President Obama’s Approval Tanks on Economy, Deficit

Flickr/<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/chryslergroup/5794582354/in/photostream/">Chrysler Group</a>

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


That was fast. The boost in President Obama’s approval ratings following the killing of Osama bin Laden last month has melted faster than a popsicle on a summer day in Abbottabad. Now Americans, by a two to one margin, say the nation is headed in the wrong direction, according to a new Washington Post/ABC News poll.

To no one’s surprise, Americans are most pessimistic about the health of the US economy, the poll found. A staggering 90 percent of respondents view the economy negatively, and nearly 60 percent say the economic recovery hasn’t even begun. It’s not hard to see why: job growth is underwhelming, the unemployment rate is 9.1 percent, long-term unemployment (out of work six months or more) is worse than in the Great Depression, youth unemployment is through the roof, the housing market is bottoming out (again), and on and on. So gloomy are recent economic indicators that talk of a full-blown double-dip recession has picked up.

President Obama received equally dismal marks on his handling of the US deficit, with 60 percent of respondents rating him poorly. But here’s the figure that’ll keep Obama’s 2012 campaign advisers up at night: Among political independents, that coveted bloc of voters who play an increasingly vital role in American elections, almost 66 percent criticize Obama’s handling of the economy. Within that independent bloc, a majority of independents “strongly” disapprove of Obama’s economic policies, a first in a Washington Post/ABC News poll during Obama’s tenure.

There’s some good news in the new poll for Obama and his team. Stacked up against six 2012 GOP presidential hopefuls, Obama enjoys stronger backing than five of them. He is, however, tied with former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, largely seen as the GOP frontrunner and a candidate who’s made economic issues his number one issue.

This poll hammers home what was already known: that Obama’s weakness is the economy, and that, barring a miraculous turnaround for the US labor force, a candidate who runs an economy-heavy campaign will pose a serious threat to Obama’s re-election. Granted, as New York Times data wizard Nate Silver recently noted, the relationship between the jobless rate and re-election is “maddeningly inexact”—that is, there’s no threshold or single figure that dooms a president’s re-election bid. But gloomy approval ratings like these and an economy that simply doesn’t work for most Americans right now leaves President Obama with the mightiest of obstacles between now and November 2012.

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with The Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate