The Official Obama 2.0 Approval Ratings Thread

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

It's been so long coming that people probably believe the recovery is occurring in spite of Obama, not because of him.

Or, they're just not feeling the so-called "recovery." Despite all the recent employment "growth" data, labor force participation has shown no improvement, while the number of full-time jobs declined by 523,000. Most of the jobs that were created were low-wage and/or part-time, so it isn't surprising that this "recovery" hasn't translated into great approval ratings for Obama.

It's worth noting that while the current unemployment rate is 6.2 (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tag/unemployment-rate-june/), including people who would like a job but haven't looked for one recently due to discouragement (which are not included in the unemployment rate) raises the rate to 9.6% (http://seekingalpha.com/article/2299505-the-real-real-unemployment-rate-for-june-2014-9_6-percent), and adding in those employed part-time for economic reasons only gets it up to 12.1% (often referred to as underemployment) (http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf (page 27, U-6)).
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Granted, this number was significantly worse back in '10 and '11, but it is still too high - it was at 7.9% in Jan. 2008, just as the recession was beginning (it peaked at around 17% in 2011) (http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf).

Even though most people don't know what the underemployment rate is, that doesn't change the fact that 12% of the country is experiencing some level of unemployment (the rate is even higher in some states) that they were told they wouldn't be experiencing six years into Obama's presidency (Obama's 2008 promise of a speedy recovery in which un/underemployment would not significantly raise from where they were in Jan. 2009 has not been forgotten by most), and that's what people are witnessing in their cities, families, and neighborhoods - people giving up, people settling for part-time work - and (since we are so far in Obama's presidency) people view it as 'Sure, it's a slow recovery, but it's really helping yet and won't be soon' or 'Sure it's a very slow recovery, but it would have happened without Obama' or even 'bah, it's too slow to even be called a recovery'. Take it all into account, and it's easy to see why Obama's approval ratings haven't skyrocketed.


 


 

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Obama had a boost after the 2010 midterms too, for what it's worth.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Yeah, this is your traditional "YAY!" bounce. One/Two small scale but really good thing(s) happens, a few obama critics join the other side briefly, then jump back a few weeks later when they realize it doesn't undo everything they didn't like about Obama.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

If he kills the Keystone pipeline or closes Gitmo, it'll go up even more.

the Keystone pipeline is popular, actually. But you're right on gitmo.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Obama at 45-49 on RCP. In the "Approve of Obama's Job on the Economy" question, he's slightly better at 46-49. For "Foreign Policy Job Approval", however, he's still doing terrible at 37-52.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

The American People gave the speech rave reviews:



I would not be surprised if his approval rating were above 60% by the weekend.

Nice Sarcasm.

That hasn't happened since 2009. Didn't happen in his post-2010 boost, didn't happen in his post-2012 boost, didn't even happen when he got Osama Bin Laden Killed.

And you don't have to be an Obama supporter to have a non-negative outlook of his speech. I'd place myself in the somewhat positive category.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

And you don't have to be an Obama supporter to have a non-negative outlook of his speech. I'd place myself in the somewhat positive category.

But what about BENGHAZI??!!

Never mentioned it in his speech, so I don't take it into account here.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Obama Approval Rating - RCP Average: 45.6% (50.3% Disapprove)
With YouGov Outlier removed: 46.3% (49.5% Disapprove)

Also "going on the right track" is at its highest point since February 2013.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

If you take out the YouGov/Ipsos outliers from the RCP Average, Obama's approval is at:

46.4/48.7

Even I have to admit that Obama's been on fairly good behavior since the election. He gave way too many veto threats in the SOTU and vetoed Keystone, but aside from that he honestly hasn't done anything wrong between November 5 and now. (I actually support his executive orders on immigration, as much as that may surprise some of you.)

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

I wouldn't include the GWU polls tbh. The sample sizes for the individual states are too small to be meaningful.

He's including them because he likes most of the results (all but the CA result).

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Obama at only 47-44 in Washington State.
http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/2015/PPP_Release_WA_52015.pdf

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Bad news for Obama:

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http://morningconsult.com/2015/06/clinton-leads-in-early-states-but-sanders-popular-in-new-hampshire/

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

Obama having higher approvals in Florida than in Pennsylvania seems odd.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

RCP has Obama at 47/49

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

He's the worst President in modern history

All credibility is lost when stuff like this is said.