The Official Obama Approval Ratings Thread

[pbrower2a]

Obama is slipping some -- probably because he is out of the country.

Haha, what?  Do you think people are like, "Ah! I don't see the President! Where is he, where is he?! He's horrible!"

When a mad leader in North Korea fires off missiles and has a nuke program, any missiles (nukes or not) that that mad leader orders fired at the West Coast must pass through Russian airspace, and our President gets a chance to discuss what to do about it with the Russian political leadership and gets a chance, do you think that he would be wise to take factory tours in Ohio instead?

To put it crudely, he had better do diplomacy with Russia so that people in Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Sacramento, Fresno, Los Angeles, San Diego can be sure of being able to vote for him. Vaporized people don't vote, among other things. If one of our great cities is hit hard enough, then a high level of unemployment there will be the least of most people's problems.

Who wants to create jobs for grave diggers? 

 

[pbrower2a]

Obama is down to 51% in Rassy and down to  56% in the RCP average.

Don't worry, Dems, I'm sure that Obama is as invincible as you've all told us for months.

I'm not worried considering Saint Reagan was sitting at 35% in Gallup as of January 1983

Saint Reagan's won because the economy recovered in the second half of '83.  So Obama should be fine if the next election doesn't happen until 2017.

I don't see how the economy would take that long to recover when almost every group of economists has predicted the recovery to start in 2010...

The same economists who didn't see the crash coming?  The same economists who now have to admit their stimulus projections were wrong because they underestimated the recession?

And when they say the recession will end, they mean GDP will stop literally shrinking.  That doesn't mean they are predicting recovery.

In 1984 the economy grew at a 5.8% pace.  For 1983 it grew at a 7.7% pace.  There is nothing like that on the horizon.

I have only a BA in economics, and I saw this meltdown coming. Real estate prices can't continue to overshoot incomes indefinitely, and rip-off lending eventually wrecks borrowers so that they must scale back their consumption to the barest necessities of life after they exhaust their assets and creditors find people un-creditworthy.  The downsizing of our industrial base was certain to result in a damaging imbalance of payments with a resulting debasement of currency.

I expected this one to be far worse than the effects of the stagflation of the middle-to-late 1970s. All that would keep it from being as bad as that of 1929-1933 was New Deal reforms and Great Society programs that would prevent bank runs, ensure that retirees have some income, and that people would have the equivalent of food stamps. I just couldn't think of any means in which to take advantage of the situation.  The stagflation of the 1970s resulted from inflation in energy prices that drove the price of everything else up; this one suggests major losses of American capital.

[pbrower2a]

2012 President
Obama 36%, Romney 34%

I'm pretty sure most of the 30% who didn't give an answer are Republicans, so not to worry.

That Obama should be slightly ahead of Romney in Texas even with a large number of undecided suggests that

(1) Texans don't know Romney well enough to make a decision,

(2) Romney would be in trouble in Texas in 2012 against Obama, or

(3) Huckabee would do far better than Romney in Texas.

I would have expected Romney to fare better than Huckabee in Texas.

[pbrower2a]

The las trip probably helped, but not this one.  We're approaching that six months mark.

This one is even more important because the Russian leadership has more to say about whether our Korea policy works -- or doesn't -- except for the leadership of the PRC. 

Should the mad tyrant of North Korea vaporize an American city with a missile and a nuke, then President Obama's approval ratings in recent weeks won't matter; they will then fall precipitously. 38 or 62 the day before? They will be in the teens within a week.

Oh -- Obama was able to get Russia to allow American access to Afghanistan through Russia. Nice deal, likely with good effects.

[pbrower2a]

I mark 'em down, so I also mark 'em up. Same day, same state, and one pivotal in the last three Presidential elections, so I average it (Ohio):

.... Mississippi, North Dakota, and Montana have yet to show up, and there are some old polls that I'd like to see get superseded (notably Arizona and Colorado, but also a bunch of southern states).

Note well that after Obama took a foreign junket during the 2008 campaign, his polls slipped some.  The same effect may apply this time, too.

[pbrower2a]

Assessment of the likelihood of Obama winning certain states in 2012 (by sequence):

First five for Obama: deep red   
Second ten for Obama: red
Third five for Obama: pink
Fourth two for Obama:orange
Fourth five for a generic Republican: aqua
Third five for generic Republican: light blue
Second ten for generic Republican: blue
First five for generic Republican: deep blue

All others are in white.

Obama will have to win anything in a reddish color or pale orange as well as one in white to win. The generic Republican dares not lose anything in any shade of red, orange, or white.

[pbrower2a]

tender you forgot to add texas ...

The Texas poll today pitted Obama against Romney, and although it gave a slight lead to Obama, it was something like 39-36 with so many undecided (obviously!) that it is worthless even at its purpose. 

I'm surprised that so few Texas voters know about Romney.

[pbrower2a]

http://publicpolicypolling.blogspot.com/2009/07/obama-up-big-on-pawlenty-palin.html

In case anyone wondered whether Pawlenty had any viability as a GOP nominee, then look at how he does in his own state, Minnesota, against Obama:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Whoops! There goes another question mark!

If Pawlenty can't do well in Minnesota, then he certainly won't pick off Wisconsin, Iowa, or Michigan for the GOP in 2012, those states being most similar to Minnesota in their political cultures -- states that the GOP will need to win if something goes wrong for the GOP in the South, like poor whites finding that they have common interests with poor black people.

[pbrower2a]

Obama is down to 51% in Rassy and down to  56% in the RCP average.

Don't worry, Dems, I'm sure that Obama is as invincible as you've all told us for months.

I'm not worried considering Saint Reagan was sitting at 35% in Gallup as of January 1983

Saint Reagan's won because the economy recovered in the second half of '83.  So Obama should be fine if the next election doesn't happen until 2017.

I don't see how the economy would take that long to recover when almost every group of economists has predicted the recovery to start in 2010...

The same economists who didn't see the crash coming?  The same economists who now have to admit their stimulus projections were wrong because they underestimated the recession?

No, the same economists that said that the GOP neutering of the stimulus bill would slow the recovery because Republicans underestimated the recession.

It is amazing that it took only six months for the left's argument to reach this point.

The failure of Keynesianism is evidence of the need for more Keynesianism!

Your arguments have reached the point where nothing is ever falsifiable.  If your polices fail, you can always excuse the failure by saying your policies were not sufficiently pure.  You never have to re-examine your premises or think seriously about where you went wrong, you just have to shout louder.

Supply-side economics has been tried for the last 28 years, and it has proved promising at first and troublesome later. Productivity increases have not resulted in improved living for most Americans, so its very premise has been proved false.

[pbrower2a]

Obama comes down to earth a bit in Minnesota:

but has little to fear from a challenge from Pawlenty:

I may be excessively generous to Pawlenty, whose surname will be no less exotic in the South than "Obama" in 2012 (a huge detriment), and who is likely well known in the Dakotas (except for Rapid City, the more populated areas of the two states' media come from or feed into Minnesota).

We will have a Polish-American President someday; we missed our chance with Muskie, and Pawlenty is not the one.

[pbrower2a]

I will gladly take Keynesian economics over supply-side theory any day of the week. Comparing the historcial performance of each, as well as the logic behind both theories, it's clear Keynes had it right and supply side is a dismal failure.

Supply side has only really been tried once and it was a huge success.

The time that it worked was the 1980s, when lots of young workers (late-wave Baby Boomers)  entered the workforce who learned because of severe competition in the workplace that they would be wise to be thankful just to be able to have food in their bellies, clothes on their backs, the means of getting to work (an aging used car), and protection from the elements (some tiny apartment). Supply-side economics then rode the learning curve of young workers in rapidly-growing service and retail businesses (like fast food places). It could then be imposed with little loss of personal freedom. Poverty, sure, but tycoons and executives can always exempt themselves from its hazards.

The failure of the 1929 economy was not that it was insufficiently productive by the standards of the time.

The cruder sort of Keynesian (depression) economics can fail -- when it is done too long or in inappropriate times. If it is done in a time of inflation -- as Jimmy Carter tried to do -- it leads almost entirely to inflation. When a national economy is working at its maximum of effectiveness and unable to add desirable workers, then bigger government spending can only result in squeezing the private sector.  John Milton Keynes recognized that in the 1930s.

So let's suppose that the following conditions exist:

1. Mass unemployment exists. Where unemployment reaches double digits, competent employees who can be very productive can be found easily. With huge needs, such people will (upon getting a paycheck) spend just about everything they get. They will replace their rags with new clothes. They will celebrate with restaurant meals. They will get medical and dental care that they deferred. They will start commuting and get auto repairs. Their hard-luck relatives will start leeching off them.

2. Real interest rates are near zero -- the liquidity trap. If government simply prints more money, then people will sit on it for fear that there will be no more to come. Look at the image of the Great Depression: the people who still had money were hoarding it in the expectation of later needs, rather than enjoying what remained of the bounties of capitalism.

3. People are averse to investing -- or even maintenance -- in productive activities. Net investment (investment less depreciation) went negative at times around 1930.

4. Productive capacity is grossly under-used. Industrial plants are in mothballs, retail rentals are cheap, raw materials are plentiful. 

Deficit spending that puts people back to work in construction, iron and steel, concrete, brickmaking, lumber, coal, and probably now glass industries and landscaping effectively pays for itself in income tax and sales tax receipts -- and of course reduction in "relief" payments, some of them through the multiplier effect. Some newly-employed construction worker at a dam project or bridge buys, buys, and buys. That worker's income ends up flowing through retail stores, restaurants, apartment rents, etc.

You tell me -- does this time look more like 1930 in economic direction... or 1980?  Keynesian depression economics are relevant now as they weren't in 1980. Indeed, JMK would have told government to cut government spending and raise taxes around 1980 even if it were politically uncomfortable.
 


 

[pbrower2a]

I don’t really want to turn this into an econ threadjack so I will not address all your points, but I do feel the need to correct the most egregious of your errors.

The time that it worked was the 1980s, when lots of young workers (late-wave Baby Boomers)  entered the workforce who learned because of severe competition in the workplace that they would be wise to be thankful just to be able to have food in their bellies, clothes on their backs, the means of getting to work (an aging used car), and protection from the elements (some tiny apartment). Supply-side economics then rode the learning curve of young workers in rapidly-growing service and retail businesses (like fast food places). It could then be imposed with little loss of personal freedom. Poverty, sure, but tycoons and executives can always exempt themselves from its hazards.

The 1980s were not a period where people got less but were happy to get it, which is how you seem to be portraying it.  Inflation and unemployment fell and GDP grew.  Actual economic indicators went in a positive direction at an impressive rate.

And poverty fell in the 1980s!  I don’t have a clue where you would get the idea that most late wave boomers were all stuck working in fast food or that the 1980s created more poor people while shielding tycoons from onrushing social decay.  The America you describe as existing in the 1980s actually has not existed for about a century.

Of course the economic misery that many young workers found to their surprise (I got a college degree and I am working for the minimum wage!) generally did not last long for individuals.  Many learned something from their low-wage job, such as marketable skills more lucratively rewarded elsewhere. Many were stranded for a few months in fast food, retail sales, and cleaning work.

The failure of the 1929 economy was not that it was insufficiently productive by the standards of the time.

No one said that was the cause of the crash of ’29.  In fact, my view of the crash of ’29 is quite the opposite.  The economy needed to slow down in the late ‘20s because we were in a severe bubble.

The cruder sort of Keynesian (depression) economics can fail -- when it is done too long or in inappropriate times. If it is done in a time of inflation -- as Jimmy Carter tried to do -- it leads almost entirely to inflation.

The Carter years were not an anomaly.  In fact, they are quite instructive because the Keynesians said that high unemployment and high inflation in concert were impossible (Or close to impossible).  The very fact that stagflation happened at all undercuts one of the central theses of Keynesianism: That in times of high unemployment we need not worry about inflation.  The late 1970s proved once and for all that inflation is not caused by prosperity, but rather is a primarily a monetary phenomenon.

This is very useful today.  Keynesians dismiss the events of the 1970s as an anomaly.  Then they dramatically expand the monetary base while increasing government expenditures.  They then claim that there is no threat that increasing public expenditures and growing the money supply will create inflation because there isn’t enough consumption to have inflation.  But the 1970s prove that you don’t need an overheated economy to have inflation!  When inflation has returned by the middle of next year, the Keynesians will be very surprised but the monetarists and supply-siders will not.  The reason is that Keynesians never learned the central lessons of stagflation because those lessons were too inconvenient for them.[/quote]

Reason: once-low fuel prices skyrocketed. Until the 1970s the US produced the oil that it needed for fuel; then it became a net importer. If a major component of both productive activities and consumer costs gets more expensive, then one can have both reduced economic activity and rising prices. Few could have predicted that -- monetarists, supply-siders, or monetarists. Until 2007 the highest real cost of petroleum was to be found in the early 1980s.   

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Wrong.  People did not hoard that much in the Great Depression.  The money supply was shrinking when the economy was shrinking.  Once FDR went partially off the Gold Standard and the money supply was allowed to grow people did, in fact, begin consuming as the supply of money increased.  When monetary policy was conducted well, it was an effective stimulus.

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You make the classical economist mistake: You assume that because you can design a stimulus program that will get economic activity going then that means you must be able to actually create that stimulus program in the real world.  But you can’t translate that program from the blackboard to real life.  Part of the reason for that is that politics take over and money is directed towards the politically connected and not towards things that are economically viable.  Part of the reason is that shovel ready projects aren’t shovel ready.  Part of the reason is the leaky bucket problem, where money is siphoned off in administrative costs instead of being injected straight into the economy.

And part of the problem is that central planners often just make bad decisions about where to spend money, so even when the money is spent quickly and does into the economy it often still doesn’t do any good.

[/quote][/quote]

Central planning? Who is asking for central planning? Such aid as business has been getting has been thrown heavily at those culpable of the mess (banks far more than the auto industry). I'd have let the giant banks that got us into this mess fail; banking used to be a cottage industry, and it worked far better for all when it was "Bailey Savings and Loan" instead of "First International Megabank" (Citibank/Wells Fargo/Bank of America/Chase/SunTrust/PNC...) The auto industry? The Big 3 hardly misbehaved so badly, and got burned by the failure of the banking system.

The fault in 1929 as in 2007 -- the ends of corrupt booms based on enrichment of the "right people" (the wealthy, politically-connected) -- was that the people who did the work were terribly underpaid. Such wealth as the economy created tended to go into speculation -- securities in the 1920s and real estate a few years ago. Productivity gains outpaced wages, an unstable situation. Debt burgeoned, and as it outpaced wages, the economic order became a pyramid game in its last stage. Even the political orders of the Harding-Coolidge and Dubya eras were remarkably similar in their unconstrained belief in the concentration of economic power as the cornerstone of some super-prosperity that would make all questions of inequity irrelevant.

The Meltdown of 1929-1933 was the realization that all of the supposed economic gains of the Roaring 'Twenties were a sham. America receded to levels of GDP per capita not known since about 1908. We are going to see much the same as what we thought were assets are either debt that nobody can ever pay off or empty shells that sucked wealth into dubious investments. We may be back to 1950s levels of economic activity faster than we think.   

Of course we have a lack of shovel-ready projects other than repairs. Such an activity as highway construction requires engineering plans, efforts to find politically-feasible routes, and often land acquisition, both of which take time. Supertrains? They are at least as expensive as superhighways and have much the same problems.

Among the administrative costs is engineering cost. Engineering cost is an early cost.  After that comes surveying.

[pbrower2a]

Obama comes down to earth a bit in Minnesota:

Lol at Nevada and Florida. Whatheck is going on?

Housing bust hitting a swing state puts states to Obama by wider margins then he should have won them, especially NV. Housing continues to bust and guess what Obama hasn't solved the problem yet. Even if condiditions stay the same Obama's approvals will drop in the hardest hit areas first and it will show up in the swing states first like NV and FL. The only way the trends top is for things to improve and we are far away from that at this point.

The other side of the coin is that Obama seems to be doing surprisingly well in the Plains states and the  Southeast (FL and NC excepted) -- in places in which he was absolutely crushed in the election. It could be that the more agrarian states have been hurt less, and that there was no corrupt housing boom in places like Tennessee and Arkansas. 

I figure that the recent Lyceum poll in Texas is an outlier, but if Texas is nearly-even, then that suggests big trouble for the GOP. It is consistent with an even-approval rating in Kansas at the least. It could be that the states that voted decisively for McCain were in better economic shape than the others, and that good times favor the incumbent Party and bad times the other.

I see no quick fix to the housing devaluation. Major reforms of the banking industry, including quite possibly the break-up of the giant banking trusts, must take place before there can be any new big lending.  Even the prosecution of culpable people will do more to sate transitory anger than to solve the mess.   

[pbrower2a]

Obama comes down to earth in North Carolina:

Let's see what happens after he's back in the USA for a few days when he can address American audiences. 

[pbrower2a]

Sorry but texas is in yellow ...
http://www.utexas.edu/news/2009/07/09/government_texas_poll/

(My modification)

... and still close. I thought that the Lyceum poll was an outlier.

Face it: if Obama is close in Texas in 2012, the GOP nominee is in deep trouble. I can think of at least one of whom many now tout as a likely challenger for the nomination (Barbour) who would probably lose.  Gingrich probably also loses Texas.

[pbrower2a]

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_state_surveys/minnesota/toplines/toplines_minnesota_july_15_2009
Obama:
F-47
U-46

No where on that link does it have the question of Obama's approval rating.

It's specifically on his health care proposals. Obama has a huge selling job to do.

[pbrower2a]

The 47-51 in Texas looks more ominous for Obama than it is, but such are the rules:

[pbrower2a]

The 47-51 in Texas looks more ominous for Obama than it is, but such are the rules:

So, Florida disapproves of Obama while Utah approves? That's interesting.

The poll for Utah is old -- really old. It could be that Obama had not done anything to offend Mormon sensibilities.

[pbrower2a]

Ouch! Georgia was close in 2008!

We will likely see a bunch of southern states go from green to tan when some of the old polls are supplanted.

[pbrower2a]

Expected (Louisiana):

[pbrower2a]

What is Louisana, gay?

No, not gay enough.

Sorry about the dreadful pun. It's simply reverting to the pattern that it showed in November 2008.

Obama has been President for six months, and he has yet to face a natural disaster. After all, hurricane season has yet to happen, and the southeastern US always gets at least one. How well will he handle it? I can't imagine him bungling the response any hurricane as badly as Dubya bungled the response to Katrina.

[pbrower2a]

Two Midwestern states from SurveyUSA's monthly tracking (KS, MO) . Down to Earth a bit in both states:

Since 1960, the only Presidential candidate to win Missouri and lose the election was John McCain, and THE bellwether state seems to revert to its old pattern. In view of the Blue Firewall, and that there are several states not in the Firewall  more D than Missouri (NM, IA, NH, NV, VA, CO, OH, FL, NC, IN, perhaps AZ),  Obama cannot win Missouri without getting re-elected. Demographic change alone would still be enough to swing Missouri from R to D.

So here's how I call it 39 and a half months out:

Key (margins) :

Deep Blue:     Generic GOP win 10% or more
Blue:              Generic GOP win 6 - 9.9%
Pale Blue:      Generic GOP win, 3 - 5.9%
White             Far too close to call
Pink:              Obama wins 3 - 5.9%
Red:               Obama wins 6- 9.9%
Deep Red:     Obama wins 10% or more 

Jeb Bush or Charlie Crist probably wins Florida, but I don't see either of the two winning the Republican Presidential nomination, and VP won't be enough for either. Thune would probably be enough to flip South Dakota as a VP nominee. Romney stands to lose a raft of Southern states if Obama plays the Clinton-like populist role well this time. Huckabee could lose Utah if he doesn't make amends with the LDS Church and wins the nomination.

[pbrower2a]

Just for the record, Obama is at his lowest approval and highest disapproval in Gallup polling:

Approve 55%
Disapprove 39%

http://www.gallup.com/poll/113980/Gallup-Daily-Obama-Job-Approval.aspx

It's all over!!  It's all over!!

President Obama will be a one termer!!!

BYE BYE BARACK!  BYE BYE BARACK!!

As of January 1983, Ronald Reagan looked like he was going to be one termer too given that he was riding in at 35% approval according to Gallup

Excuses excuses.  I smell desperation!!

IT'S ALL OVER!!!!!  Like an OVERBID on the Price is Right with Bob Barker.  I can even hear Barker sadly saying 'You're Over!' with the loser horns playing in the background.

No desparation here. I've always said that Obama will be held to a high standard, such is the ideological nature of America. As for Reagan's approvals, as of January 1983, I'm merely stating a fact

Considering how badly George W. Botch messed things up, making things far more dangerous for America, it is necessary that President Obama be held to a higher standard than his predecessor.

I almost think that he welcomes a higher standard.

two words:  North Korea.

four letters: Iran. 

[pbrower2a]

I think Republicans need to step back and see how things play out.  Obama's still very early on in his first term and there's more than enough time for him to make these falling numbers go back up again before the next election.  I personally hope they just keep getting lower and lower, because I think everything about him is scary and anti-American and I'm glad my fellow citizens are starting to wise up to his act, but Republicans need to take all of this with a grain of salt or else they'll appear as even bigger fools than they've been acting like for the past six or seven months.

President Obama has demographic trends working in his direction. The youngest voters lean strongly Democratic and are much more liberal than America as a whole. The potential new voters born between 1990 and 1994 in no way show signs of moving away from that tendency. America is becoming less white -- and no non-white groups except perhaps Vietnamese-Americans trend Republican. As the Grim Reaper takes away older and more conservative-leaning voters (by the standards of 2008), the American electorate becomes more amenable to Obama.

Another trend that can do well for Obama is practically any economic recovery. So far the worst bear market in 75 years seems to have abated:



Even if he did nothing to make this recovery possible other than "do nothing stupid" he gets the credit because you-know-who gets the blame for the dangerous downturn.

I have yet to see anything anti-American about him. We don't prove how "American" we are by endorsing recent faults of American leadership any more than a devoted spouse shows loyalty to an alcoholic by providing copious booze and excusing the drunken behavior that one expects from a heavy drinker. Putting an end to those faults is no act of disloyalty.

Scary? Maybe he seems scary because he isn't as "100% American" as you wish.  That concern need not be racial; most American blacks have no African ancestry from persons arriving in America after 1807. His African heritage reeks of the British colonial empire, and someone whose father were from Hong Kong would be no less exotic. But note well that he was born in the United States, so he fits the Constitutional requirement for the Presidency. 

He is not a Muslim; he is no more a Muslim than John Kerry is a Jew because of his father's religious heritage -- as if having a non-Christian father (or not being a Christian)  should disqualify anyone from the Presidency. He gets a perverse sort of endorsement from the condemnation of him from Mahmoud Ahmedinedjad, President of Iran (and certifiable nutcase) as a (derogatory term for a submissive black man who sells out to the white establishment).  Sure, he is without precedent as the first President not descended wholly from stock from the British Isles, Low Countries, France, Germany, and Scandinavia... does that matter?

I can think of worse strategies than "wait and see" from the GOP. Obstruction of what seem like constructive solutions will backfire. Obama might find his ratings going down -- but so will those of any possible rival. Such is no bargain for Americans other than those who seek failure of the system -- typically radicals.

I watch state polls of approval more than I watch national tracking polls -- and the most recent one for Missouri, a state that he lost in 2008 (if barely) seems to give him about a 55% approval rating. In view of the Blue Firewall (states that have not voted for a GOP nominee for President after 1988) showing no signs of weakening, and other states not in the Firewall showing recent polls positive for Obama (like Ohio), I have no cause to expect anything other than re-election in 2012. Obama will not win Missouri and lose the election.

[pbrower2a]

A bunch of new polls. VA is a big surprise, and it won't be long before polls turn a few states "yellow" or "tan" (NC, SC, SD, TN, AR, UT) should they appear.

The GOP still has plenty of ways to lose, and few in which to win.