WhatFinger


We wouldn't expect anything better from the AP, but still....

AP Buries the lede as Obama approval plunges to 37% - Mainstream ignores



UPDATE: My numbers below are slightly off. Actually, Barack Obama is polling two points LOWER than George W. Bush during the same point in their Presidencies. Bush hit 39% in the AP/Ipsos poll conducted October 3-5 in 2005 - and that was while the media hammered him with the Hurricane Katrina story.
This morning, the Associate Press released the results of a new round of polling. The data focuses on the impact of Harry Reid's fiasco, as the headline proudly proclaims that "GOP gets the blame in shutdown." Look a little deeper, however, and you find that they've buried the most interesting numbers. Now, why in the world would they do that? First, let's get their premise out of the way. Their report begins thusly:

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Americans are holding Republicans primarily responsible for the partial government shutdown as public esteem sinks for all players in the impasse, President Barack Obama among them, according to a new poll. It's a struggle with no heroes. The Associated Press-GfK survey, out Wednesday, affirms expectations by many in Washington -- Republicans among them -- that the GOP may end up taking the biggest hit in public opinion from the fiscal paralysis, just as that party did when much of the government closed 17 years ago. But the situation is fluid nine days into the shutdown and there's plenty of disdain to go around. Overall, 62 percent mainly blamed Republicans for the shutdown. About half said Obama or the Democrats in Congress bear much responsibility.
So, while most people think the GOP has forced the situation, half of respondents think The President and his congressional allies bear "much responsibility." If I were a Republican advisor, I'd embrace those numbers and run with them. Honestly, they could be a lot worse - there's nothing there that the party couldn't turn around, if it would just take its message to the people and fight. Far more interesting are the AP findings about the Tea Party and President Obama. First, the study shows that the Tea Party is much larger than the left would like you to believe.
The poll found that the tea party is more than a gang of malcontents in the political landscape, as its supporters in Congress have been portrayed by Democrats. Rather, it's a sizable -- and divisive -- force among Republicans. More than 4 in 10 Republicans identified with the tea party and were more apt than other Republicans to insist that their leaders hold firm in the standoff over reopening government and avoiding a default of the nation's debt in coming weeks.
As I've written numerous times before, no Republican candidate will ever win a national election without the support of this base. The conservative wing of the GOP is massive, and growing. Far from being a minute gang of "hostage takers," "arsonists," or "extremists," conservatives make up the core of the party. Folks like Chris Christie and Pete King may as well hang it up now, because they haven't got a prayer. The "4 in 10" have no interest in seeing RINOs land at the top of the political food chain. Couple this with a similarly growing Libertarian-leaning faction - which is generally unwilling to portray itself as aligning with the Tea Party - and you're close to a plurality of Republicans who will stay home rather than embrace the notion of "President Christie." Further down in their story, near the bottom, the AP buries the red meat: President Obama's self-inflicted damage.
Most Americans disapprove of the way Obama is handling his job, the poll suggests, with 53 percent unhappy with his performance and 37 percent approving of it. Congress is scraping rock bottom, with a ghastly approval rating of 5 percent.
An approval rating of 37% is only one point higher than the approval of George W. Bush at the same point in his presidency. Now, liberals will tell you that Bush's numbers fell so low because he was a radical, war-mongering, go it alone cowboy, who "lied" and "people died." They won't back these claims up with any proof, but that's what they'll say. It's a different story for Obama, who's numbers have collapsed due to repeated anti-constitutional scandals, petty tantrums, an imploding economy, disastrous jobs numbers, exploding debt, and a complete inability to lead. The left knows this, but they'll never publicly admit it. They refuse to give any reasonable explanation for his terrible polling other than to scream "racism" and run out of the room. Bush's 36% rating was considered by the mainstream media to be an indictment of a failed President whose administration was completely unraveling. The press was merciless in its reporting as it hammered away at a lame duck who had obviously lost the support of the American people. So far, they're completely ignoring the fact that Obama is now in exactly the same predicament. Surely, CNN, MSNBC, ABC, CBS, and NBC will be reporting the American people's disdain for Obama with the same fervor. Right?


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