Centerfield

The Dems fell farther and come in lower. Heh. Sounds like Americans are getting sick of politicians.

I notice the Journal article has no demographics attached, without which the poll is meaningless.

Rasmussen's daily tracking poll has Bush steady at 43%. Sucky, but much higher than the other polls I've seen of late. Those in which I've been able to see the demographics indicate oversampling of Democrats (or udnersampling of Republicans, however you care to phrase it).

Polls can say whatever you want them to say. And, in many cases, they can say things that just aren't relevant. For example, putting Hastert and Frist in a national poll really says nothing. Hastert will be re-elected or turned out by the voters of his own district. First isn't even running for re-election, so I'm not sure what these numbers are supposed to prove.

The country is in a sour mood and it appears that very few are exempt right now.

Side note...I keep hearing these polls and they cite "the Administration's slow Katrina response, rising gas prices, etc." as the reason for Bush's low poll numbers. Could someone please send the media a note about current gas prices? I'm not sure about where everyone else lives, but I'm paying a full 70 cents less than I was in the week following Katrina. It just amazes me that they get away with continuously harping on a problem that no longer exists at present.

$1.83/gallon this morning.

$1.83????? What heaven! Here in Baton Rouge, $2.39 is still a good price. Does Kansas not have much in the way of taxes stuck on gasoline, Tully?

There certainly seems to be something strange going on.
Although Iraq and the economy seem to be what people rate as the top national priority, the polls took a definite turn for the worse when the hurricanes hit and gas shot up. Those two items could just be the straw that broke the camels back.
http://www.pollingreport.com/

Maybe the Hurricanes just ripped the facade away. Americans like to be in control, or at the very least like to have the appearance that the government has everything under control. Iraq, hurricanes and gas prices may have just scared the {expletive deleted} out of everyone.

18.4 cents a gallon federal, 21.3 cents a gallon state. But we have refineries and oil wells and no smog problem at all, so no "special" blends are needed and there's no real transportation cost.

If I wanted REALLY cheap gas, I'd drive down to the "out of the country" reservation stations of the Civilized Nations in Oklahoma. But by the time I drove there and back I'd have burned up my savings.

Lowest approval ratings during office:

Truman, 22%. Eisenhower, 48%. Kennedy, 58%. Johnson, 35%. Nixon, 23%. Ford, 37%. Carter, 28%. Reagan, 35%. GHW Bush, 29%. Clinton, 36%. GW Bush, 35%.

Well, he's no Truman.

Nice polling archive I will have to add them to my list.

But why was Gallup's data used for every president except for Clinton and W?
Using Gallup's data on pollingreport.com Clinton's lowest Job approval was 53% while W's is 37%.

And I didn't see any demographic data or a break down of what exact question was asked.
I would be very interesting to see what how the question evolved from Roosevelt to W.

I would be too, Bob. I suspect they grabbed the lowest number from an all-poll sweep, or being academics, they worked with what was handy in the library. Clinton's low spot was shortly after the burning of the Branch Davidian compound when the "100 days" were expiring, empty. Monica didn't even compare. Indeed, his high spots were the week he denied "having sexual relations with that woman" and the week he bombed Iraq.

I don't place all that much faith in polls to begin with (having written them) but they are fun to play with.

We've got plenty of oil wells and refineries here, too, Tully. Some of the largest in the country, in fact. But it's still $2.35 today. I heard elsewhere in the state it's a lot cheaper. Some of the price may be due to the vastly increased demand in Baton Rouge from the displaced population.

I'll bet you're dead on target there, Pat. If local demand is even marginally greater than the local infrastructure is set up for, prices go up disproportionally. "Elasticity of demand > 1."

Now Tully, you know supply and demand have absolutely nothing to do with gas prices! **Sarcastic tone**

Pat, that's about what we are paying here in Florida and I consider it pretty cheap. We were paying about $3.15 after the storms hit, so $2.35 is looking pretty good to me. And, yes, the local media is still talking about high gas prices--even those these prices are slightly lower than what we saw during the summer, even before the storms hit.