Obama’s Poll Numbers Sinking Like a Leaky Boat

When politicians do bad things, they try to cover them up. That’s just the way it is. From past experience, we all know most of the dirt comes out sooner or later. These things can’t be hidden forever. All they can hope for is to delay discovery.

Just like the revelations of Watergate, you knew all the recent administration scandals and the Obamacare debacle were bound to raise their ugly heads eventually. The president’s dreaded ghost ship has finally come into port.

It was obvious that Americans weren’t buying President Obama’s portrayal of all the Washington scandals as “phony.” In fact the scandals of the IRS to the NSA, along with Obama’s signature legislative success, Obamcare, have crashed the president’s ratings to levels last seen more than a year and a half ago.

Polls, Polls And More Polls

In the Gallup daily tracking survey last Saturday president Obame managed a paltry 41 percent approval rating. That was a very serious 7-point drop from the previous day. Obama’s disapproval rating wasn’t any more helpful to him, either, sitting right at 50 percent on Saturday.

Some may say it is only one poll, but Real Clear Politics corroborated that, averaging the polls. That averaging had his approval at 43.6 percent and his disapproval at 51.1.

Not a pretty sight!

If personal popularity was his only problem, he could treat it like water off a duck’s back, but the economic numbers are actually worse than his popularity. The Real Clear Politics average of polls shows 42.2 percent approve of Obama’s job performance while 53 percent disapprove. On foreign policy, the president garnered 44 percent approval, 47.6 percent disapproval.

Obama’s Real Clear Politics-averaged approval rating sat at 54 percent as recently as December, but it has slipped steadily since then, with a temporary bump in late April.

What more could go wrong now?

Delaying The Obamacare Trainwreck

The implementation of Obamacare is the next cab off the rank, but Obama and the democrats have cleverly postponed some of the things that would have derailed it. The only possible reason that the White House might not be worried is that they don’t care. There are also many unanswered scandals that the president labels “phony.” His opinion is obviously not shared by the American people.

In fact, speaking on a Sunday talk show, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus said members of Obama’s own party are distancing themselves from his healthcare law as they head into 2014.

The phrase “like rats deserting a sinking ship” comes to mind.

As Priebus put it on CNN’s State of the Union, “If this was such a great idea, then all of these senators who are vulnerable in 2014 would have voted for it, and they didn’t.”

The GOP has “total unanimity” on getting rid of Obamacare, Priebus said. It’s the Democrats, he said, who are fighting each other over whether to keep Obamacare in place.

Meanwhile, the mainstream media continues to report divisions within the Republican Party on Obamacare that is without merit as the entire party unites in their distaste for the Affordable Healthcare Act.

Many Republicans from the tea party wing are calling for defunding Obamacare in the 2014 fiscal year budget. Most party leadersfear the electorate blame them if there is a government shutdown to achieve it.

Priebus said that 30 Democrats voted against Obamcare. That means the real division is within Democratic ranks and especially those up for re-election in 2014. He says it is “very obvious” the delay in the employer mandate is about getting Democrats elected.

A Fox News Poll conducted Aug. 3-5 on Obamacare saw 31 percent of respondents say “it’s going fine,” while 57-percent said, “it’s a joke.”

More Troubling Issues

Two other issues that Obama is in deep water with, are the recent NSA intelligence leaks by Edward Snowden and he Justice Department looking at reporters’ records, Fox News pollsters found those two things caused 59 percent polled to say it is a “serious situation.” The same percentage considered the IRS targeting of conservative groups to be “serious.”

Sixty-nine percent of those polled thought the NSA surveillance of Americans was not a “phony scandal,” while 78 percent didn’t think investigations into the changes in talking points on the Benghazi attack were phony.

That is a lot of scandal to go around, that it is almost impossible for them all to be phony.

The president’s strategy is to change the focus of discussion to the economy, but that obviously is not working. A recent poll found that 71 percent of voters say he isn’t saying anything new and would prefer to see him stay in Washington to work things out with Republicans.

Looking back at past performance, we see he prefers to go do something else, rather than do what he ought to be doing.

The fireworks within the American electorate appear to be set to explode with the inception of Obamacare January 1, 2014.

Dwight L. Schwab Jr. is a moderate conservative who looks at all sides of a story, then speaks his mind. He has written more than 3500 national political and foreign affairs columns. His BS in journalism from the University of Oregon, with minors in political science and American history stands him in good stead for his writing.

Publishing

Dwight has 30-years in the publishing industry, including ABC/Cap Cities and International Thomson. His first book, “Redistribution of Common Sense – Selective Commentaries on the Obama Administration 2009-2014,” was published in July, 2014. “The Game Changer – America’s Most Stunning Presidential Election in History,” was published in April 2017.

Location

Dwight is a native of Portland, Oregon, and now a resident of the San Francisco Bay Area.





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