rssRasmussen Strikes Back
Friday, March 13, 2009 at 8:22 am
- 11 Comments
The Pollster.com average of President Obama’s approval rating is 60 percent, with only 33 percent of voters disapproving. Scott Rasmussen’s polls are way out of whack with this, giving the president only a 56-43 approval/disapproval rating. How to get taken seriously? A column in The Wall Street Journal arguing that his polls are right.
Polling data show that Mr. Obama’s approval rating is dropping and is below where George W. Bush was in an analogous period in 2001. Rasmussen Reports data shows that Mr. Obama’s net presidential approval rating — which is calculated by subtracting the number who strongly disapprove from the number who strongly approve — is just six, his lowest rating to date.
The rest of the column is a recap of Rasmussen’s other polls, which show the president’s agenda strikingly unpopular. Let’s assume that’s true, and all other polls about Obama are wrong. Why, then, are Republicans faltering in the first competitive race of 2009 — the open House seat in New York’s 20th Congressional District? Why does the Siena poll just released in that race record a 65 percent approval rating for Obama in a district where he only won 51 percent of the vote over John McCain’s 48 percent?
UPDATE: Scott Rasmussen e-mails me to say that his topline polling, the 56-43 Obama approval number, is in line with other polls.
We’ve shown the President at 56 percent to 58 percent approval for the past few days. Quinnipiac, Cook, and Newsweek all have him in the exact same range. A few firms have him in the low 60s to bring the average right about 60. Since we are polling likely voters, you would expect the numbers to be a few points lower than a survey of adults. On top of that, the trend is just about identical in our polls. Gallup shows the President down five or six points since Inauguration Day and so do we.
Still, “down five or six points” is a more moderate assessment of Obama’s popularity than appears in this column, illustrated with a cartoon of Obama hurtling down to earth.
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11 Comments
Comment posted March 13, 2009 @ 8:40 am
If voters aren't happy with his policies then they weren't listening to what he said is his campaigning. What part of Obama's repudiation of Reganomics did voters not understand would translate into the policies Obama's proposing?
Comment posted March 13, 2009 @ 8:41 am
most polls a re liberal leaning, so they would generally favor dems more than rasmussen's unbiased polls. If you examine a lot of political polls over the course of elections, you will see that rasmusseen reports is the most accurate.
Comment posted March 13, 2009 @ 8:48 am
Why? Rass and the WSJ are proven hacks. That is all.
Comment posted March 13, 2009 @ 9:20 am
The bias in the WSJ expresses the joy of Wall Street and those fellows who cheerfully fleeced Main Street with free market up and bailout down (can't lose and no regulation).
No doubt the polls will wander up, down and sideways until the current chaos of being served the fruits of Bush-Republican greed grab settles down into the reality of changed circumstances. No one approves of a reality check and empty ATM, but … that that's just life. We're screwed and we just didn't know how badly until the hype and lies hit hard reality..
Pingback posted March 13, 2009 @ 11:19 am
[...] second week in a row they have reported an outlier in which president Obama gets a 53% approval. Odd that Pollster gives Obama a 60% approval and gallup as of today gives him a 63% approval. With unemployment at over eight percent, some of [...]
Comment posted March 13, 2009 @ 10:20 am
Doesn't matter whether President Obama's approval ratings is really 60% or 56% in the big picture anyway. Undoubtedly his rising disapproval is directly attributable to previously “undecided” Republicans and Republican-leaning independents for the first time expressing disapproval of the President after weeks of separation from the Inauguration and polarizing debate. These people receive informational shortcuts from their like-minded representatives who have been very combative against the President from the beginning, explaining why Obama's disapproval has risen quicker than some past Presidents even as his approval is average for this juncture. This same process explains why approval ratings of Congress have risen dramatically according to Gallup, as formerly frustrated Democrats under Bush are now spirited by their representatives' legislative success, even though Congressional priorities as a whole have not changed greatly since 2006, nor differ greatly from Obama's.
Comment posted March 13, 2009 @ 5:19 pm
I respect the Rasmussen polls as they had it right all through the campaign. I think the rising disapproval rating of Obama is partly a result of people coming to terms with the reality that Obama is nothing more than a far left politician and not the messiah of change and prophet of unity he tried to make himself out to be. I think people are truly becoming alarmed at the unbridled spending of money that we do not have and that will be borrowed or printed. Don't get me wrong, the Bush administration spent tons of money as well but it's pocket change compared the money this administration is going through.
Comment posted March 13, 2009 @ 5:20 pm
Doesn't matter whether President Obama's approval ratings is really 60% or 56% in the big picture anyway. Undoubtedly his rising disapproval is directly attributable to previously “undecided” Republicans and Republican-leaning independents for the first time expressing disapproval of the President after weeks of separation from the Inauguration and polarizing debate. These people receive informational shortcuts from their like-minded representatives who have been very combative against the President from the beginning, explaining why Obama's disapproval has risen quicker than some past Presidents even as his approval is average for this juncture. This same process explains why approval ratings of Congress have risen dramatically according to Gallup, as formerly frustrated Democrats under Bush are now spirited by their representatives' legislative success, even though Congressional priorities as a whole have not changed greatly since 2006, nor differ greatly from Obama's.
Comment posted March 14, 2009 @ 12:19 am
I respect the Rasmussen polls as they had it right all through the campaign. I think the rising disapproval rating of Obama is partly a result of people coming to terms with the reality that Obama is nothing more than a far left politician and not the messiah of change and prophet of unity he tried to make himself out to be. I think people are truly becoming alarmed at the unbridled spending of money that we do not have and that will be borrowed or printed. Don't get me wrong, the Bush administration spent tons of money as well but it's pocket change compared the money this administration is going through.
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