It is not hyperbolic to suggest that the future of America’s prosperity hangs in the balance in the next election. But less than a year out from the vote on Nov. 6, 2012, current polling finds 1) bad news, 2) theoretically better news but then 3) the worst development yet.
1. The bad news:
Pres. Obama’s approval rating according to Gallup is now the lowest of the prior 10 presidents at this point in each of their first terms — it is even lower than Jimmy Carter’s 51 percent in December 1979.
You may see spin from sources like this claiming that Obama’s approval is the lowest of all modern presidents. That is not quite true. Obama’s approval is certainly lower than the 55 percent rating George W. Bush, the Worst President Ever, was enjoying in November 2003, but Obama’s approval now is about the same as that of his eleventh predecessor, Harry Truman, at the equivalent time in his presidency. In fact, Truman’s polling went even lower in the months before the election, down to 36 percent, and yet he went on to beat his GOP opponent, Thomas Dewey, in November 1948, in one of election history’s all time squeakers.
(To see comparative trend lines, go here to Gallup’s Presidential Job Approval Center and click the “Compare Presidents” tab.)
2. Theoretically better news:
Public Policy Polling, the widely respected Democratic-leaning shop in Raleigh, finds support for Mitt Romney fading in 13 key states:
You want to know the biggest reason Mitt Romney hasn’t surged at any point in the Republican Presidential race this year? It’s because the more GOP primary voters across the country have been exposed to him, the less they’ve liked him.
There are 13 places PPP has polled the Republican race in October or November where it also did a poll sometime between January and March. In those places Romney’s net favorability has dropped by an average of 15 points over the course of the year.
On average Romney’s favorability with primary voters was 54/25 in these 13 places at the begininng of the year. Now it’s only 50/35. His problem is partially that his positives have gone down but more than that it’s that as his name recognition has increased, most folks moving off the fence have gone into the negative column.
What’s most remarkable about the decline in Romney’s popularity is how uniform it’s been — he’s less popular now than he was at the start of the year in all 13 places where there are polls to compare. And in 11 out of the 13 places that decline in his net favorability has been at least 14 points- the only places with more modest declines are Maine and North Carolina.
3. The worst development yet:
Disgraced former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is rising in the polls — he had a 4 point lead over Romney, 24-20 percent nationwide in the most recent CNN/ORC International Poll — and the beard-strokers in the Beltway are all but certain that if/when Herman Cain drops out of the race, his support will gravitate to Gingrich. But even now, Gingrich is moving up in the early voting states:
Newt Gingrich leads Mitt Romney by more than 20 points in the important early-voting state of Florida, according to a new Insider Advantage poll.
Gingrich has 41 percent support while Romney has 17 percent … The Florida poll comes on the heels of an Insider Advantage poll released Tuesday that showed Gingrich leading by 15 points in Iowa. And a Rasmussen Reports poll also released Tuesday showed Gingrich moving closer to Romney in the former Massachusetts’ governor’s stronghold of New Hampshire. Nationally, Gingrich holds a narrow 2.5 percentage point lead in the RCP Average.
Florida’s Jan. 31 primary comes 10 days after South Carolina Republicans go to the polls, offering Sunshine State voters a chance to add clarity to the race after the traditional early-voting states have their say.
Not surprisingly, Gingrich has a big edge in South Carolina, a tea party bastion, where he leads Romney by 11 points, 33-22 percent.
