Man, that's really low...
In the eyes of the public, Congress is doing even worse than the president.
Public satisfaction with the job lawmakers are doing has fallen 11 points since May, to 24 percent, according to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll. That's lower than for President Bush, who hasn't fared well lately, either.
Bush has been taking heat over the Iraq war, his decision to spare a former top vice presidential aide from going to prison and his desire for an overhaul of immigration laws that critics said would give a free pass to illegal immigrants. His job approval rating in the AP-Ipsos survey remained virtually unchanged at 33 percent.
The 24 percent approval rating for Congress matched its previous low, which came in June 2006, five months before Democrats won control of the House and Senate due to public discontent with the job Republicans were doing.
Just two months ago, 35 percent of the public approved of Congress' work.
That's a 31% drop in 60 days...a pretty dire warning, wouldn't you say? But wait, here comes the part where the press pushes their own narrative:
Poll respondents from both political parties say they're tired of the fighting between Congress and the White House, and want the two branches of government to work together on such issues as education, health care and the Iraq war.
This is what I'm talking about when I say we MUST pierce through the bubble that encircles the Beltway. These politicians read these stories and polls (TPM has the full poll here) and internalize it that their approval ratings will sink even further if they give Bush too hard a time or play the same kind of hardball that the Republicans had no problem playing when they were the majority. It is incumbent upon all of us to make very clear that their approval reading has to do with their lack of action, not fear of it.
