| WIKI | FAQ | Tech FAQ | |
 http://csua.com/feed/ | |
| ||||||
| 4/3 |
| 2008/7/8-11 [Politics/Domestic/California, Politics/Domestic/President/Bush] UID:50495 Activity:low |
7/8 Congress approval in single digits for first time ever
http://preview.tinyurl.com/5d496t
\_ The Democrats in Congress are considerably higher, though
still quite low, at 21%:
http://www.pollingreport.com/cong_dem.htm
\_ The trick is, the Republicans are also 21% favorable.
"Congress" is too amorphous a body to have a meaningful
approval rating. -tom
\_ Also meaningless because generally people like their guy.
And since you can only vote for your guy overal approval
rating is really just a indicator of how fucked up people
think the country/economy is getting.
\_ But the comparison to previous congresses is valid.
\_ The way this congress handled issues like war spending, Farm Bill,
and the upcoming FISA bill make me want to vote out pretty much
every incumbent senator and congressman out of office regardless
of party affiliation, starting with Nancy Pelosi. This congress
has not attempted to resolve any issues that they were elected
to work on, and for the last 12 months they had been for the
most part engaging in election year politics and pandering to voters.
most part engaging in election year politics and pandering to
voters.
\_ Totally agree. Didn't we elect them to remove the rubber-stamp
practices? I don't get why Pelosi doesn't stand up to Bush
the way she did when first elected, telling the President he
needed to calm down. Since then, every confrontation the
democrats have caved. Almost all the slightly controvertial
legislation they have passed has been vetoed, why does Bush
have any credibility or sway with them anymore? Its getting
pretty annoying that the republicans vote in a complete block
but the democrats can't come to a cohesive position... ever.
\- i'm willing to wait and see what kind of hearings we get
about cheney and the other liars and theives and tortures
after the election. i can see being risk averse if it looks
like you will cruise to victory.
\_ Not exactly:
http://preview.tinyurl.com/5n4kc2 [yahoo news] |
| 4/3 |
|
| preview.tinyurl.com/5d496t -> rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/mood_of_america/congressional_performance/congressional_performance ae0ed026 The percentage of voters who give Congress good or excellent ratings has fallen to single digits for the first time in Rasmussen Reports tracking history. This month, just 9% say Congress is doing a good or excellent job. Most voters (52%) say Congress is doing a poor job, which ties the record high in that dubious category. Last month, 11% of voters gave the legislature good or excellent ratings. Congress has not received higher than a 15% approval rating since the beginning of 2008. The percentage of Democrats who give Congress positive ratings fell from 17% last month to 13% this month. The number of Democrats who give Congress a poor rating remained unchanged. Among Republicans, 8% give Congress good or excellent ratings, up just a point from last month. Sixty-five percent (65%) of GOP voters say Congress is doing a poor job, down a single point from last month. Voters not affiliated with either party are the most critical of Congressional performance. Just 3% of those voters give Congress positive ratings, down from 6% last month. Sixty-three percent (63%) believe Congress is doing a poor job, up from 57% last month. Just 12% of voters think Congress has passed any legislation to improve life in this country over the past six months. The majority of voters (62%) say Congress has not passed any legislation to improve life in America. Just 41% find it at least somewhat likely that Congress will address important problems facing our nation in the near future, while 55% find this unlikely. Most voters (72%) think most members of Congress are more interested in furthering their own political careers. Just 14% believe members are genuinely interested in helping people. ElectionEdge(TM) Premium Service for Election 2008 offers the most comprehensive public opinion coverage ever provided for a Presidential election. Scott Rasmussen, president of Rasmussen Reports, has been an independent pollster for more than a decade. This national telephone survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted by Rasmussen Reports July 1, 2008. The margin of sampling error for the survey is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Survey of 1,000 Likely Voters July 1, 2008 How would you rate the way Congress is doing its job? |
| www.pollingreport.com/cong_dem.htm Data are from nationwide surveys of Americans 18 & older. "How would you rate the job Democrats in Congress are doing: excellent, pretty good, only fair, or poor?" "Do you approve or disapprove of the way the Democrats in Congress are doing their job?" Approve Disapprove Unsure % % % 1/30 - 2/1/08 39 54 7 12/6-9/07 40 53 6 10/29 - 11/1/07 36 58 6 9/27-30/07 38 57 5 7/18-21/07 46 51 2 5/29 - 6/1/07 44 49 6 4/12-15/07 54 44 2 10/5-8/06 48 50 3 5/11-15/06 39 58 4 10/30 - 11/2/05 41 54 5 6/2-5/05 42 56 3 6/99 51 42 7 3/99 51 42 7 7/97 45 49 6 Pew Research Center for the People & the Press survey conducted by Princeton Survey Research Associates International. All other surveys conducted by Princeton Survey Research Associates International.. "Do you approve or disapprove of the job the Democratic leaders in Congress are doing?" Approve Disapprove Unsure % % % 1/9-13/08 31 53 16 11/20-26/07 35 50 15 10/17-23/07 31 54 15 7/25-29/07 33 54 13 5/30 - 6/3/07 34 49 17 4/18-22/07 36 43 21 2/7-11/07 41 36 23 1/10-15/07 39 34 27 9/21 - 10/4/06 35 53 12 6/14-19/06 32 50 18 3/8-12/06 34 46 20 1/4-8/06 34 48 18 11/3-6/05 36 44 20 10/6-10/05 32 48 20 9/8-11/05 36 45 19 5/11-15/05 39 41 20 3/17-21/05 37 44 19 2/04 38 42 20 6/02 47 36 17 5/02 42 37 21 2/02 49 30 21 9/01 49 30 21 6/01 50 28 22 USA Today/Gallup Poll. "Do you approve or disapprove of the way the Democrats in Congress are handling their job?" Approve Disapprove Unsure % % % 12/14-16/07 30 64 5 8/3-5/07 37 55 7 2/9-11/07 41 50 9 6/23-25/06 38 55 8 10/21-23/05 41 53 6 4/29 - 5/1/05 40 52 8 11/03 47 50 3 10/03 45 48 7 4/02 57 32 11 8/01 52 38 10 6/01 54 37 9 8/00 56 34 10 7/00 51 36 13 4/00 46 42 12 11/99 49 42 9 10/99 48 44 8 8/99 48 41 11 6/99 46 46 8 FOX News/Opinion Dynamics Poll. Except where noted, results below are among registered voters. "Do you approve or disapprove of the job Democrats in Congress are doing?" Approve Disapprove Unsure % % % 6/26-27/07 36 49 15 10/24-25/06 LV 37 46 17 9/26-27/06 LV 39 48 13 5/2-3/06 36 49 15 4/4-5/06 29 51 20 2/28 - 3/1/06 36 48 16 1/10-11/06 39 41 20 11/8-9/05 33 47 20 CBS News Poll. "In general, is your opinion of the Democrats in Congress favorable or not favorable?" Favorable Unfavorable Unsure % % % 2/8-11/07 54 35 11 10/30 - 11/1/05 41 45 14 10/3-5/05 43 46 11 5/20-23/05 44 43 13 CNN Poll conducted by Opinion Research Corporation. "Do you approve or disapprove of the way the Democrats in Congress are handling their job?" Approve Disapprove Unsure % % % 10/13-15/06 42 54 4 8/30 - 9/2/06 35 57 8 Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg Poll. As of today, is it very favorable, somewhat favorable, somewhat unfavorable, very unfavorable or haven't you heard enough about them to say?" Favorable Unfavorable Haven't Heard Unsure % % % % 9/16-19/06 40 41 16 4 6/24-27/06 34 36 24 6 4/8-11/06 41 38 17 4 CNN/Time Poll conducted by Harris Interactive. "Next, I'm going to read you the names of some people in the news today. Please tell me whether you have generally favorable or generally unfavorable impressions of each, or whether you are not familiar enough to say one way or another. Favorable Unfav- orable Not Familiar Unsure % % % % 11/13-14/02 43 31 22 4 3/13-14/02 47 28 20 5 11/7-8/01 59 15 21 5 7/17-18/01 48 27 20 5 3/21-22/01 48 22 23 7 5/26-27/99 50 31 13 6 1/7/99 55 26 12 7 12/17-18/98 53 27 13 7 9/23-24/98 52 27 17 4 9/16-17/98 59 23 10 8 1/14-15/98 50 25 17 8 . " Bloomberg News Poll conducted by Princeton Survey Research Associates. "Do you approve or disapprove of the job the Democratic leaders in Congress are doing?" |
| preview.tinyurl.com/5n4kc2 -> news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20080709/pl_politico/11617;_ylt=AleEcVxUm_c4zdE7xjQCra4b.3QA Not exactly Daniel Libit Wed Jul 9, 5:40 AM ET Matt Drudge blew the ram's horn early Tuesday morning: "Congressional Approval Rating Falls to Single Digits for First Time Ever." Within minutes, the conservative group Freedom's Watch was blasting the news out to reporters. WnmfDxJJQDCw5R4/Y=YAHOO/EXP=1215652549/L=GApa6UWTVvr83xETQI4V vwYURTfow0h1RqUAA2GF/B=W6RhCNGDJHg-/J=1215645349313964/A=5406809/R=0/* "A new national survey out today puts congressional approval in the single digits, at 9 percent," Putnam told reporters gathered for a pen-and-paper session. "At the rate we are going now, gas prices and congressional approval should cross paths any day now." Congressional approval ratings are low and getting lower, but the Rasmussen Reports poll numbers that had Drudge breaking, Freedom's Watch blasting and Putnam bludgeoning Tuesday weren't really congressional approval ratings, even if Rasmussen's own headline described them as such. Rasmussen didn't ask respondents whether they approved or disapproved of Congress; it asked respondents to rank Congress' job performance as excellent, good, fair or poor. Just 2 percent rated the performance as excellent, and 7 percent rated it as good. But 36 percent of Rasmussen's respondents said they consider Congress' job performance to be fair. Rasmussen CEO Scott Rasmussen said that's a fair question but one without a clear answer. His best guess: If you converted the thinking behind the answers into the binary results of most polls -- approval or disapproval -- then Congress' approval rating might actually be as high as the mid-20s. That's higher than the 13 percent approval rating Congress got in an "approve or disapprove" NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll last month. But it's well below the 41 percent favorable rating Congress got last month when The Pew Research Center for the People & the Press asked whether voters had a favorable or unfavorable view of Congress. Pew's Michael Dimock said asking respondents -- as Rasmussen did -- to say whether Congress is doing an excellent job or a good job amounts to setting a higher bar. "You have to actively think they are doing a good job, and not many people ever have that view of Congress," Dimock said. Of course, fewer people today seem to have that view than in years past. When Democrats took control of Congress in January 2007, 53 percent of Pew's respondents said they had a favorable view of the institution. However you gauge it, Rasmussen says it's "impossible to overstate the general level of cynicism people feel about Congress and the functioning of government." Rasmussen is quick to note that polls such as his do not presuppose that respondents are paying close attention to the daily goings-on in the halls and hearing rooms of Capitol Hill. So maybe Congress is just a national metonym for "government" or "the world" or "the crappy way things are going these days." Rasmussen's poll delved a bit into America's anti-Congress sentiment. It found, for example, that likely voters think most members of Congress are more interested in furthering their own political careers (72 percent) than in helping other people (14 percent). It also found that 62 percent of likely voters think Congress hasn't passed any legislation this year that will "significantly improve life in America." But Brookings Institution scholar Thomas Mann wonders how they would know. "The reality is, most Americans don't have a clue of what is actually being done or not being done by Congress," Mann said. "They are sort of grasping at bits of information that they come on that is general statements of general productivity." Mann said that most Americans have failed to internalize the Madisonian Model, let alone its dilatory and argumentative nature. "The other problem," Mann said, "is that most of the reporting on Congress, most of the stories people hear, are failures or examples of scandal or corruption, of filibusters or failure to act on legislation or campaign fundraising conflicts." A survey respondent who disapproves of Congress might feel that way because of the agenda the Democrats are pursuing. Or the respondent might disapprove because the Republicans are standing in the way of that agenda. Putnam said Tuesday that poll results such as Rasmussen's show both parties that 2008 is shaping up to be "a strenuously anti-incumbent cycle" -- but that the Democrats have the most cause for worry because they have more seats to lose. "I would argue that all incumbents are facing head winds that they have never seen before," Putnam said. "And the arithmetic of that is that it will disproportionately affect the party with the most seats. Add to that the fuel -- forgive the pun -- that is this energy dynamic in Congress. Frustration over lack of solutions over high gas prices is certainly a driver in the low congressional approval rating. on any aspect of solving this problem, I think, puts them in grave danger." The counterpoint: In last month's NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, 52 percent of the respondents said they would like to see Congress controlled by the Democrats next year, while just 33 percent said they wanted to see the Republicans back in charge. Does that mean that the approve-disapprove, favorable-unfavorable, excellent-good-fair-poor polling is wrong? It just means those polls -- taken alone -- aren't all that useful as crystal balls. "We feel one of the major purposes of polling is to provide Americans ongoing views of their government, which is different than projecting election probabilities," Newport said. "This captures the underlying faith and attitudes people have in Congress and their president. No, but they are important indicators taken with other indicators." |