Posted on 07/30/2009 3:26:56 PM PDT by dangus
In 1993, Bill Clinton’s approval ratings sank to 37%, according to a Gallup poll at the time. Yet he was re-elected. Does this mean that Obama can survive his own sinking approval ratings? Maybe not.
The low approval ratings of President Clinton were partly due to an American public withholding judgment on his presidency. Unlike President Obama, Clinton had been elected with a mere plurality (43%) of the vote. Clinton’s disapproval ratings peaked at 49%. In 1996, he was again elected with a mere plurality (49%) of the vote.
In 1994, the Republican party swept into power, gaining 52 house seats and ten senate seats. Certainly, anger at President Clinton’s liberalism helped motivate many Republican voters. Yet Clinton had already recovered his approval rating to 49%. Most generic Congressional preference polls failed to detect a Republican-voting majority. The opposition to Obama is much sharper. Fully 40% of Americans strongly disapprove of Obama’s performance in office, according to the latest Rasmussen poll; although the Rasmussen poll did not exist in 1993, this is likely considerably higher than President Clinton ever would have achieved.
This polling data points to a possible Republican tsunami. That may not be good for conservatives. The Republicans hold most of the Senate seats up for grabs, and need to gain 11 more, for an historic 27 wins. For the Republicans to recapture the Senate, they’d have to win in states as profoundly liberal as New York, California, New Jersey, Connecticut, Hawaii and Delaware. The winners would likely include many “moderates” who would vote with the Democrats on most contentious issues. Conservatives might be better to have 43 conservative Republicans, 5 Democrat-voting Republicans and 52 Democrats in the Senate than to have 43 conservative Republicans, 10 Democrat-voting Republicans and 47 Democrats in the Senate. If the country is to be controlled by liberals, isn’t it better that Democrats take the blame?
Barring a surprise such as a sudden, sharp reversal in the rising unemployment rate, the Republicans will gain plenty of seats to block a Democratic agenda; they only need 40 in the Senate. Conservatives would be wise focusing on winning primary elections and contributing to true conservatives than supporting candidates who are merely “the lesser of two evils.”
I fully agree with you.
The rebound in Clinton’s ratings was due to the Oklahoma City bombing.
When did this kind of polling begin?
That certainly helped. The strong economic growth brought on by the Republicans’ welfare reform, tax cuts and deregulation also helped, but the Oklahoma City bombing helped make President Clinton look like he was in charge.
I’m not sure such a disaster would help President Obama; after President Bush kept up safe for 7 1/2 years, a terrorist attack would likely be blamed on Obama’s weakness. Only a natural disaster would help Obama. Better keep Rahm Emmanuel away from the levies.
With ACORN all things are possible.
What kind of polling? RasmussenReports.com came out around 1999. I hesitate to use other pollsters’ “strongly disapprove” data, because that’d be a little like comparing apples to oranges, since wording is so much more important than when one simply measures approval or disapproval. But NPR’s “strongly disapprove” to “strongly approve” ration has to be at least as terrifying to Democrats as Rasmussen. Only 34% “strongly disapprove,” but only 20% “strongly approve.”
What the article forgot to mention was that Clinton also won with a plurality in 1996. 2010’s senate elections seem analog to 1994. 2012’s election’s analog seems to be 1980’s analog. We all know what happened both times ;).
Good analysis!
The big question is who do the Republicans run? Despite all the blather about Zero's popularity, if the Republicans had run a decent candidate, they would have won. Clinton ran first against a wounded GHWBush. Bush was bloodied by Buchanan in the primaries and Ross Perot ran on a platform specifically designed to steal the most votes from Bush. In Clinton's second election, he ran against Bob Dole, who's campaign slogan was, "It's my turn."
Republicans cannot run lackluster aging party insiders who have no fire or vision. Six months in, there are plenty of reasons to vote against Zero. Can the Republicans give voters a reason to vote for them?
Didn’t help running Dole in 96.
Once Rahm figures out how to work Rove's hurricane machine, coastal residents watch out!
The "hitting the news" part will never happen, at least not in the state-run media.
I am thinking that the Republicans had better come up with a reason to vote FOR them, otherwise what is the difference? If we have Obama care, cap and trade and a left wing “volunteer” army, they won’t have the guts to do anything about them.
What about the House?
Do you have any polls, predictions for that?
No question Juan McCain was about the worst candidate the Republicans could have put up.
It wasn't so much that conservatives were voting FOR McCain, conservatives were voting AGINST 0bama and for Sarah Palin. McCain by himself, certainly deserved to lose.
Clinton may have been reelected but the Dems lost control of Congress and he was impeached. I’ll take an Obama reelection under those conditions.
His Socialist cohorts like Pelosi, Reid, Babs Boxer, Charlie Rangel, Barney Frank et al all must go down with him. They’re all in this disastrous plot together.
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