Last week’s ABC/Washington Post poll was a nightmare for George W. Bush. One would think he had hit rock bottom, but the new NBC/Wall Street Journal poll (subscription required, but if you get there fast it is free this week only) is even worse. One gets the feeling that this administration is coming apart at the seams, and is in a free fall from which there may be no escape. This was the fifth consecutive major poll showing Bush’s personal job approval rating falling to an all-time low below 40%. Making the matter worse a new FOX poll has Bush at 36% job approval, so that makes it six in a row.
Tonight on MSNBC’s Hardball, Laura O’Donnell indicated that both Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan had rebounded from lower numbers, but that is at least a debateable claim. According to Media Matters.org Reagan’s all-time low rating was 35%, in a Gallup Poll from January 28-31, 1983, and Clinton’s all-time low was 36% according to a Yank/Time/CNN Poll from May 26-27, 1993. Bush is currently at 35% according to CBS, 36% according to Pew and FOX. Moreover, all the signs suggest he has not bottomed out.
Details of the NBC/WSJ poll follow:
The new NBC/WSJ poll was conducted November 4-7, 2005 and consisted of 1003 adult interviews.It reports Bush’s job approval rating at 38%, an all-time low. 57% disapprove, an all-time high. In the wake of 9/11 Bush was at an88% approval and 7% disapproval rating. He has suffered a startling 100-point reversal.
As was the case with the ABC/Wapo poll, Bush is suffering on the issues. His job-approval ratings have hit an all-time low on every issue asked about in the poll:
- Only 34% approve of Bush’s handling of the economy. 60% disapprove. Bush’s numbers have reversed themselves by 64-points since his peak in December’01.
- Only 35% approve of Bush’s handling of foreign policy. 59% disapprove. Again this is a 92-point reversal versus December’01.
- Bush’s handling of the “war on terror,” once his strong point, has also tanked. More now disapprove (55%) than approve (39%). This is a 73-point reversal.
- The public no longer approves of Bush’s handling of the situation in Iraq. Only 32% approve, while double that amount, 64%, now disapprove.
- Only 27% hold a “positive” view versus 49% who have a negative view. This represents an 84-point reversal for Cheney.
- Intensity of the negative feelings is suggested by the 33% who are “very negative” versus 10% who are “very positive.
- A surprisingly high 63% know enough about Mr. Rove to have an opinion about him. Only 10% have a positive opinion of him (which translates to 16% of those who are familiar with him). 35% have a negative opinion (56% of those familiar with him).
- Roves also elicits an intensity of negativity with 25% holding a “very negative” opinion of him compared to only 3% holding a “very positive” opinion
- 66% know who Libby is. Only 6% have a positive opinion of him (which translates to 9% of those who are familiar with him). 39% have a negative opinion (59% of those familiar with him).
- Libby’s intensity of negative opinion is even greater than Rove’s with 27% holding a “very negative” opinion of him compared to only 1% holding a “very positive” opinion.
- Honesty:Only 20% rate Bush “very good.” 32% rate him on “very poor.”
- Appointing Qualified People:very good: 9%; “very poor”: 28%
- Protecting the Environment:Democrats: 49%; Republicans: 10%
- Dealing With Social Security:Democrats: 44%; Republicans: 24%
- Dealing With Health Care:Democrats: 43%; Republicans: 17%
- Dealing With Taxes:Democrats: 40%; Republicans: 30%
- Dealing With Education:Democrats: 39%; Republicans: 20%
- Dealing With the Economy:Democrats: 39%; Republicans: 25%
- Reducing the Federal Deficit:Democrats: 38%; Republicans: 19%
- Dealing With Foreign Policy:Democrats: 36%; Republicans: 27% (this is the first time the Democrats have held an edge on this question).
- Dealing with Energy Policy:Democrats: 35%; Republicans: 19%
- Controlling Government Spending:Democrats: 34%; Republicans: 22%
- Dealing With Abortion:Democrats: 33%; Republicans: 25%
- Dealing With Iraq:Democrats: 33%; Republicans: 30%
- Protecting America’s Interests on Trade Issues:Democrats: 31%; Republicans: 21%
- Promoting Ethics in Government:Democrats: 26%; Republicans: 22%
- Dealing With the War on Terrorism:Democrats: 26%; Republicans: 35% (a one-time 36-point Republican edge is now a 9-point Republican edge)
- Dealing With Immigration:Democrats: 25%; Republicans: 19%
- Ensuring a Strong National Defense:Democrats: 22%; Republicans: 43% (Republicans once held a 41-point edge here. It is now 21-points.
- Promoting Moral Values:Democrats: 18%; Republicans: 35% (a one-time 22-point Republican edge is now a 17-point edge)
It isn’t only George W. Bush who is on a slippery slope:
Dick Cheney:
Karl Rove:
Lewis “Scooter” Libby:
Bad news for Republicans in Congress also abounds. Prior to the 2004 election 43% preferred a Republican-controlled Congress, and 43% preferred a Democrat-controlled Congress — a 1-point Republican edge. Today 48% prefer the Democrats and 37% prefer the Republicans — an 11-point edge for the Democrats, and a 12-point reversal in the past year.
George W. Bush’s Personal Qualities:
58% feel Congress should immediately enact price caps on the cost of gasoline at the pump.
The Parties on Issues (Who Would do a Better Job?):
Clearly the Democrats have some work to do before they can capitalize fully on the problems of President Bush and the Republicans. 36% feel the Republicans do not have a clear message/vision for the future. 45% feel that way about the Democrats. 18% feel the Republicans have a clear message/vision for the future. Only 11% feel that way about the Democrats.
An incredible 79% think the leaking of Valerie Wilson Plames CIA identity and the indictment of Libby “is a serious matter.”
An equally incredible 78% believe “others in the Bush administration may have acted illegally as well.”
57% feel President Bush “deliberately misled people to make the case for war.”
58% feel the president “has not given good reasons” for why we must keep troops in Iraq.
It would be hard to categorize the current situation for the White House as anything but a meltdown. The polls do not suggest they bottom has been reached.
A MELTDOWN, would be a nice start.. EtJ
This is nuclear meltdown on a major scale!
Excuse me while I don’t feel bad….
Dancing in the streets, toasting in the saloons and taverns are more appropiate. Sadly just a trend, one must send energy to keep the light shining on this gang of momma boy bushs’.
These numbers suggest a number of opportunities for Democrats, but they had better begin defining themselves better real soon, because as low as these numbers are, they aren’t all that much better for Dems.
In at least some places this election(here in CA and back home in PA for instance) the sentiments have been across the board “whatever it is, I’m against it” (to quote Marx–Groucho of course). The poll results on incumbents vs. newcomers support this nationally.
But in terms of the Pressgeist, there are only two story lines determined by polls: PRESIDENT (or whoever) FALLING in popularity (or whatever category), and PRESIDENT REGAINING.
We already saw stories last month claiming Bush had “rebounded” because he gained two points, within the margin of error, from the previous month.
If Bush goes below 33-35% then it really is free fall. One-third of the electorate seemed to be his unassailable base. During impeachment hearings, Nixon fell to 19%. He had to resign before it fell further.
The Democrats in Congress and the Leadership of the Democratic Party have to move on this.
I read this great comment to a Kid Oakland post the other day. It addresses the 27% Crazification Factor:
I put the completely insane at about 12%, with the totally ignorant at another 12%, with the remaining 3% swinging between insane and ignorant.
on the Dems’ side, I suspect I might be part of the 27% who would vote for any Dem, any time, over any Repug; and would be so unwilling to give the Repugs any satisfaction that I’d respond “Approve” about a President accused of pretty much anything short of beating my cats and toddler with a lead pipe. I think the “Approve” responses, at this point in time, are just that: feet-dug-in, utter refusal to give the hated other side the satisfaction of seeing someone on their own side slide even further. It’s not a reflection of their feelings about Bush, it’s a reflection of their feelings about US.
While this may come as a surprise to pollsters, survey respondants have mixed agendas and in a lot of cases don’t really give a crap about your margin of error. A certain amount of Bush approval is just being a Republican loyalist and not wanting those Democrat bastards getting the satisfaction of knowing what you really think of what Bush did to the Party of Lincoln. And I suspect there is still a lingering amount of “War Time President” thinking here, because the only thing worse for the former Bush base than knowing Bush profoundly let them down is the prospect that Osama bin Forgotten is smiling about it.
I am a Yellow Dog Democrat and however disappointed I might be at a Democratic President’s actual performance (and Bill had some disappointing moments) I certainly wouldn’t have put the boot in once he was down. The Fox 35% number is frankly shocking. When you look at the graph of fifteen national polls since Bush got in office you see polls moving in lockstep but Fox (the green diamond) consistently riding at the top end of the band Pollkatz: Bush Approval with other polls trailing 3-5 points behind. If this was a stock chart I would be considering liquidating my holding and just taking the offsetting loss. Unfortunately for Republicans this stinker is going to stay in their portfolio for three more years.
Yup…
But this is the same Democratic leadership that “arranged” the confirmation of Roberts after the WH Katrina debacle… so I am not holding my breath. Any mention of “Bi-partisanship”… and we will know that they fucked up and sold out the base AGAIN.
Why do so called Dems think that aligning themselves with the most vile characters of the GOP gives them more credibility…. quite a sad commentary.
When you present a percentage change in the polls for Bush, how are you computing it?
I am not expressing it as a percentage, rather as a pure shift. Thus if a 20 for and 10 against becomes 10 for and 20 against, that is a 20-point shift.
The new NBC/WSJ poll was conducted November 4-7, 2005 and consisted of 1003 adult interviews.It reports Bush’s job approval rating at 38%, an all-time low. 57% disapprove, an all-time high. In the wake of 9/11 Bush was at an88% approval and 7% disapproval rating. He has suffered a startling 100-point reversal.
OK. I may be slow, but how is a 100-point reversal computed?
He went from 88% approval to 38% approval. that is a shift of 50-points. He went from 7% disapproval to 57% disaproval. That is another 50-point shift. When you go from 50-points up to 50-points down you have a 100-point shift.
Thanks.
Isn’t that sort of double counting the magnitude of the shift?
You seem to be counting the negative shift for Bush (which implies an equal positive shift for the negative) and then adding the positive shift for the opposite view to the negative shift for Bush.
The two numbers seem to be automatically the converse of each other. A negative move of 50% implies a move of 50% for the positive. They are the same thing, aren’t they?
Not at all. the sheer immensity of the numbers is putting you off, but if someone went from 2 down to 2 up would a 4-point shift seem bother you? The 100-point shift is based on the same math.
OK. And each shift is counted from that candidate’s previous reading, so the two are in fact additive and numbers over 100% are possible. They are not starting from the same base.
Thanks for straigtening me out about that.
I know I must have problems, but how bad are they when Bush’s nightmares are my wet dreams?
On second thought don’t answer :p
In most cases, I’m really glad that polls aren’t the driving force of actual action in politics. As the American public’s opinions seesaw back and forth across the political landscape from year to year, I think any direct linking of polls to government structure would insure pure chaos, like unsupervised 4-yr olds in a playground.
That said, I don’t see how these ever lower poll numbers are going to get BushCo. out of office anytime soon. The way poll numbers are commented upon,
makes it seem as if these numbers have the power to sweep Cheney & Co. from positions of power. I’m not seduced by this subtle message.
Constitutionally, we’re still stuck with the endorsed (again, unelected) president until January 20, 2009, and a still solidly lemming Republican Congress still willing to do the bidding of greed, evil, selfishness, feudalist establishment and non-cooperation.
If we really want to change things, let’s consider at least at first in our minds creating a parliamentary system, trying to transit our government over say a 30-year period out of this melee of experimental democracy to something with better “check and balances.”
I don’t know where phrases like the one quoted above will serve us any but to gloat in our self-satisfactions that BushCo. is suffering popularity. It’s not a presidential election year, and the seesaw of our people can swing quickly back to regressive reactionary emotion-based opinion easily enough, no? Gloating does nothing but comfort our worst fears of destruction until the next threat from BushCo. comes forward.
Let’s channel our energies into changing the House and Senate, so that we can IMPEACH these monsters in the Executive Branch. Let’s take back the Congress via the Democratic Party and Independents and Greens and emergent others can correct the wrongs of selfishness, greed and power obsession. We need to at least, at least, reduce the excessive powers of the Executive Branch which have gotten more powerful since FDR’s reign in the 30’s and 40’s.
I love to gloat too, but only in the context of knowing that it’s just the beginning of a turnaround, not the middle or the end.
NYT: House Leaders Postpone Vote on Budget Bill “Facing defeat, House Republican leaders on Thursday abruptly called off a vote on a contentious budget-cutting bill in a striking display of the discord and political anxiety running through the party’s ranks.”
CNN: House suspends Alaska drilling push “A solid phalanx of Republican moderates drove House GOP leaders to drop a hotly contested plan to open an Alaskan wilderness area to oil drilling as a sweeping budget bill headed toward a vote Thursday.”
An increasing number of those lemmings are unwilling to follow Bush over that cliff. A substantial fraction of the Republican Party is looking in the mirror and wondering how they were moved from the Party of Lincoln to the Hot Tub Party of Tom Delay. And not liking at all what is going on under the surface.
Lousy poll numbers for Bush are a delight, but this administration’s handmaidens, especially in the form of Lindsey Graham, have just managed to pass a bill in the Senate that effectively wipes out every right achieved since the Magna Carta was signed, in cancelling Habeus Corpus. I am sick at my stomach over what these criminals have done to this country.
but I do know that there is no recovery for him from this that anybody could equate to Reagan or Clinton. The one thing that the man did that I didn’t know anybody could do was crack this nation like an egg during a major emotional crisis for us all – 9/11. I felt my nation all join hands to do what we needed to do the remedy the situation and the commitment was overwhelming. It was difficult for many to abandon ship, they clung to any last little shred of rope there was to the bitter end. A president doesn’t break people like this and recover! I think most Americans are only beginning to tap into their anger and rage about everything. He is doomed and he is drowning his party too………and they are leaving him now during their election bids. He has only begun to fry!
.
Throw Checks & Balances Out the Window ¶ Guantanamo Bay, Cuba ~
House Leaders Postpone Vote on Budget Bill
WASHINGTON (NYT) Nov. 10 – Facing defeat, House Republican leaders yesterday abruptly called off a vote on a contentious budget-cutting bill of $50 billion in a striking display of the discord and political anxiety running through the party’s ranks.
Representative Tom DeLay afterHouse Republican leaders postponed
a budget-cutting vote.
Stephen Crowley/The New York Times
It was a stunning retreat for a Republican majority that has prided itself on iron discipline and an ability to win even the most difficult floor votes consistently.
It was set against Democratic election victories on Tuesday that left Republicans worried about the 2006 midterm contests.
It was also a setback for Mr. Blunt, who is filling in as majority leader for Representative Tom DeLay and would be a candidate for the job permanently should Mr. DeLay’s legal problems persist in Texas, where he is under criminal indictment.
“I’m the whip,” said Mr. Blunt, who with Speaker J. Dennis Hastert of Illinois spent hours yesterday closeted with lawmakers trying to line up backing for the bill.
House leadership dropped its plan to allow oil drilling
in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge as part of the budget bill.
“Treason doth never prosper: what’s the reason?
For if it prosper, none dare call it treason.”
▼▼▼ READ MY DIARY
.
WASHINGTON (1 hour ago) – Most Americans say they aren’t impressed by the ethics and honesty of the Bush administration, already under scrutiny for its justifications for an unpopular war in Iraq and its role in the leak of a covert CIA officer’s identity.
Almost six in 10 — 57 percent — said they do not think the Bush administration has high ethical standards and the same portion says President Bush is not honest, an AP-Ipsos poll found. Just over four in 10 say the administration has high ethical standards and that Bush is honest. Whites, Southerners and white evangelicals were most likely to believe Bush is honest.
United Methodists Repent Their Sins for Iraq War
Horror link to Fox News!
WASHINGTON Nov. 10 — Ninety-five bishops from President Bush’s church said they repent their “complicity” in the “unjust and immoral” invasion and occupation of Iraq.
“In the face of the United States administration’s rush toward military action based on misleading information, too many of us were silent,” said a statement of conscience signed by more than half of the 164 retired and active United Methodist bishops worldwide.
The signatures were also an instrument for retired bishops to make their views known, said bishop Joseph H. Yeakel, who served in the Baltimore-Washington area from 1984 to 1996. The current bishop for the Baltimore-Washington area, John R. Schol, also signed the statement.
The statement avoids making accusations, said retired Bishop Kenneth L. Carder, instructor at Duke University’s divinity school and an author of the document.
###
Methodist Judicial Court Homosexuality Ruling Fuels Revolt
The 65 active Methodist bishops in the nation, meeting in Lake Junaluska, N.C., unanimously voted to issue a pastoral letter contesting a 5-3 ruling in Houston by the eight-member Judicial Council. The council’s rulings are the final word on Methodist doctrine.
“Treason doth never prosper: what’s the reason?
For if it prosper, none dare call it treason.”
▼▼▼ READ MY DIARY
are feeling the heat. The so-called moderates started standing up and representing their constituency (for a couple of hours anyway). People were urged by their churches to call and protest the cuts in services to the needy.
HOWEVER, they will not go down easy and the habeas thing shows that they will still do what they do best – fling something up for public notice while they screw us over with something else. Only when we actually get these bast**ds out of office will we begin to see some improvement.
But I also have another caveat. We cannot listen to the news media as to what the dems should look like. We have to come to our own consensus. I was appalled that even with our good news lately getting (or keeping ) two dems governorships the point driven by the news media was that these folks had “moderate” (read conservative) policies and that the dems should play to the “moderate” (again read conservative) folks for their votes. All of us liberals or progressives need not apply for a voice in government according to the media.
I agree. We’re seeing a backlash vote right now. Many of those who voted Bush are starting to realize they got snookered, but most of these people are also spitting mad at the whole process right now. The Dems need to work at appealing those people and playing to them by being a non-evil Bush will not work in 2008.
Hopefully having Dean at the head of the DNC will give the Dems a good chance to redefine themselves. Now is the time for the Dems to start leading again. Here’s where I’m hoping they go:
End the war in Iraq
Balance the Budget
Single-payer health care
Energy Independence