JOBS REPORT: +114K, 7.8% UNEMPLOYMENT
Heh:
October 4, 2012
In the midst of a painful news cycle after last night's debate, President Barack Obama received a bright sign for re-election. His Gallup approval rating hit 54 percent, jumping to its highest level since November 2009.
His approval rating soared four points from the previous day in Gallup's three-day rolling average. The last time he matched that came in the Nov. 11-13, 2009 period.
The 54-percent mark puts Obama well above the "safe
" 50-percent threshold for an incumbent's re-election. Obama's highest mark this year came in the sunny aftermath of the Democratic National Convention
, when he reached 52 percent. Then it tanked, and since then it has fluctuated wildly.Here's why the 50 percent threshold is important, per Gallup managing editor Jeffrey M. Jones:
The 50% approval mark is significant because post-World War II incumbent presidents who have been above 50% job approval on Election Day were easily re-elected. Presidents with approval ratings below 50% have more uncertain re-election prospects. Historically, two presidents below 50% in their final approval rating before the election -- George W. Bush and Harry Truman -- won, and three, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and George H.W. Bush, lost.
In the Gallup daily tracking poll, Obama leads Romney 49-45. That was unchanged from the previous day.
cartoon via Democratic Underground
"Obama's overall favorable numbers remained unchanged at 56-44. His numbers with Democrats also remained unchanged at 90-10. But he flipped a 46-54 deficit with independents to a 54-46 positive rating. The post-debate sample included fewer Democrats than the pre-debate sample, which helps explain why Obama's overall rating remained constant even as he did so well with independents.
Again, this is a single poll. But if these numbers hold up in other polls, it tells us that Obama actually won the debate with people in the middle who are what we call persuadable voters. It could be that people recognized that Romney was more aggressive and therefore assume he won the debate, but they weren't personally impressed. Republicans loved the debate because Romney got to use a bunch of their crazy talking points without the usual contradiction. It made them feel good to watch someone get away with that for a change and also to see someone be rude, arrogant and condescending to the president they love to hate.
There's a real benefit to this for Romney. He energized his own troops. He gave them hope. He gave them a reason to keep working. He pulled a lot of people out of their apathetic stupor. Riling up the troops is important and will deliver votes to Romney. But it comes at a cost, too."
8 comments:
If the President seemed "tired and flat" perhaps the media should focus speculation as to the reasons why. Here is my conjecture:
Hours before the debate, an international incident occurred - one that did not get the media attention it deserved.
The Syrian military lobbed artillery shells across the border into Turkey killing 5 villagers. Inasmuch as Turkey is a Nato member and all members are bound by the terms of the treaty, an attack against one is considered an attack against all.
I am willing to conjecture this: Obama spent considerable time that day on the telephone urging restraint among Nato leaders to avoid a larger Middle East conflict. Obama has always been focused on performing his job; spouting "blah-blah-blah" before TV cameras has never been his top priority.
Meanwhile Rmoney has the luxury of sitting on plush and cushy piles of money stashed in offshore tax-sheltered accounts as he prepares for the debate. In contrast, Obama probably spent that day putting out fires.
Although the numbers are encouraging and it is good to see, how can new unemployment claims be in the mid 300k, jobs created in the low 100's and the unemployment rate go down. I know it is October but don't you even find that strange?
The encouraging statistic is job participation was up .1% which means fewer people dropped out of the work force. The jobs participation is now down only 3% since Obama took office.
Guess debates don't matter after all, which is what you said.
What ever Obama's reason for his poor performance (prevent defense, non confrontational , presidential calm) you would think he would have changed his strategy in mid debate, hearing Romney's lies. I cannot understand Obama's poor performance. According to liberals left of Obama, he has never attacked the Republiscums as hard as he should have. Maybe that's part of the explanation.
Today's jobs numbers will help a lot.
Unless Obama has the same poor performance in the next two debates, he will win.
Most Americans are just starting to pay attention now. They may not be aware that Romney was lying, compared to what he has said during the whole campaign. Romney fell back on losing points, like defunding PBS will save enough money to balance the books.
The big decision is whether Americans are ready to eliminate programs like Medicare and Social Security. Half the country seems to say yes. I wonder if they have stopped to think how bad things would be since the crash, if we did not have safety net programs. They should read American history before safety net programs, before they think that's a good idea.
If Obama can give a great speech while his orders to kill Bin Laden were in process, I doubt the Syrian problem was the reason for his poor performance.
@ O)CT(O)PUS I was thinking something along the same lines. Either this incident or a personal issue at home. Having two daughters and a wife I know there are times when my personal life spilled over into my professional life. Clearly, there was an issue. I suspect we will know more and more details in the years to come when another book of his is published.
Blogger is giving me trouble.
I published KP's comment, but can't find it.
Sorry. This happened yesterday with another comment.
I checked all the comments and hit publish. Only skudrunner's appeared.
I'll see where it could have gone. But right now I've got some stuff to do.
My comment that disappeared into the ether simply agreed with O)CT(O)PUS in that something was wrong with Obama. We may find out what it was years from now. Perhaps his immediate family's health, his own, Turkey and NATO. I don't know; but I am guessing something was amiss more than simply "the emperor with no close" theory.
Things like this make the books published by ex-presidents fascinating.
I am seeing a total of six comments (not counting this one) including two from KP.
skud,
I suggest you read this article. It provides some back up for the drop in unemployment. For example, the July and August job growth numbers were revised upward by 40,000 and 46,000 respectively. Also, the household numbers show 873,000 more employed in September than in August. (Yes, that is 873,000 more!)
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