Near-Complete Disapproval
With so many news websites and blogs devoted to endless, and largely pointless, discussion of politics (don’t they every learn?), there is no reason for me to add my lousy, ill-informed two cents to that din. So I’ve mostly eschewed politics in favor of things not discussed in other blogs. However, I can’t pass up the opportunity to remark how remarkable it is that both the U.S. President and the U.S. Congress have sunk to all-time lows in their public approval ratings.
President George W. Bush and the U.S. Congress registered record-low approval ratings in a Reuters/Zogby poll released on Wednesday, and a new monthly index measuring the mood of Americans dipped slightly on deepening worries about the economy.
Only 29 percent of Americans gave Bush a positive grade for his job performance, below his worst Zogby poll mark of 30 percent in March. A paltry 11 percent rated Congress positively, beating the previous low of 14 percent in July.
My appreciation of all things political is fairly limited, since my approval rating have hovered around zero for years and I stopped paying attention. Potential for the new Democrat-controlled Congress were always pipedreams, considering how diplomatic and economic factors so far outweighed anything Congress could realistically impact through legislation (which, BTW, is its job, right?).
So it’s with no great satisfaction that I note that the American public seems to be coming closer to my level of dissatisfaction. I wonder if if the minority who approved of things aren’t mostly made up of the top quintile who earned 50.5% (more than half) of all U.S. wealth, as contrasted with the bottom quintile who only account for 3.4%. The superrich have lots about which to be glad.
