Gallup: Democratic Favorability Falls To Lowest Level Since The Question Was Asked Beginning in 1992

In final sum, when public opinion shifts on the Main Question its opinion on subsidiary questions will shift to match that opinion.

I didn't want to link the HuffPo but this guy adds something:

Today's Gallup Poll, "GOP Favorability Matches 2008 Pre-Convention Level," shows the pre-convention favorability ratings of the two Parties going back as far as 1992. For the very first time, the favorable/unfavorable ratios are now higher for the Republican Party than for the Democratic Party. For the first time ever, the Democratic favorability ratio, which has always been within the range of 1.20 to 1.56, is now below 1. It is a stunningly low .83, which is 31% lower than the prior Democratic Party low of 1.20, which was reached in 2004.

By contrast, the Republican ratio is now .88, which compares with the 2008 ratio of .80, which was that Party's lowest-ever ratio, reached at the end of the Bush Presidency.

I think we might look back at this year as the Last Days of Democratic Fantasy. By which I mean this: They simply have refused to acknowledge, publicly but also I believe to themselves, that Obama's economic record, whether it's fault or not, is horrible and something that would lead to an electoral defeat in 8 or 9 runs out of 10.

They're not, I think, merely attempting to divert the public's attention from this fact; they're also heroically striving to con themselves. They're only looking at the possible pathways in which Obama can win, which causes them to posit things like "all Obama needs to do is get the unemployment rate under 8%." They trotted that out last year, based on nothing, except their realization that that was the best he could hope for.

Now that it appears that that won't be happening, they have abandoned this rule-of-thumb. You don't hear them saying this anymore.

And 8% was never the historic line of demarcation between reelection and ejection. Reagan's 7.2% was the highest unemployment rate for any president who went on to win renomination, and that 7.2% is deceptive, because at the time of the election the economy was growing strongly (9% in one quarter) and the unemployment rate was plummeting.

Obama's is ticking up.

The point is, being partisans, and being emotionally invested in Obama, they wish to see Obama win. And that causes them to optimistically consider only the scenarios in which, somehow, an 8.3% unemployment rate doesn't matter.

But there's no reason to think such a thing except the emotional partisan rooting interest of wishing to believe such a thing. There's no evidence for any of this thinking. It's not thinking. It's wishcasting.

The Days of Democratic Fantasy are soon to end. It will soon become apparent that yes, 40+ months of an 8+% unemployment rate is, in fact, a very high hurdle for an incumbent to clear, and it was only deranged optimism that kept the media and the Democrats (but I repeat myself) from seizing on this simple truth.

posted by Ace at 01:31 PM

| Access Comments