The Daily Background

Record low both for Bush and Congress according to a new Zogby poll:

President George W. Bush and the U.S. Congress registered record-low approval ratings in a Reuters/Zogby poll released on Wednesday, and a new monthly index measuring the mood of Americans dipped slightly on deepening worries about the economy.

Only 29 percent of Americans gave Bush a positive grade for his job performance, below his worst Zogby poll mark of 30 percent in March. A paltry 11 percent rated Congress positively, beating the previous low of 14 percent in July.

Republicans like to say that “Democratic-controlled Congress has a lower approval rating than Bush!” but of course this argument is quite misleading because if you look at what people disapprove of, it’s the fact that Congress isn’t doing enough to counter the Bush Administration, not too much. I explained the phenomenon of Republicans dragging down overall Congressional approval ratings and then blaming it on Democrats in July:

I’ve always thought “overall” Congressional approval ratings were rather pointless. The only thing they serve is Drudge, so he can print headlines like “SHOCK: Democrat Congress lower than Bush!”

What’s more instructive is to look at polls that break down overall Congressional approval, alongside generic approval for Congressional Democrats and generic approval for Congressional Republicans.

For instance, take a look at the Harris/WSJ poll that was released on July 12th (full results PDF). This was the one that pegged Bush at 26%, echoing Nixon’s low point.

When respondents were asked how they felt about Congressional Democrats, 31% said they felt favorably towards them. Meanwhile, only 21% approved of the job Congressional Republicans were doing. As a result, the people’s overall approval rating was 24%, regardless of the fact that the party that a plurality agree with is in the majority.

Filed under: Z-TDB Blog