quote:Other recent Bush polls from newest to oldest:
For the first time in the Newsweek Poll, a majority of Americans -- 58 percent -- believe that the Bush administration purposely misled the public about evidence that Iraq had banned weapons in order to build support for the war. Thirty-six percent say it did not. In general, 66 percent of Americans say that the Iraq war has not made Americans safer from terrorism; 29 percent say that it has. A 58-percent majority also say they are not too confident or not at all confident that the United States will successfully establish a stable democratic form of government in Iraq over the long term.
code:If the Democrats can't win at least the House in this election climate, they might as well break up the party.Lowest Approval Ratings for Past Presidents
President % Approve
Clinton 36 5/26-27/93 Newsweek
G.H.W. Bush 29 7/31-8/2/92 Gallup
Reagan 35 1/28-31/83 Gallup
Carter 28 6/29-7/2/79 Gallup
Ford 37 1/10-13/75 & 3/28-31/75 Gallup
Nixon 23 1/4-7/74 Gallup
Johnson 35 8/7-12/68 Gallup
Kennedy 56 9/12-17/63 Gallup
Eisenhower 48 3/27-4/1/58 Gallup
Truman 22 2/9-14/52 Gallup
Roosevelt 48 8/18-24/39 Gallup
code:... what did Clinton do in his first four months of office that left him with an approval rating of 36% ? He'd just won an election!Clinton 36 5/26-27/93 Newsweek
quote:While I can see 1,3,4 and 5 I think you're pushing it with including 2 as something that's gone right. #2 could just as easily/accurately say "North Korean nuclear test shows we need a strong leader who won't stand by on the sidelines and wring his hands while a dangerous nation gets the bomb leading our country" or some such.
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What has gone well for President Bush?
1) Record high Stock Market and other signs of am improving enconomy.
2) North Korean nuclear test shows we need strong man leading our country.
3) Lower gas prices relieve pressure on lower and middle class.
4) Weak hurricane season takes spotlight off of his lack of a plan on Global Warming and other environmental issues.
5) Peace holds in Beirut, takes the spotlight off of his lack of a plan for the Isreali/Palestine issue. (perhaps not lack of a plan, but lack of progress on his plan).
quote:Not necessarily with what, but they were on the rebound. After hitting his actual low of 29%, he climbed back to the low 40s, until more recently.
Originally posted by Lyrhawn:
On the rebound with what?
What has he done in the last couple months, or what has gone well for him other than a drop in gas prices that would cause his numbers to rebound?
Especially, what would offset increasing disapproval of the war or the mounting list of problems befalling the Republican Party?
quote:I already agreed with you on 3, but 2, 4 and 5 don't help him at all. Most of America has already forgotten about Lebanon, and it isn't like Bush did a whole lot to solve that problem to begin with. 2 hurts him because strong man or not, thanks to the mess he has us in currently, which a majority of the country agrees is a mess, we're in a weaker position to deal with N. Korea, and Bush's Korean policies have been a disaster.
Originally posted by Dan_raven:
What has gone well for President Bush?
1) Record high Stock Market and other signs of am improving enconomy.
2) North Korean nuclear test shows we need strong man leading our country.
3) Lower gas prices relieve pressure on lower and middle class.
4) Weak hurricane season takes spotlight off of his lack of a plan on Global Warming and other environmental issues.
5) Peace holds in Beirut, takes the spotlight off of his lack of a plan for the Isreali/Palestine issue. (perhaps not lack of a plan, but lack of progress on his plan).
quote:It's sad, because I thought there was some potential to the Social Security and immigration reform ideas that he floated. Unfortunately the parties were unwilling to work together or work at all on these two issues and they are kind of dead in the water. He also had some good points to make about energy, but didn't every follow through with a solid plan or much political backing.
Originally posted by Lyrhawn:
I was always told in my polisci classes that the best time for a president to put forth new ideas was the first two years of his second term. After that, he's dead in the water. Well, as of a month from now he's dead in the water.
quote:I really think it's impossible to say. The problem is that the X-1 from Hurricanes and Lebanon are still in the minds of the people. They don't blame Bush for them happening, they blame him for his response. Lack of an opportunity to rectify his actions by doing better the next time doesn't erase the original offense.
Originally posted by Dan_raven:
I agree that most of these are pathetic because they are things that did not go wrong, instead of things that went right.
Still they helped improve his rating because they silenced the negative that was already going on.
In other words, The Presidents ratings are at X.
The war in Lebanon goes on and he appears inneffective. We get x-1 which equates to a lower poll number. When the war is over and our focus is away from it, the -1 goes away.
Similarly there was a lot of talk early this summer about how bad the Hurricane season would be, how another Katrina was inevitable, and how FEMA was unprepared, and big oil was the cause of the global warming that caused the hurricanes. X-1. When those storms didn't materialize, the -1 went away and his numbers recovered.
Its not like I list "We didn't sell the Washington Monument to Al Queda". Obviously that would be a big -10000 to the presidents poll numbers. However, nobody was expecting that to happen so it wasn't already dragging down his numbers.
In defence of number 2--NK and the Bomb. This news could have gone either way. It could have been seen as either a need for a tough pres, and President Bush has been tough on NK, or it could have been seen as further impotence on behalf of President Bush and the US. I believe that since many are leaning to view President Bush and the US as impotent in world action being all tied up in Iraq, that is how it fell out. But for the first few days, when it may have given President Bush a slight bump.
quote:Either of these applied statements ('Record high' and 'improving economy') can be contested easily.
Record high Stock Market and other signs of am improving enconomy.
quote:http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18505030/site/newsweek/
By Marcus Mabry
Newsweek
May 5, 2007 - It’s hard to say which is worse news for Republicans: that George W. Bush now has the worst approval rating of an American president in a generation, or that he seems to be dragging every ’08 Republican presidential candidate down with him. But According to the new NEWSWEEK Poll, the public’s approval of Bush has sunk to 28 percent, an all-time low for this president in our poll, and a point lower than Gallup recorded for his father at Bush Sr.’s nadir. The last president to be this unpopular was Jimmy Carter who also scored a 28 percent approval in 1979.
quote:Yeah, I'd like one too.
2) North Korean nuclear test shows we need strong man leading our country.