Congressional Dems' Approval Tops Bush's, Congressional GOP's

by Jonathan Singer, Thu Jul 12, 2007 at 02:01:07 PM EDT

For all of the talk of President Bush's abysmal approval rating being slightly higher than Congress' abysmal approval rating, the far more important and meaningful comparison to make is the approval rating of Democrats in Congress. The latest Harris Interactive poll (.pdf, via Atrios) does just that, and the numbers look like this:

	Approve	Disapprove
Dems in Congress	31	64
George W. Bush	26	73
GOP in Congress	21	76

As you can see from this polling, Congressional Democrats aren't terribly popular these days. In fact, their favorable rating has dropped 10 points since February and 4 points since April. Yet at the same time, Congressional Democrats are more popular than the President and quite a bit more popular than Congressional Republicans, who are about as popular as the plague. Nancy Pelosi's numbers, while having fallen from a high of 38 percent in the poll back in February to 34 percent today, are also significantly higher than those of the President or Republicans in Congress.

There still remains quite a bit of work for Democrats in Congress to do before they are able to regain some of the trust they earned during the lead up to the 2006 midterm elections all the way up through their ascension to the majority in the House and the Senate earlier this year. That said, there's no way for the GOP to spin the fact that the Democrats are significantly more popular than the Republicans, that individual Democratic leaders like Nancy Pelosi are more popular than individual Republican leaders like George W. Bush, and that generally the Democrats are in a stronger position than the Republicans a quarter of the way through the 2008 cycle.

Tags: Approval Rating, Congressional Democrats, George W. Bush (all tags)

Comments

7 Comments

Sort by

permalink

Re: Congressional Dems' Approval Tops Bush's...

They will spin it the same way they have been for weeks, by pointing out that Congress has an approval rating in the dumpster and that they aren't accomplishing anything.

The key here isn't how THEY spin it, it is rather what this information really means.

The fact that Dems in Congress are more popular than the Republicans or the President is a sign that we have to do more about other aspects of our agenda in addition to continuing to push on Iraq (hitting the White House hard for ignoring subpeonas, and for general douchebaggery wouldn't hurt either.)

by JDF 2007-07-12 02:05PM | 0 recs

permalink

personally...

i'd throw it back at bush. "bush is dragging us all down. he's so unpopular plus he's so stubborn that he throws up road block preventing the government from functioning properly everywhere he can. for six years, bush argued that elections have consequences, but when elections don't turn out his way, he does everything he can to avoid the consequences."

only sharper, more to the point, less wordy...

by bored now 2007-07-13 05:51AM | 0 recs

permalink

Re: Congressional Dems' Approval Tops Bush's, Cong

Yep, but amidst your own spin let me remind you that still means that a very large chunk of the country is pretty pissed off at the Dems too... and 31 percent is still abysmally low.

by MNPundit 2007-07-12 05:30PM | 0 recs

permalink

Re: Congressional Dems' Approval Tops Bush's, Cong

I suspect, though, that disapproval of the Dems is a lot softer than disapproval of the Prez and GOP.

If the Dems actually start standing up to the others, their approval will rebound. Only Iraqis throwing flowers at the feet of our soldiers by say...tomorrow would result in a similar rebound for the GOP.

by howie14 2007-07-13 06:08AM | 0 recs

permalink

Re: Congressional Dems' Approval Tops Bush's

While I am not happy with our Congress, these stats really do not indicate the disaparity in the degree of discontent of each person in the 20% odd that disapproves of the President. If I were in the poll, I would be saying I disapprove of both the President and the COngress. But my disapproval of the Congress is only a fraction of my disapproval of the President.

by Pravin 2007-07-13 03:05AM | 0 recs

permalink

thanks for this...

i might have missed it. what's the national generic ballot numbers? as much as i like knowing that democrats in congress are more popular than bush -- something i hope they remind bush of, frequently -- i'd imagine the proper response to "congress in more unpopular than bush" is to pair democratic popularity with this number and the generic ballot number. just my thoughts...

by bored now 2007-07-13 05:29AM | 0 recs

permalink

Re: Congressional Dems' Approval

Everyone makes a big deal about the Democratic approval. Well here is the GOP approvals. The Democrats enjoy a 12 pt advantage on the generic congressional ballot.

by olawakandi 2007-07-13 08:21AM | 0 recs