Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Obama and the Oil Spill

Barack Obama's getting bad marks from the voters for his handling of the oil spill in the Gulf, but it's not having any impact on his overall approval numbers.

47% of voters express disapproval of how he's dealt with the spill to only 38% who think he's doing a good job. But his overall approval of 48% to 47% of voters disapproving of him is basically identical to what it was a month ago.

85% of the voters who don't like how Obama has handled the spill also don't like his overall job performance so this isn't really something where people who liked him before are turning against him- it's just giving people who already didn't like him one more reason not to.

Obama's approval numbers continue to be remarkably consistent in our national polling. Every month since November his approval has come in somewhere between 46 and 50% and his disapproval has come in somewhere from 46 to 49%. There's no doubt the American public is pretty much evenly divided on its President and there's been little change in those feelings over the last six months.

Full results here

4 comments:

Christian Liberty said...

Rasmussen has the same. Obama's approvals have held steady at 46% or 47% for the past 6 months.

Among those with intense opinions, however, there is much more disapproval. The approval index of %strongly approve minus %strongly disapprove has been -11 or lower for the past 6 months (currently -15) and has been -7 or lower for the past 11 months.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/obama_administration/obama_approval_index_month_by_month

Rasmussen's analysis of why the oil spill is not lowering his approval ratings, despite all the pundit chatter speculating that it would, is quite instructive. The paradox comes down to the difference in how the mainstream class sees Obama and how the political class sees Obama.

"So if the numbers are showing no change, why does the Political Class talk as if they have? It’s hard to know.
Perhaps the political junkies are ahead of the curve and recognize that the oil spill storyline may eventually cause public support to erode.
Or they may be behind the curve and are just beginning to recognize the decline that began long ago.
Perhaps the simplest explanation of all is that those in the political world just don’t have a good understanding of the general public."

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/obama_administration/june_2010/gulf_oil_spill_not_dragging_down_obama_s_approval_ratings

Considering how poorly the "stimulus" and mortgage bailouts were received by the mainstream class, the latter seems more likely. The majority of Americans (the mainstream class) soured on Obama already. It has only taken the political class this long to realize what the mainstream class saw months ago. The Obama downslide has already occurred. The political class is just late reporting it -- hence they speculate using the news of the week, rather than realizing that the majority of Americans (the mainstream) soured over Obama for his past mistakes (pushing healthcare Deform, pushing a wasteful "stimulus", pushing a mortgage bailout, nationalizing car companies to bailout their corrupt unions, pushing an economically crippling cap-and-tax bill, refusing to secure the border, etc.)

Ranjit said...

Tom,

The reason still obama is holding up in 40's is directly attributed to unconditional support of African Americans(95%). When that base cracks up and goes to 70% to 75%, then he will fall below 40%. So the question should be how much of African Americans will come back to re elect in 2012?

Bluejoy said...

The President will be back in the low to mid 50s if the economy turns around, and that is all this comes down to. The health care thing will not affect this election because people have no point of reference. There is nothing affecting them yet.

The key thing is people have not turned on him they are just withholding opinion. They are waiting to see how things go. He continually pokes progressives though, and if it does go South, he will have a primary challenger. Gore has never liked him from what I hear. Keep that in mind. File it away. More importantly, is the independent. I see a scenario where a unpopular to mediocre popular President wins due to a third party. The Republicans will know a lot more about the Tea Party value after the midterms. My thinking is that they will be too extreme and help Democrats, but if they don't unite, you will have a reverse Dixiecrat situation on your hands in '12 for sure I believe.

Christian Liberty said...

Bluejoy, the economy has already peaked. The economy is only going down from here because Obama has CRIPPLED the economy with burdensome regulations and higher taxes and wasteful spending and higher debt. The bear market rally is over. THE NEXT WAVE DOWN has already begun. And anyone paying attention knows that Obama and the Dumbocrats have made the economy WORSE. Anyone hoping for an economic "recovery" to lift Obama and the Dumbocrats will be sorely disappointed.

Obama's approval ratings are a ceiling, not a floor. Obama will only become MORE unpopular, more radioactive, more useless for helping any Democrat get elected.

 
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