Poll: Public Dissatisfied With War, Country’s Direction And Democratic Congress
A new poll has some more bad news for the administration — but it has particularly bad news for the Democratic Congress. In fact, the poll spells t-r-o-u-b-l-e:
Growing frustration with the performance of the Democratic Congress, combined with widespread public pessimism over President Bush’s temporary troop buildup in Iraq, has left satisfaction with the overall direction of the country at its lowest point in more than a decade, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.
Almost six in 10 Americans said they do not think the additional troops sent to Iraq since the beginning of the year will help restore civil order there, and 53 percent — a new high in Post-ABC News polls — said they do not believe that the war has contributed to the long-term security of the United States.
Bush continues to have basement-level poll ratings — but the new twist is that the Democrats are facing deteriorating ratings in Congress. And if you look at the numbers, some of the soured voters are Democrats. Danger: if Democrats either don’t vote or don’t aggressively work for candidates of their own party in 2008, the Democratic Party’s hold on Congress could be in danger or at least greatly weakened:
Disapproval of Bush’s performance in office remains high, but the poll highlighted growing disapproval of the new Democratic majority in Congress. Just 39 percent said they approve of the job Congress is doing, down from 44 percent in April, when the new Congress was about 100 days into its term. More significant, approval of congressional Democrats dropped 10 percentage points over that same period, from 54 percent to 44 percent.
Much of that drop was fueled by lower approval ratings of the Democrats in Congress among strong opponents of the war, independents and liberal Democrats. While independents were evenly split on the Democrats in Congress in April (49 percent approved, 48 percent disapproved), now 37 percent said they approved and 54 percent disapproved. Among liberal Democrats, approval of congressional Democrats dropped 18 points.
Bush’s overall job-approval rating stands at 35 percent, unchanged from April.
The big question is whether disappointed members of the Democratic Party who feel the Congress has not acted swiftly and/or strongly enough decide to sit on their hands in 2008. If so, the GOP will pick up seats. Democrats have cast protest votes (Ralph Nader) or not voted before and the beneficiary has been the GOP. Is it heading in that direction again?
Most likely: it’s still a long way to the election and George Bush, Dick Cheney and Karl Rove have a way of unifying Democrats — even disgruntled ones.
14 Responses to “Poll: Public Dissatisfied With War, Country’s Direction And Democratic Congress”
Any one who thinks that the Republicans are going to win enough elections to regain either the House or Senate must have smoked more crack than the women who ran her car through the festival in DC.
The only question in the house and senate races in 2008 is whether the Democrats will get to 60 seats or not. The Republicans only have a chance to unseat one Democrat (La) but the Republicans will probably lose in Colorado, Minnesota, Oregon, and New Hampshire. The Democrats also could pick up seats in Virginia, New Mexico, or Maine.
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The truth is most people vote against the party they think is more damaging to the country. The Democrats have not exactly lit a fire on Capitol Hill due to a variety of things. First they don’t have a supermajority in both houses, which the public most likely does not understand. Second, there is disunity within the party on issues such as the war. The GOP has always been more unified in their voting patterns. Third, they have only been in office for 4 1/2 months. Getting out of Iraq will not be as easy as getting in. The drop in popularity reflects dissatisfaction with their inability to get the timelines passed.
Nail – meet Hammer! Exactly right, well said Kim.
kritter,
the Republicans never had a supermajority for six years. The public did not understand it then but that did not stop the Democrats from calling them a do-nothing Congress.
Of course, the first real test of the Democratic leadership is if all of the budget bills are passed by September 30. That was something the Hastert lead House never could accomplish.
They didn’t need it with a Republican president who they supported in lockstep. Remember the Hammer? You need a supermajority if you are overriding a veto.
kritter,
The Republicans never had 60 votes in the Senate. thus, they could never close debate on any issue when the Democrats did not want it closed. Since the Democrats in 2005 and 2006 were using a scorched earth policy, nothing was accomplished and then the Democratic Party called the Republicans do nothing. That is why the most important result in 2008 is whether the Democrats get to 60 Senate seats or not. Of course it seems like everyone would rather talk about the bust size of Fred Thompson’s wife instead of the whether John Warner is going to retire.
Well both sides have obstructed each other. You can see with the immigration bill that both extremes attack the middle when they do manage to compromise. I think the real problem is that we are polarized 50/50. But the GOP also tried to use uberloyalty to Bush to force things through, instead of working with the Democrats in 05-06.
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sd,
What is the bust size of Fred Thompson’s wife?
Chris- XL
And I hear she works the stripper pole LOL.
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