At least the British people get it

In his book The Wisdom of Crowds, James Surowiecki writes that ‘under the right circumstances, groups are remarkably intelligent, and are often smarter than the smartest people in them’. Our poll today shows that the response of the British people to the terror emergency has been robust and clear-sighted. While many in the political and media elite have offered only hand-wringing, point-scoring and a feeble enthusiasm to blame the West for everything, the voters themselves grasp the scale of the threat and the need for a firm response.

As low as their opinion of politicians may be, most of them have not been seduced by the preposterous suggestion that this security alert was an elaborate hoax, a ploy to enable ministers to grab even more powers or divert attention from Lebanon. The British people are innately decent: as our poll shows, they know full well that most Muslims are moderate.