bush. Approval of the president was at 35 percent, essentially unchanged from his rating of 33 percent last month based on the poll's margin of error of 3 percentage points.

His handling of Iraq and foreign policy and the fight against terrorism hit new lows: Just 33 percent approved of his actions on Iraq and 39 percent on the commander in chief's fight against terrorism.

People had an even lower opinion of the Republican-controlled Congress. Only 24 percent approved of the way it's doing its job, essentially unchanged from last month but still a new low.

Fifty-two percent want Democrats to capture control of Congress in November, about the same as last month's poll.

For years the president and his supporting cast of arrogant, bullying characters have tried to put the best face on this war. They had no idea what they were doing when they ordered the invasion of Iraq, and they still don't. Many of the troops who were assured that the Iraqis would welcome them with open arms are now dead. And there's still no plan.

Paul Wolfowitz, who fashioned the phony intellectual underpinnings of this catastrophe, told us that Iraqi oil revenues would cover the cost of reconstruction. He was as wrong about that as the president was about the weapons of mass destruction. (And as wrong as Dick Cheney was last June when he said the insurgency was in its last throes.)

Here are the facts: The war so recklessly launched by the amateurs in the Bush White House has already taken scores of thousands of lives, and will ultimately cost the United States $1 trillion to $2 trillion.

No one has been held accountable for this. While Mr. Bush's approval ratings are low, the public has been largely indifferent to the profound suffering in Iraq. This is primarily for two reasons: Because most Americans have no immediate personal stake in the war, and because the administration and the news media keep the worst of the suffering at a safe distance from the U.S. population.

The killing of American troops is usually kissed off with a paragraph or two in the major papers, and a sentence or two, at best, on national newscasts. (Imagine if someone in your office, sitting at a desk across from you, were suddenly blown to bits, splattering you with his or her blood. You wouldn't get over it for the rest of your life. This is what happens daily in Iraq.)

The many thousands of Iraqis who are killed - including babies and children who are shot to death, blown up, or incinerated - remain completely unknown to the American public. So not only is there very little empathy for the suffering of Iraqis, there is virtually no sense among ordinary Americans of a shared responsibility for that suffering.

Despite the frequently expressed fantasies expressed by President Bush and some of the leading politicians of both parties, the idea of a U.S. victory in Iraq is an illusion. The nightmarish violence is rising, not receding. Iraq is not being pacified. A suicide bomber blew himself up in a bustling market in Basra over the weekend, killing 27 and wounding scores. On Sunday, 20 people were stopped and pulled from their vehicles on a highway near Baquba and shot to death.

John Burns, writing in yesterday's New York Times, told us: "The death toll in one of the most grisly recent attacks, in the village of Hadid, near the Diyala provincial capital of Baquba, rose to 17 on Tuesday when the police delivered nine severed heads to the Baquba morgue in the fruit boxes in which they were found in the village."

Eight other heads had previously been found.

Instead of beginning to pull our troops out of Iraq, we are sending more in. The permanent Iraqi government, which was supposed to be the answer to everybody's prayers, is a study in haplessness. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, Al Qaeda's man in Iraq, remains at large. (As does Osama bin Laden, somewhere in Pakistan.)



As was the case with Vietnam, the war in Iraq is a fool's errand. There is no clear mission for American troops in Iraq. No one can really say what the dead have died for. And yet the dying continues.

When it all finally comes to an end (according to President Bush, on somebody else's watch) we'll look around at the hideous costs in human treasure and cold hard cash and ask ourselves: What in the world were we thinking?