by Patrick Appel
Blumenthal corrects Nate Silver, who wrote that "Egyptian popular opinion toward the United States has substantially improved over the course of the past 2 to 3 years":
Silver may have overlooked a footnote in the report he linked to explaining that the BBC sampled only urban areas of Egypt -- specifically Alexandria, Cairo, Giza and Shoubra al-Khaima -- that represent only 22 percent of the total national adult population.
More importantly, a more comprehensive survey of Egypt last year produced a very different result. The Global Attitudes Project conducted by the Pew Research Center conducts an annual, in-person survey that samples all but 2 percent of the population (it excluded smaller "Frontier governorates for security reasons"). That survey finds a very different pattern: The favorability rating of the United States among Egyptians has fallen sharply, from 30 percent in 2006 to 17 percent last last year.